“The most successful leaders have a clear understanding of what leadership means to them. They are able to articulate this viewpoint to colleagues and direct reports for the purposes of building stronger relationships,” says Pat Zigarmi, a founding associate of The Ken Blanchard Companies.

Zigarmi recently sat down with Chad Gordon of the Blanchard LeaderChat podcast to share a three step process from Leading at A Higher Level the bestselling business book coauthored by the founding associates and consulting partners of The Ken Blanchard Companies.

1. Identify key people and events that have shaped and influenced your thoughts about leadership.
2. Describe your leadership values by explaining specific behaviors.
3. Share your expectations of yourself and of others.

“The process is purposefully thoughtful and requires time to complete,” says Zigarmi. “The first step is to spend some time thinking about people who have influenced your life, such as parents, grandparents, coaches, or bosses. Also, think about key events that might have been turning points for you. Then describe what you learned about leadership from these people and events.”

Next, Zigarmi suggests you identify your core values.

“But don’t just create a list of words. Create a narrative that defines your core beliefs and how they influence your behaviors as a leader.”

“The last step focuses on describing what you expect of yourself as a leader, what you expect of others, and what the people you lead can expect from you. When people know the expectations, you have for yourself and for them, all goals are easier to reach.”

“Sharing your leadership point of view with your direct reports is the ultimate indication that leadership is a partnership—something you do with people, not to people.”

To hear more from Zigarmi’s interview, listen to the LeaderChat podcast and subscribe today.

Organizations are quickly releasing policy statements as part of their contingency response to the coronavirus outbreak around the world. In addition to having well thought out strategies, it’s important for senior leaders to be prepared for questions that will inevitably arise as soon as these policy statements are released.

When leaders are not prepared to adequately address concerns about necessary change, they may inadvertently increase people’s fear, stress, anxiety, and time spent off task. This leads to confusion, frustration, mistakes, and distrust and can result in decreased creativity, engagement, productivity, and ownership.

Fortunately, these questions typically fall into a pattern that senior executives can plan for. Research by The Ken Blanchard Companies has found that people go through five predictable and sequential stages of concerns.

Information Concerns. This is the first response people have when confronted with something new. People want to know what the change is, why it is important, and what success looks like. People with Information Concerns do not want to be sold on the proposed change; they want to be told about it. They need to understand what is being proposed before they can decide whether the change is good or bad.

Personal Concerns. The next response is personal—how will the change impact me personally, how will I learn to work in new ways, will I have the time and who can help me. People with personal concerns want to know how the change will play out for them and they want to be reassured they can successfully make the change. This is the most often ignored stage of concern and the stage where people get stalled most often.

Implementation Concerns. At this stage, concerns will focus on how the change will be accomplished. People want to know that challenges, obstacles, and barriers will be surfaced and addressed, and that they will have the time, support, and resources they need to successfully implement the change.

Impact Concerns. At this stage, the change has “gone live” and people want to know if the change is working for me, my team, the organization, and our customers. Is it worth my effort? People are focused on results and getting others on board with the change. At this stage, people sell themselves and others on the value of the change.

Refinement Concerns. At this stage, people want to know that a tipping point has been reached and that most people are on board and succeeding with the change. They also want to be assured that continuous refinement of the change is valued and they are trusted to lead the change going forward.

When change leaders effectively frame the change, discuss what is and what could be, collaboratively plan the change, strengthen the change by fixing implementation issues and sharing impact, and then entrust day-to-day change leadership to others, they:

• Surface challenges sooner
• Achieve better results, faster
• Build change leadership capability that can be used again in the future

These are important goals right now, as we manage the immediate impact of the coronavirus in our personal and professional lives. It’s also a great roadmap for future change after we get through this health crisis together.

About the Author

Judd Hoekstra is an expert in the field of change management, leadership, and human performance with The Ken Blanchard Companies. Judd is a coauthor of the bestselling books Leading at a Higher Level and Who Killed Change? Judd is also the co-creator of Blanchard’s Leading People Through Change solution.

Dear Madeleine,

I really messed up—and I’m so embarrassed I’m thinking of quitting my job. I yelled at one of my direct reports during a team meeting.

I was very tired because I had been up all night with a sick kid, and I was super stressed because several of my own deadlines were looming. She just kept pushing and pushing her own point of view about a decision that already had been made two weeks earlier.

At first I tried to be diplomatic by saying, “Okay, we need to move on.” But she just kept going: “I think this is going to cause big problems for us; you should reconsider; blah blah blah.” I finally interrupted her and let her have it. In front of everyone. I don’t even remember what I said, but I know I raised my voice. All of the faces on the web conference just looked shocked.

