Learn about the Johari Window, trust, vision, mission, goals, measures and behavior and how they all contribute to the process of strategic organizational transformation in Part III of Mike Kublin’s speech “Strategic Organizational Transformation is a Process, Not an Event”.
You Don’t Need Direct Reports to Be a Leader – Part 2
Learn why leadership is not always about receiving direct reports. Mike Kublin discusses why leadership is not exclusive to bosses. He goes on to share his twelve components to achieving success as a leader, describes the importance of how you “show up”, why your vision, mission, and goals are so important to the transformation of yourself and your entire organization.
You Don’t Need Direct Reports to Be a Leader – Part 3
Learn why leadership is not always about receiving direct reports. Mike Kublin discusses why leadership is not exclusive to bosses. He goes on to share his twelve components to achieving success as a leader, describes the importance of how you “show up”, why your vision, mission, and goals are so important to the transformation of yourself and your entire organization.
You Don’t Need Direct Reports to Be a Leader – Part 1 – How You Show Up & Intro to the Johari Window
We’re All Leaders
In Mike Kublin’s speech “You Don’t Need Direct Reports to Be a Leader” he introduces the idea that leadership is not exclusive to bosses or those with a leadership title. Instead, we are all leaders.
Kublin also reveals that there are 12 components for achieving success as a leader. These will be discussed in later in this video series. But in short, people will learn how to take their leadership to the next level; this series is all about personal leadership. Everything must link with the organization’s as well as the individual’s vision, mission, measures, and strategies.
To Be a Leader We Need One Thing: Passion
Being passionate affects how you show up and people watch how you show up. Kublin notes IT professionals as an example of this point. None of the ideas of innovation or creativity can be implemented without these people, and therefore, how they should up on a day to day basis is critical.
The Johari Window
Using an icebreaker (which can be applied in any workplace) where people share information about themselves to a partner, Kublin illustrates how the “people factor” is so important. By engaging, learning about, and connecting with others, we build relationships and trust, in turn bringing balance and strength to our team.
The Johari window is closely related to this concept. It contains within it four parts: information known to self and not known to self, and information known to others and not known to others.
The intersection of these four areas is important because has to do with how you show up and how others show up.
Information that is known to others and known to self is what is called our “open self.” Great leaders need to open up to some degree about who they are and get others to do the same. Great teams increase the open self.
More Videos in This Series
If you enjoyed this video/found it helpful, check out the next video in this series!
Work vs Life – Why it’s Importance to Maintain a Balance
Maintaining a balance between work and life is very important. Mike Kublin, of President of PeopleTek and Rebecca Staton-Reinstein of Advantage Leadership discuss the epidemic of work obsession and addiction, and it’s negative impact on productivity, innovation, and creativity. What can we do to be more balanced? How do we encourage more creativity and productivity? These are some of the questions that Mike and Rebecca discuss and answer.
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Got EQ?
Do you think leaders must be emotionally intelligent? What about being aware of their impact on others? About how their words and delivery may be interpreted? And, what is our responsibility to expose poor leadership?
Can you imagine a leader in corporate America calling any person a “bimbo” or an “idiot”? How would the staff feel? What would peers think? Would it promote a team atmosphere? How would it play with any partner, vendor partner, or customer? How would the stockholders feel? What could possibly be in a person’s mind to degrade another person? What and why would a person continue to subject people to slanderous rants and raves and then be congratulated because they speak their mind?
If that is viewed as leadership, and strong leadership at that, we don’t want any part of it. We doubt that there is a company on this planet that would tolerate name calling, or allow this kind of behavior to be proudly tweeted around the globe. If it’s acceptable for one person to act that way, doesn’t it give permission for others to act the same way? Regardless of your title, wealth, and known successes, this behavior is unacceptable. Period.
Our thoughts are that a leadership “must” is to give respect and dignity to everyone. Not because they’ve earned it but because they are people. If someone hurts your feelings is there a better way to handle the situation other than throwing around negative terms like “bimbo” and “idiot”? Is this the type of behavior we want to see in our children, our peers, and in society?
Can you imagine what our environment would be like if our bosses called us (or others), dumb, not smart, or slow? How would we feel? We’ve already seen various people downplay this behavior yet they likely would not tolerate it from a co- worker, a friend, or a family member.
All the work that has been done with leadership development can be thrown out the window if we are to view this kind of behavior as acceptable. We think it needs to be talked about. If we don’t, that implies consent/acceptance and that simply is not the case. We need to hold ourselves and others accountable, and speak up, or we are no better than the person who makes disrespectful statements.
We must give feedback in a healthy, honoring, and respectful manner, and it is up to each of us to treat every person on the planet with the dignity and respect they deserve. We strongly support being true to oneself and being authentic, but we must also be emotionally intelligent.
