... however, in today's world, it has become a necessity." Unknown
Today, I’m wrapping up my vacation and tomorrow I head back to work. I’ll pay for being gone. When I left the office, I managed to get my e-mail inbox down to zero – it won’t be zero now and it will be a while before I’m caught up. There are some tasks that I let sit for two weeks and I’ll need to get started on them again. I know I have a workshop to lead on Tuesday and a committee meeting on Monday in addition to regular meetings so there will be no easing back into the action when I return.
That’s not meant to be a list of complaints; it’s just the reality of taking time away from a busy job. As a result, many people choose not to take vacation or they only take little bits of time away. Then even when they are away from the job, they spend time answering e-mail and working on projects - not much of a break. People in leadership positions are particularly prone to this behavior. After all if they are gone, someone else must pick up the work and keep things going. This can create one of two worries – either we worry that the work won’t get done right without us or we learn that we aren’t indispensible. It’s hard to know which worry is scarier, so some people worry about both!
Yet the reality is that we all need time away and perhaps effective leaders need the time away more than most. Have you ever been frustrated working on a jigsaw puzzle? Then you get up and walk away for a while and when you come back not only do you find the piece immediately, you can work a large section quickly. It also works with crossword puzzles and anytime you are stuck in a project. Time away, no matter what you do with it, refreshes your vision, your ideas, and your perspective in many ways.
Think for a moment about the word ‘recreation.’ One dictionary defines it as ‘refreshment of one's mind or body after work, through activity that amuses or stimulates’; another defines it as ‘refreshment of health or spirits by relaxation and enjoyment’. But there’s a third way to think about it. When you split the word it becomes re-creation meaning re-newal. And that’s the most important reason to take vacation. It may be hard to get away, it may be hard work when you come back, but to continuing being effective creative leaders, we need to take a break – a real one – and come back renewed and refreshed and ready to do our best work. Vacation as a leadership skill - who knew?
Take care,
Gage
Sunday, July 25, 2010
Sunday, July 11, 2010
I don't know what to write today!
Sometimes as leaders we are faced with an assignment that befuddles us in some way. It may be that we don't really know how to do the task. It could be that we have a lot on our plate and we can't fathom how we fit in one more item. Sometimes the problem is that there is a deadline and that can be paralyzing; other times the problem is there is no deadline and the task falls to the bottom of the pile of things we have to get done. Sometimes I don't have a single idea about how to get started, at others we have too many ideas and can't pick out one of them to focus on.
That last one is where I am today. I have a number of half-baked ideas and can't seem to get any of them to gel in a way that seems useful or even barely sensible. So I have a choice, as I do every Sunday and what I'm choosing to do about it tells something about my leadership style. I'm choosing to admit that I don't know what to do today. I'm choosing to admit that ideas don't flow from my pen to the page every time I sit down to write. In other words I'm choosing to admit that I'm human.
It seems to me that a fundamental problem with leadership is that leaders are afraid to admit that they are human. And there are good reasons for that fear. It's not irrational. There are people who will use the fact that leaders don't have all the answers against them - even the very people who appointed, elected, hired the leader will do this sometimes. And yet I believe that the fact that leaders feel the need to hide their flaws. their questions, or the fact that they don't have all the answers is one of the major reasons that leaders fail. The need to hide who we really are and that we really aren't perfect can result in leaders' unwillingness to ask questions and their inability to seek advice and counsel from people who have differing ideas. This leads to the failures we have seen in the news. On a smaller scale, it can result in workplaces that stifle rather than support creativity, in offices where it is hard to tell the hard truth and, in organizations that are miserable.
If we want to create healthy, honest, creative organizations of any kind, it is important for leaders to be forthright about their strengths and weaknesses. It is important for leaders to make it possible for people to speak the truth. Sometimes, in admitting that we are lost and confused we find a way to lead effectively, we manage to make a difference in our organizations and, as you can read here today, we find a way to complete the task before us.