My boss is in Thailand on vacation, so I can’t talk to him. I am beside myself and really need some input.

Lost It

Dear Lost It,

Geez, don’t quit. There really is no need for that. That would be short-sighted and would really hurt your career, not to mention ruin your boss’s vacation. Just the fact that everyone was so shocked makes it clear to me that this is not a habitual thing. So get a grip.

You have clearly broken trust. Here is a great blog post by our trust expert Randy Conley that will give you step-by-step directions on how to rebuild it.

The first order of business is an apology. This will be time consuming, but you need to apologize to each member of the team individually. Ask someone you trust on your team about what you actually said so that you can apologize properly. With any luck, you didn’t call Pushy McPush Push any names, and you didn’t use profanity or obscenities—but you do need to find out just how bad the damage is.

Once you know exactly what you did that was so awful, go to the object of your ire and tell her you are sorry. No excuses, no ifs, no buts. Just “I am sorry. I am really sorry. Please forgive me.” You can promise that you will work hard to do better in the future.

Then do the same with each person who was on the call. You obviously take your job very seriously and are very chagrined that this happened, so I am guessing your people will cut you some slack. We are all only human. Sometimes our pre-frontal cortex, which is in charge of self-regulation, just gives out. On top of being short of sleep and concerned about your workload, I’ll bet your blood sugar was low or maybe you were dehydrated. This might be a good time to review your own self care routine so that you can stay more balanced in the future. You might be able to make some small changes to ensure you never go ballistic at work again.

Once you have properly apologized, you will want to review what made your team member engage in the behavior that put you over the edge. Did you not properly hear everyone out before the decision was made? Or is there an expectation that once decisions are made it is okay to revisit them? This may be an opportunity to discuss team norms around decision making—it sounds like everyone may not be on the same page.

You are going to be fine, Lost It, I promise. Everybody behaves badly sometimes. It’s okay. Apologize, make a few changes so that it doesn’t happen again, and move on.

Love, Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

Want a more purposeful, aligned, and engaged organization? “Make sure managers and direct reports are taking a collaborative approach to performance,” says Susan Fowler, senior consulting partner with The Ken Blanchard Companies and coauthor of the company’s Self Leadership training program.

“It starts with agreed-upon goals,” Fowler continues.

“In my early days as a consultant, I was asked by leaders of an organization to help improve telephone communication skills. I soon realized that the organization wasn’t actually interested in general telephone skills but only wanted to address the mistakes being made at their front desk—especially the negative feedback from employees and customers about one telephone operator in particular. I decided to work directly with the operator on goal setting.

“She had been in her role for a long time but her manager had never attempted to work with her on setting goals—he had only expressed frustration about the complaints. Her service position was primarily reactive and the manager had found it too challenging to set goals for a job where there was little control.

“She and I tackled the negative feedback regarding mistakes by setting a goal to reduce mistakes by 50 percent over the next two months. We identified actions she could take to improve accuracy and customer service. We also asked company employees to monitor their messages for mistakes and to report any customer complaints.

“After a couple of months, I checked in and was dismayed to learn that inaccuracies and complaints had actually increased! We attributed the bad news to the fact that we had brought attention to the problems and asked for feedback. We decided to consider the feedback a gift and began analyzing the data we’d received.

“Together, we discovered that most of the mistakes were occurring between the hours of 2:00 and 4:00 p.m. Pacific Time. When the business day ended in the Eastern and Central Time zones, calls were routed to the California office. The extra volume was too much for one person to handle, putting an unreasonable expectation on the operator and her ability to deal with calls in a friendly and effective manner.

“The data gave us the evidence we needed to ask for help. We asked the operator’s manager to put a second person at the switchboard for those two hours. Two months later, the operator had not only achieved but exceeded her goal,” says Fowler. “It was a simple solution—but without a collaborative goal-setting approach, we never would have understood the underlying cause of her poor performance. She would have continued to get negative feedback—and maybe lost her job.”

That’s why Fowler is so adamant about approaching goal setting as a joint responsibility where managers and team members work together to clarify expectations, identify challenges, and develop a plan for accessing the resources each person needs to succeed.

“Managers and direct reports need to sit down and talk about what it would look like if each of them were doing the best possible job. It is a rich, deep conversation that clarifies expectations on both sides about what the job is and how they can work together to create alignment in a way that is effective, engaging, and worth pursuing.”

Rethinking SMART goals

Fowler says this type of approach requires tweaking the SMART goal criteria used in most organizations.

“Most people know SMART as specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and trackable. At Blanchard, we recommend changing the M to motivating.”

Fowler explains that if managers don’t explore a team member’s motivation and create a way for each individual to connect their work to personally meaningful values, the manager ends up having to hold them accountable.