A great place to start is with our words, and our actions.
QwikTip and QwikCoach
PeopleTek’s Strategic partner, E-Coach, specializes in online coaching tools.
QwikTip for Getting Along With Peers
And for those with a QwikCoach license, refresh your existing skills and acquire new skills by visiting the QwikTips library for leadership ideas and techniques.
If you don’t have QwikCoach, it’s an excellent resource for growing your leadership skills remotely that you should consider.
Help turn your leadership knowledge into leadership action!
Conflict and Productivity Costs
Conflict In The Workplace – Have you ever witnessed it, been part of it, or tried to manage others through it? We’re guessing you said yes to all 3!
“For good ideas and true innovation, you need human interaction, conflict, argument, debate.”
–Margaret Heffernan
Conflict is positive when differences are discussed in a healthy manner but can be devastating when the conflict occurs with ill intentions.
Studies show that 2.8 hours per week, per U.S. employee, are spent engaging in unhealthy conflict. This is equated to losses of $359 billion in wasted wages. (Calculated at an hourly rate of $17.95 / hour.) In the September issue of SUCCESS magazine, Emma Johnson provides 11 tips to prevent these losses:
- Recognize that disputes can’t be avoided. Acquire skills to help manage it.
- Step in early. Don’t ignore unproductive differences.
- Don’t just tell people to get over it. Be prepared to step in and mediate.
- Make each person acknowledges the other. Truly listen to opposing points of view.
- Focus on expectations. What exactly are the mutual expectations?
- Tell them to come up with the solution. Empower them and don’t pick sides.
- Assist them in articulating a plan to resolve their differences. Have joint follow-up sessions.
- Skirt instincts to separate the warring bodies. Keeping them apart prevents any chance for an improved relationship.
- Unite them in solving a crisis bigger than their argument. Have them work together on a project/initiative.
- Invest in personality assessments. They increase awareness, understanding, and communication skills.
- Create a process for dealing with conflict. Devise a plan that promptly addresses interpersonal annoyances.
Don’t allow the conflicts in your workplace to impact productivity; instead, use them to inspire creativity, build stronger relationships, and improve the bottom line.
QwikTip and QwikCoach
PeopleTek’s Strategic partner, E-Coach, specializes in online coaching tools.
QwikTip for Getting Along With Peers
And for those with a QwikCoach license, refresh your existing skills and acquire new skills by visiting the QwikTips library for leadership ideas and techniques.
If you don’t have QwikCoach, it’s an excellent resource for growing your leadership skills remotely that you should consider.
Help turn your leadership knowledge into leadership action!
Top 10 Time Wasters
Do you manage your time, or do events and those you work with/for manage it? How often do you mentally have your day planned out, only to have the day “disappear” with most if not all of your plans set aside?
Stop Wasting Time
Tania Khadder says “Time flies when you’re wasting it” and provides the following list of top time wasters:
- Instant Messaging – IMing has a time and place, but in most business situations, a phone call, email, or a face to face meeting may serve you better (and ultimately save you time and improve the likelihood of obtaining desired results).
- Over-Reliance on Email – Email is a wonderful tool to get information out quickly to many people. The down side is you can’t be certain the message was read, or that the tone and information were accurately interpreted. Do you send emails to only those that need to take action or receive an update? How many unneeded emails do you get copied on daily?
- Meandering Meetings – Some meetings go longer than anticipated and accomplish little. Stick to an agenda, control side bars, highlight meeting accomplishments and document takeaways/next steps. Have you ever left a meeting and wondered why you were there or questioned its purpose?
- Short Gaps Between Meetings – Schedule your meetings so that your day is as minimally disrupted as possible. If you have the choice, pick either mornings or afternoons to meet, and leave the other open to deal with daily activities and to work on what’s important to you.
- Reacting to Interruptions – We don’t always have the latitude, but if possible, schedule a time in your day to answer phone messages and check email.
- Ineffective Multi-Tasking – Multi-tasking can impact quality; we don’t listen well, and we may appear inattentive and disengaged since we aren’t focusing on just one item at time.
- Disorganized Workspace – Did you know the perception of a leader lacking organization skills impacts the ability for that leader to be trusted? Enough said.
- Personal Communications – Try to limit checking your personal emails, text and phone messages to your break and lunch time only.
- Web Surfing “Breaks”– It’s great that many have the opportunity to use a computer at work, but similar to personal communications, limit your personal activity/searches to your break and lunch time (if your company allows it).