Take care,
Gage
That last one is where I am today. I have a number of half-baked ideas and can't seem to get any of them to gel in a way that seems useful or even barely sensible. So I have a choice, as I do every Sunday and what I'm choosing to do about it tells something about my leadership style. I'm choosing to admit that I don't know what to do today. I'm choosing to admit that ideas don't flow from my pen to the page every time I sit down to write. In other words I'm choosing to admit that I'm human.
It seems to me that a fundamental problem with leadership is that leaders are afraid to admit that they are human. And there are good reasons for that fear. It's not irrational. There are people who will use the fact that leaders don't have all the answers against them - even the very people who appointed, elected, hired the leader will do this sometimes. And yet I believe that the fact that leaders feel the need to hide their flaws. their questions, or the fact that they don't have all the answers is one of the major reasons that leaders fail. The need to hide who we really are and that we really aren't perfect can result in leaders' unwillingness to ask questions and their inability to seek advice and counsel from people who have differing ideas. This leads to the failures we have seen in the news. On a smaller scale, it can result in workplaces that stifle rather than support creativity, in offices where it is hard to tell the hard truth and, in organizations that are miserable.
If we want to create healthy, honest, creative organizations of any kind, it is important for leaders to be forthright about their strengths and weaknesses. It is important for leaders to make it possible for people to speak the truth. Sometimes, in admitting that we are lost and confused we find a way to lead effectively, we manage to make a difference in our organizations and, as you can read here today, we find a way to complete the task before us.
Take care,
Gage
Sunday, June 27, 2010
"You can not lead where you do not go." Don Ward
A couple of weeks ago, I attended a professional conference and presented a program there. I hadn’t submitted a proposal in some time, but decided that I needed to start again. I’ve realized that if I’m tired of sitting through ‘sit and listen’ presentations on the same old topics, I need to step out there and do something different. So I submitted a proposal to present ‘The Leadership Dance’ even though there was a possibility that no one would show up or like it if they did.
I’ve mentioned this workshop before (Stepped On Anyone’s Toes Lately) and in its full form it takes at least an hour and a half. I only had 60 minutes which meant I would not be able to do the full workshop. Instead I started by explaining the history of the workshop and its purpose of creating an opportunity for participants to experience the partnership aspect of leadership. I explained kinesthetic learning (briefly, it is learning by doing rather than by listening or reading). Kinesthetic learning is an appropriate style for this workshop since there is really only one way to learn to be an effective leader and that's by actually practicing leadership. Then I told them that they were the brave group who would choose to attend a session with the words lively, interactive, and dance in the description and asked them to move the chairs back against the walls.
There was a fair amount of nervous laughter at this point and one person actually left the room, but the rest stayed and were good enough sports to give it a try - though one person told me later he had been pretty resistant to the idea at first. For the next 30 minutes we had a dance lesson and each person had a chance to serve as a leader and as a follower and then we talked about their experiences. Based on their comments and evaluations, participants both enjoyed the session and learned something, so it was a successful endeavor.
I share this story for two reasons. First, when you do something that is unusual, you take the chance that some people will be resistant to the idea. However, while some people will walk away from the opportunity presented, others will hang in there. Of course, those who hang in there may not like it. But that's no reason to refrain from taking the chance. If we can just get past our fear that we'll look foolish or that people won't understand what we're trying to do, our possibilities to be creative, to teach, to lead will expa
nd immensely.
This is, of course, the second reason to share this story. Some participants said they gained a new understanding of leading and following. Others commented that they would now try to find creative ways to do their work. Still others asked for further information about the exercises in the larger workshop. In other words, they were engaged in learning. I've presented the Leadership Dance many times to a wide variety of groups, some of which were very surprised by what they were expected to do. But as one person told me, they may joke about having had to dance, but they remember it and that's more than usually happens after a speech. Learning something new often requires the learner to be a bit uncomfortable; seems only fair that the teacher ought to be a bit uncomfortable sometimes too.
