12 Ways to Get Results Without Losing
Your Soul
Rigged Game?
“You can’t be in last
place!” Joe shouted, and immediately winced as he saw Ann’s exhausted eyes
begin to tear up.
Later in his office, Joe
admitted: “She didn’t deserve that. She’s a newly promoted director working
long hours in a fast ramp-up. The problem is, we’re out of time. The business
plan called for us to be profitable in six months, and it’s been over a year,
and we’re not even close. My VP keeps calling for updates every few hours, and
that just wastes everyone’s time.”
Joe squeezed his temples.
“My people need me to coach and support them, but if we don’t improve in the
next ninety days, none of us will be here next year. Maybe I need to go.”
Can you identify with
Joe’s frustration? He’s been asked to win a game that feels rigged. He feels like
he can’t possibly do everything he needs to. Every time he tries to win, he
ends up hurting people – people he knows are trying as hard as he is.
At this point, he’s not
sure he can win, but if he can, it seems that victory will cost him dearly. He
can feel his soul slipping away every time he loses his temper. It gets results
– but at what cost?
When Leaders Lose Their
Soul
The hypercompetitive post
recession global economy puts frontline and middle level leaders in a difficult
position – expected to win, to “move the needle,” to get the highest ratings,
rankings, and results. Many managers become hell-bent on winning no matter what
it takes, and they treat people like objects – in short, they lose their soul.
This exacts a high price
from managers as they work longer hours to try to keep up. Those unwilling to
make this trade-off either leave for a less-competitive environment or try to
stave off the performance demands by “being nice” to their team.
After years of trying to
win while sandwiched between the employees who do the heavy lifting and leaders
above them piling on more, they give up and try to get along. Inevitably, after
prolonged stress and declining performance, they surrender to apathy,
disengage, or get fired.
The good news is that it
doesn’t have to be this way. It is possible for you to win well and sustain
results overtime. Ultimately, you can blend the bottom line
with the human spirit.
12 Steps to Get Results
Without Losing Your Soul
1. Know Your Own
Strengths
You don’t need to lead exactly
like anyone else, but you do need to be confident in who you are and what you
bring to the table. If you don’t believe in yourself, your employees won’t
either.
2. Stand Up for What
Matters
You won’t win every
argument, but your own confidence and your credibility as a leader grow when
you speak up for what’s really important.
3. Speak the Truth
When you fail to speak
the truth, you undercut your ability to trust yourself.
The most difficult and
most important part of speaking the truth is to be willing to share tough
feedback and deliver bad news – up, down, and sideways. Winning Well means
being willing to tell your boss the project is in jeopardy, to tell your direct
report her attitude could get in the way of her career aspirations, or to admit
to yourself that the way you’ve been doing things isn’t working.
4. Recognize Other’s
Value
Leaders who win well have
an accurate self-image. They recognize their own strengths and they recognize
that each person on their team also has strengths, talents, and ability to
contribute.
5. Admit Mistakes
You might be tempted to
avoid owning a mistake for fear that it will make you look weak. In reality,
the opposite is true. When you admit mistakes, take ownership, and make it
right, you demonstrate strength and people know they can trust you.
6. Invite Challengers
“Mini-me” clones don’t
help you make the best decisions or achieve the best results. Effective
managers invite dissent and welcome diverse ideas so that the very best
decisions can be made.
7. Clarify What Success
Looks Like
In our experience, the
majority of performance problems managers experience derive from a lack of
shared, mutually understood commitments between team members and their leaders.
When you’re clear about what success looks like, you energize your team to
achieve results.
8. Plan to Achieve
Results
Be clear about the path
to achieve those results. What key behaviors does each role perform? How do
they contribute to the team’s results?
9. Practice
Accountability
Effective leaders celebrate
when things go well and they ensure everyone keeps their commitments to one
another when things don’t go as planned.
10. Connect With Your
People
Treat everyone with
respect and dignity, not as a number, object, or problem. When you connect this
way, you build trust with, and between, your people; you listen to their
values, needs, and insights; and you encourage their success.
11. Invest In Your People
Recognize and value the
unique strengths and perspectives your employees bring to the team. Draw out their
talents and skills while helping them minimize their liabilities. Your
employees will know you care about them as people as you help them grow,
becoming more effective and productive.
12. Collaborate
Collaboration is more
than simply working together. It’s an attitude that communicates you are in it
with your people, not apart from them.
Early in David’s career,
a co-worker approached him with a hard truth: “In that last conversation with
our supervisor, she asked about us, but you kept saying, ‘I did this . . . I’m
doing that.’ How about some ‘we’ next time?” Your people are working with you,
not for you.
These 12 steps are a
powerful leadership cocktail that will help you achieve lasting results with
motivated teams – and feel good about the way you do it. What is the first step
you’ll take to begin Winning Well today?
·
Posted
by: Karin Hurt and David Dye
Karin Hurt (Baltimore,
MD) is a top leadership consultant
David Dye (Denver,
CO) is a former nonprofit executive, elected official, and president of
Trailblaze, Inc., a leadership training and consulting firm and co-author
of Winning Well.
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