- Cigarette/Coffee/Snack Breaks – How often do you get up from your desk or leave your office? Every time you do, you lose focus on whatever it is you were doing. Sometimes we need a break to stretch our legs or clear our head, but be cognizant of how many times you allow interruptions to delay what you’re trying to accomplish.
Click here to see the complete article and read Tania’s Khadder’s thoughts.
Your Challenge
Remain focused, identify what’s truly important to you, and have the courage to say “no” to tasks that may be important to others, but prevent you from addressing your priorities and using your time wisely!
QwikTip and QwikCoach
PeopleTek’s Strategic partner, E-Coach, specializes in online coaching tools.
QwikTip for Getting Along With Peers
And for those with a QwikCoach license, refresh your existing skills and acquire new skills by visiting the QwikTips library for leadership ideas and techniques.
If you don’t have QwikCoach, it’s an excellent resource for growing your leadership skills remotely that you should consider.
Help turn your leadership knowledge into leadership action!
Why People Quit
A few months back we shared Joseph Cueto’s top four reasons why employees leave their jobs:
- Reward System
- Management
- Hiring/Promotions
- Too Much Work
This month Dr. Travis Bradberry (co-author of The Emotional Intelligence Quick Book) shares his thoughts as to the top 9 things bosses do that lead to an employee’s exit.
Excerpts include:
- They overwork people. Per Stanford research, productivity per hour declines sharply when the workweek exceeds 50 hours, and productivity drops off so much after 55 hours that you don’t get anything out of working more.
- They don’t recognize contributions and reward good work. Managers need to communicate with their people to find out what makes them feel good (for some, it’s a raise; for others, it’s public recognition) and then to reward them for a job well done.
- They don’t care about their employees. More than half of people who leave their jobs do so because of their relationship with their boss. Smart companies make certain their managers know how to balance being professional with being human.
- They don’t honor their commitments. When you disregard your commitment, you come across as slimy, uncaring, and disrespectful. If the boss doesn’t honor his or her commitments, why should everyone else?
- They hire and promote the wrong people. When managers don’t do the hard work of hiring good people, it’s a major de-motivator for those stuck working alongside them. Promoting the wrong people is even worse.
- They don’t let people pursue their passions. Studies show that people who are able to pursue their passions at work experience flow, a euphoric state of mind that is five times more productive than the norm.
- They fail to develop people’s skills. When you have a talented employee, it’s up to you to keep finding areas in which they can improve to expand their skill set. The most talented employees want feedback.
- They fail to engage their creativity. The most talented employees seek to improve everything they touch. Don’t limit them (or you!).
- They fail to challenge people intellectually. Great bosses challenge their employees to accomplish things that seem inconceivable at first. They set lofty goals and then do everything in their power to help them succeed.
Dr. Bradberry’s findings include what Mr. Cueto stated, and added: relationships, commitment, passion, skill-sets, creativity, and intellectual challenges.
Which of these are most important to you? Are there others you would add as a requirement for the kind of leader you would like to work for?
Let us know!
QwikTip and QwikCoach
QwikTip for Getting Along With Peers
And for those with a QwikCoach license, refresh your existing skills and acquire new skills by visiting the QwikTips library for leadership ideas and techniques.
If you don’t have QwikCoach, it’s an excellent resource for growing your leadership skills remotely that you should consider.
Help turn your leadership knowledge into leadership action!
Accountable and Responsible
Being accountable and holding others accountable is not a new topic in the workplace, or at home for that matter, and is often a struggle for leaders.
What can we do to improve accountability?
- Be specific and clearly identify what was committed to with timeframes
- Obtain buy-in
- Promptly communicate any changes impacting the commitment; escalate as needed
- Seek clarity if a task or assignment is vague
- Make sure our actions (and those of others) support what was committed to
- Address all behaviors and actions that are contrary to being accountable
A culture of accountability makes a good organization great and a great organization unstoppable.
—Henry J. Evans
Henry J. Evans, author of Winning With Accountability, says:
- Accountability is about high performance and not fear or stress.
- It’s about holding yourself (and others) to a standard that improves performance.
- When holding someone accountable we must recognize and respect the power of intention (this allows all staff to hold one another accountable regardless of title or level)
- Continually ask “How am I doing”?
- Set crystal clear expectations
- When things don’t go as planned, ask yourself:
- Where did I fail to clearly communicate?
- Who did I forget to include in the process?
- What solution can I provide?
- What can I do to obtain more information to make a sound decision?
- What could have I done better or differently to improve the results?
And the most important of all: How can I help?
Incorporate the word “HOW” in your daily activities. It sets the tone to achieve desired results, and it’s positive and goal oriented. “WHAT” is also helpful for obtaining clarity.
“HOW” and “WHAT” are magical words that engage possibilities!
As a leader, how are you improving accountability in your organization?