So what are you not doing because it's a bit risky? Is there a time or a place when you might just risk testing out that new way of doing things? After all, a significant part of leading is asking a group to go someplace or do something new; shouldn't leaders be willing to try something new as well?
Take care,
Gage
I’ve mentioned this workshop before (Stepped On Anyone’s Toes Lately) and in its full form it takes at least an hour and a half. I only had 60 minutes which meant I would not be able to do the full workshop. Instead I started by explaining the history of the workshop and its purpose of creating an opportunity for participants to experience the partnership aspect of leadership. I explained kinesthetic learning (briefly, it is learning by doing rather than by listening or reading). Kinesthetic learning is an appropriate style for this workshop since there is really only one way to learn to be an effective leader and that's by actually practicing leadership. Then I told them that they were the brave group who would choose to attend a session with the words lively, interactive, and dance in the description and asked them to move the chairs back against the walls.
There was a fair amount of nervous laughter at this point and one person actually left the room, but the rest stayed and were good enough sports to give it a try - though one person told me later he had been pretty resistant to the idea at first. For the next 30 minutes we had a dance lesson and each person had a chance to serve as a leader and as a follower and then we talked about their experiences. Based on their comments and evaluations, participants both enjoyed the session and learned something, so it was a successful endeavor.
I share this story for two reasons. First, when you do something that is unusual, you take the chance that some people will be resistant to the idea. However, while some people will walk away from the opportunity presented, others will hang in there. Of course, those who hang in there may not like it. But that's no reason to refrain from taking the chance. If we can just get past our fear that we'll look foolish or that people won't understand what we're trying to do, our possibilities to be creative, to teach, to lead will expa
nd immensely.This is, of course, the second reason to share this story. Some participants said they gained a new understanding of leading and following. Others commented that they would now try to find creative ways to do their work. Still others asked for further information about the exercises in the larger workshop. In other words, they were engaged in learning. I've presented the Leadership Dance many times to a wide variety of groups, some of which were very surprised by what they were expected to do. But as one person told me, they may joke about having had to dance, but they remember it and that's more than usually happens after a speech. Learning something new often requires the learner to be a bit uncomfortable; seems only fair that the teacher ought to be a bit uncomfortable sometimes too.
So what are you not doing because it's a bit risky? Is there a time or a place when you might just risk testing out that new way of doing things? After all, a significant part of leading is asking a group to go someplace or do something new; shouldn't leaders be willing to try something new as well?
Take care,
Gage
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Silence is Golden
I've spent the last couple of days participating in a retreat based on Parker Palmer's book A Hidden Wholeness. The main purpose of the work is to take the time to stop, be in community, and listen to one's inner teacher. And there is really only one way to hear that teacher and that is to be in silence.
The retreat was held at Pendle Hill, a Quaker center for study and contemplation. As a result, many though not all of the participants were Quakers and one of the opportunities for participants was the chance to join the people who live and work here in Meeting for Worship. I had never attended a Quaker meeting before, but I quickly learned that it is all about silence. Most of the half hour was quiet, sometimes a person will stand up and speak, but maybe not. There is time for announcements at the end and that is all. Each individual finds their own way in the stillness.
Most groups have trouble with extended silence. We feel compelled to fill the silence even if we don't have something new to add. But there is really only one way to truly listen, only one way to really hear what the other person is trying to say and that is to sit quietly, silently. The next time someone comes to you with an issue, try holding the silence. After they have told you what they came to say, what would happen if you just sat quietly for a moment or two? Yes, it might be awkward for you and for them, but they might find they have something else to say and that last bit might be the most important part of all. Larry Spears, former director of the Greenleaf Center for Servant Leadership says listening is a servant leader's most important skill. Listening deeply requires the ability to hold the silence, internally and externally, to give people time and space to find what they need to say.