“Managers who focus on only being specific and measurable in goal setting end up spending their time holding people accountable. Why? Because the goals weren’t personally inspiring to the direct report. Help people be accountable so you don’t have to hold them accountable.”

Fowler teaches managers to make sure they have a conversation with each direct report where they explore the individual’s self motivation to achieve each goal. This ensures the person’s motivation isn’t dependent on external factors they can’t control.

“When someone can connect a goal to their personal values, the result will be a person who is accountable—because they have clarified, negotiated, or reframed the goal in a way that is personally meaningful and important. That’s a key learning objective in our Self Leadership program. We teach individual contributors that when they are given a goal, it is their responsibility to:

• Clarify the goal if it is unclear
• Negotiate if they don’t believe the goal is fair or relevant to their job
• Reframe a goal if it’s not personally compelling or in line with their values or sense of purpose

“Working collaboratively to clarify, negotiate, or reframe goals sets up a joint accountability between manager and direct report that leads to goal achievement.”

From goal setting to goal achievement

Clear goals set the stage and make it easier for the manager to provide the appropriate levels of direction and support a person needs to get the job done, says Fowler.

“The reality is that most managers have their own work goals at the same time they are managing the work of others. I’m always surprised when organizations expect managers to be aware of what is going on inside the heads of every one of their direct reports while they are each working on their different tasks.  We know from experience that even our loved ones—the people we are closest to—often don’t know what we are thinking. Why would we expect managers to know what each of their direct reports is thinking?

“At Blanchard, we teach managers and direct reports how to use a shared language to describe the four stages of development everyone goes through when presented with a new goal or task. This ranges from enthusiastic beginner when someone is just starting out, through the motivational dip we describe as disillusioned learner, to capable, but cautious contributor as they build competence and commitment, and finally, to self-reliant achiever when they’ve mastered the task.

“When managers and direct reports have a shared understanding of development levels, it provides them with a means to have effective conversations every step of the way. Now a person can go to their manager and say, ‘I’m at the D1 level of development (or the enthusiastic beginner stage) on this goal. I’m excited about the challenge but since I’ve never done it before, I need direction from you.’”

A shared language also makes it easier for the manager to respond appropriately and more effectively, says Fowler.

“If an individual needs direction, a manager can immediately provide it or find a resource that can. This same shared language can make it easier for a manager to say, ‘I don’t know how to do that either—let’s find a resource for you.’

“When goal achievement is pursued as a collaborative responsibility, it gives the manager permission to talk about other resources and ways of getting the team member what they need.”

An important twist when engaging in one-on-ones

One additional recommendation Fowler has for managers is to share ownership of one-on-one meetings.

“A lot of people think the one-on-one should be driven by the manager.  What we’re saying is that the agenda for the one-on-one should be directed by the direct report. If the manager is leading the one-on-one, it’s pretty hard to distinguish it from other kinds of performance management discussions, such as goal setting or feedback conversations. When the direct report sets the agenda, they are saying, ‘I understand this is my goal. Here is the progress I’m making and here is what I need, either from you or from another resource, to keep moving forward.”

A key skill for today’s successful organizations

Fowler encourages leadership, learning, and talent development professionals at companies of all sizes to consider how they can bring a more collaborative approach to leadership in their organizations.

“In the last 15 years I have seen a tremendous increase in research that identifies the importance of self leadership. In fact, increasing the proactive behavior of individual contributors has been identified as the single most important ingredient for the success of organizational initiatives.

“Teaching people how to use a shared language to self diagnose and partner with their managers is a great way to get started. It creates an engaging and motivating environment for the individual and helps the manager and the entire organization move forward more quickly to succeed.

“Don’t delay—start using a more collaborative approach today!”

____________________________________________________________________________

Would you like to learn more about taking a collaborative approach to performance management? Join Susan Fowler for a free webinar!

Partnering for Performance: 3 Ways to Help Your Managers and Direct Reports Collaborate to Achieve Goals

March 27, 2019 / 9:00 a.m. Pacific / 12:00 p.m. Eastern / 4:00 p.m. UK Time / 4:00 p.m. GMT

If you are a leadership, learning, or talent development professional, you know that it takes two to optimize performance—the manager and the direct report. As their leader, your dilemma is how to encourage and facilitate the crucial relationship between the two.

In this webinar, bestselling business author Susan Fowler shares how you can promote a collaborative approach to performance management that has been proven to get results with high levels of engagement. Fowler reveals the latest research-based strategies on self motivation and how to combine it with the time-tested principles of Situational Leadership® II (SLII®)—the most widely-taught leadership development model in the world.