(Excerpts from The “How” Effect by Marla Skibbins, MCC, CPCC and QBQ! by John. G. Miller)
QwikTips & QwikCoach
PeopleTek’s Strategic partner, E-Coach, specializes in online coaching tools.
QwikTip for Getting Along With Peers
And for those with a QwikCoach license, refresh your existing skills and acquire new skills by visiting the QwikTips library for leadership ideas and techniques.
If you don’t have QwikCoach, it’s an excellent resource for growing your leadership skills remotely that you should consider.
Help turn your leadership knowledge into leadership action!
Quality, Change, and Ratings
How good are you at driving change? Do you have a thorough understanding of the wants and needs of your customer, and do you have analytics in place to rate the quality of what you deliver (and do)?
This month Fortune magazine featured J. D. Power, the pioneer for providing auto industries with customer opinions. This concept was initially met with resistance by Detroit carmakers, but the Japanese automakers were extremely interested in having a better understanding of the American consumer and their input on quality. (U.S. manufacturers later became a client because they determined that internal surveys weren’t always accurate.)
Research and surveys have changed throughout the years and are likely to continue to do so, but the intent remains the same. Surveys, when used correctly, provide a vast amount of information. They provide input for decision making, for developing new strategies, for setting goals and measures, and for determining what needs to change.
Not only do you need to understand your customer, you must understand your employees.
J.D. Power’s Leadership Advice
- Be accessible to your employees. He suggests walking around after normal business hours and do a “check-in”. Find out what’s being worked on, ask if any difficulties have been encountered, and ask for THEIR suggestions.
- Hold internal focus groups. Have mixed level employee meetings and be open when issues are brought up; no one is allowed to criticize.
- Hire problem solvers. Don’t limit yourself to hiring experts only. You also want those with “intellectual curiosity” and the characteristics for solving problems.
Power is proud of his impact improving the quality of products and services, and for “customer satisfaction” becoming a key component for success.
Do you use surveys to help drive change and improve satisfaction levels for both your customers and your employees?
QwikTip and QwikCoach
PeopleTek’s Strategic partner, E-Coach, specializes in online coaching tools.
QwikTip for Getting Along With Peers
And for those with a QwikCoach license, refresh your existing skills and acquire new skills by visiting the QwikTips library for leadership ideas and techniques.
If you don’t have QwikCoach, it’s an excellent resource for growing your leadership skills remotely that you should consider.
Help turn your leadership knowledge into leadership action!
Difficult People
How often do you interact with difficult people at work? Consider peers, bosses, business partners, vendors, clients, and direct reports.
Are there any that are “award winners”? We’re talking about those that may be:
- Disruptive
- Antagonistic
- Over committers
- Under performers
- Not reliable
- Lacking accountability
- Finger pointers
- Not accepting of differences or change
- Exhibitors of dictatorial behaviors
“I am thankful for the difficult people in my life; they have shown me exactly who I don’t want to be.”
–anonymous
Dealing with difficult individuals, or rather managing the situation/behavior that creates the difficulty can be challenging but must be addressed (and the sooner the better).
The longer you wait, the more the quality and quantity of work will suffer, as will morale and team synergy. By taking action you will inspire others to do the same, and taking that first step is liberating!
In Dr. Arthur Bell and Dr. Dayle Smith’s book Difficult People At Work, they identify what they call S.O.P’s (sources of pain). They recommend the following actions and considerations:
- Describe what the difficult person said or did. Do not make assumptions; state the observable facts.
- If a complete outsider witnessed these words or action, what is the most positive interpretation that could be made? What is the most negative interpretation that could be made?
- What benefits or advantages will you gain by interpreting the negative? The positive?
- What would you say or do if the interpretation was positive? Are you as willing to speak out about the negative or are you reluctant to address it? Why?
Try beginning with a blank slate. If you find you’re saying “I don’t know why they’re doing what they’re doing” ask the S.O.P. (source of pain) what their intentions or motivations are.
Misunderstandings do occur, and too often we focus on the negative interpretation and not on addressing the situation. Be aware that once we interact with difficult people we have a tendency to over emphasize their negative characteristics, and lose sight of their positive attributes.
Do you know any “award winning” difficult people whose behaviors/actions need to be addressed?
QwikTip and QwikCoach
PeopleTek’s Strategic partner, E-Coach, specializes in online coaching tools.
QwikTip for Getting Along With Peers
And for those with a QwikCoach license, refresh your existing skills and acquire new skills by visiting the QwikTips library for leadership ideas and techniques.
If you don’t have QwikCoach, it’s an excellent resource for growing your leadership skills remotely that you should consider.
Help turn your leadership knowledge into leadership action!