So this week, try giving the gift of silence to others and to yourself. You might be surprised what you hear.
Take care,
Gage
The retreat was held at Pendle Hill, a Quaker center for study and contemplation. As a result, many though not all of the participants were Quakers and one of the opportunities for participants was the chance to join the people who live and work here in Meeting for Worship. I had never attended a Quaker meeting before, but I quickly learned that it is all about silence. Most of the half hour was quiet, sometimes a person will stand up and speak, but maybe not. There is time for announcements at the end and that is all. Each individual finds their own way in the stillness.
Most groups have trouble with extended silence. We feel compelled to fill the silence even if we don't have something new to add. But there is really only one way to truly listen, only one way to really hear what the other person is trying to say and that is to sit quietly, silently. The next time someone comes to you with an issue, try holding the silence. After they have told you what they came to say, what would happen if you just sat quietly for a moment or two? Yes, it might be awkward for you and for them, but they might find they have something else to say and that last bit might be the most important part of all. Larry Spears, former director of the Greenleaf Center for Servant Leadership says listening is a servant leader's most important skill. Listening deeply requires the ability to hold the silence, internally and externally, to give people time and space to find what they need to say.
So this week, try giving the gift of silence to others and to yourself. You might be surprised what you hear.
Take care,
Gage
Sunday, June 13, 2010
Giving Up Control
I've been traveling this weekend and I'm reminded again that air travel is a great way to practice the experience of being out of control - literally. When I travel by air, I can't make the plane take off, I can't make it land when or even where I want to, and I certainly can't make my luggage show up at the right airport. It's a lesson in patience many passengers would do well to practice.
So what's that got to do with leadership? After all, leaders are supposed to be in control of what happens in their organizations, aren't they? In fact, one style of leadership is even called command and control. However, no matter how hard a leader might try to control all aspects of an organization, it's not really possible. Margaret Wheatley says part of our challenge in leaders is that we confuse order and control. She goes on to say, "What if we could reframe the search? What if we stopped looking for control and begin in earnest the search for order.... (The) basic shift needs to be from control to order, from a reliance on formal authority and procedures to a reliance on the self-organizing principles of people..."
This means a very different sort of leadership is needed, a kind of leadership that allows others to do their job well without the leader's needing to control every instance of the work. It requires different kinds of training and hiring, most of all it requires communication and great trust.
Trust like the kind we put in airlines. And we know, for all the terrible headlines on one end of the spectrum and petty annoyances on the other end, the airlines actually do quite well. After all, I don't want them to take off when the plane needs maintenance or the weather is really bad no matter how important I think my timeline. And one way or another I've always ended up back home and I had very little to do with it. Patience, trust, letting go of our needs for control, more leadership skills to think about.
Take care,
Gage
So what's that got to do with leadership? After all, leaders are supposed to be in control of what happens in their organizations, aren't they? In fact, one style of leadership is even called command and control. However, no matter how hard a leader might try to control all aspects of an organization, it's not really possible. Margaret Wheatley says part of our challenge in leaders is that we confuse order and control. She goes on to say, "What if we could reframe the search? What if we stopped looking for control and begin in earnest the search for order.... (The) basic shift needs to be from control to order, from a reliance on formal authority and procedures to a reliance on the self-organizing principles of people..."
This means a very different sort of leadership is needed, a kind of leadership that allows others to do their job well without the leader's needing to control every instance of the work. It requires different kinds of training and hiring, most of all it requires communication and great trust.
Trust like the kind we put in airlines. And we know, for all the terrible headlines on one end of the spectrum and petty annoyances on the other end, the airlines actually do quite well. After all, I don't want them to take off when the plane needs maintenance or the weather is really bad no matter how important I think my timeline. And one way or another I've always ended up back home and I had very little to do with it. Patience, trust, letting go of our needs for control, more leadership skills to think about.
Take care,
Gage
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