Participants will learn how to position performance management as a joint responsibility—with managers and direct reports working together to make sure they set clear, motivating goals and effectively diagnose competence and commitment on key tasks so that everyone has what they need to succeed.

You will explore how to help managers and team members:

• Take a top-down, bottom-up approach to SMART goal setting with a focus on motivation and task competence
• Build mutual accountability for achieving agreed-upon goals
• Take a situational approach to performance management where direct reports self diagnose their development level and ask for the direction and support they need to succeed

Fowler will share how this joint approach achieves outcomes faster, more efficiently, and with a greater sense of engagement. It’s a 1+1 = 3 approach that yields much better results than when managers and direct reports work independently.

Don’t miss this opportunity to get your managers and direct reports collaborating for goal achievement!

Use this link to register today!

“Every time, in more than six years of asking that question, almost every hand would go up,” says Rognlien. “Then I would tell them, ‘Great, now it’s your responsibility not to mess it up.'”

In his new book, This Is Now Your Company: A Culture Carrier’s Manifesto, Rognlien shares that every person must own their contribution to the organizational fabric of a company, no matter what role they are stepping into. It begins by owning your role.

“If the definition of culture is the sum total of all of our behaviors, then you can start tipping the culture in another direction by changing your behavior.”

To help with that, Rognlien suggests organizational leaders encourage higher quality conversations between managers and direct reports. He says most companies don’t have an environment that allows people to sit down with their managers and ask, “How are we going to get through this together?”

Rognlien describes this relationship as a 50-50 partnership, meaning the direct report has just as much responsibility for clear goals and performance feedback as the manager.

“You are half the relationship. If you know more about something, or if something specific requires special care or attention, then you’d better be willing to have that conversation.”

Rognlien goes on to discuss personal branding, feedback, and leveraging your strengths. He closes the interview by discussing a hot topic in today’s organizations—unconscious bias. He explains that bias exists in every organization—and that some biases can actually be helpful and support organizational values.

“At Facebook, for example, we had a bias for moving quickly. When interviewing or working at Facebook, if you were moving slowly, you would feel it—the bias for speed was ever present. That’s an example of a conscious bias that is useful and has served Facebook well.”

Rognlien explains that the unconscious form of bias accumulates over time without being recognized and it can lead organizations to act in ways that go against stated values. While he believes organizations can’t completely eliminate bias, he suggests steps can be taken to bring it out into the open.

“Our goal is to create people and organizations who are comfortable talking about unconscious bias. We have to stop being afraid and we need to have those conversations.”

In closing, Rognlien encourages listeners to step into their fears.

“The only way you will know if something isn’t going to work is to try and fail. If you can learn something from it, was it really a failure?”

Be sure to listen through to the very end of the session, where Ken Blanchard shares his key takeaways from the interview!

Basically, skill acquisition of the new and the better is expected by the sponsoring organization.

But what executive coaches have always known is what Ken Blanchard and Renee Broadwell zero in on in their new book, Servant Leadership in Action: leaders need support to look at what they need to eliminate from their behavior. This radical assessment is a critical first thing to address on the path to effective leadership.

In examining the impediments to true leadership, Blanchard states that the essential problem is the leader’s ego, and a preoccupation with how one is perceived. Specifically, he identifies the leadership-limiting implications for leaders as either over-promoting or over-protecting themselves.

Executive coaches resoundingly agree with you, Ken Blanchard!

Truly effective leaders are focused on the needs of those they are leading, which is what Ken calls servant leadership. Working with a coach can expand a leader’s focus from narrow and self-centered to include and, in fact, prioritize a focus on the needs of others. This requires a priority step in the coaching process of the leader’s honest assessment of the extent to which they are over-promoting or over-protecting themselves.

A great coach will “hold the mirror” for the leader, and ask them to honestly answer questions such as:

• What have you learned about yourself recently that was surprising?
• What other surprises could be waiting for you?
• What do you do when you hear something new about yourself that you do not like?
• What do you most fear people will discover about you?
• What do you most want people to know about you?
• What does it cost you when you behave in ways that you do not understand and cannot control?
• What is the significance of a leader in the life of an employee?
• If you were exactly the leader you wanted to be, what would be the difference between that image and who you are right now?

Coaching questions like this ask executives to consider the role of ego in their behaviors. With honest self-assessment, the leader can see where false pride or self-doubt have derailed their effectiveness.

With increased knowledge of self, the mirror can be replaced by a window and the gaze of the leader can confidently focus on the needs of others. Expanding skills and leveraging underused strengths is possible now, as the leader’s focus is off of their ego maintenance and on to meeting the needs of their followers and the organization.

Editor’s Note: Would you like to learn more about implementing a servant leadership mindset and skill set in your organization? Join Ken Blanchard for a free online Servant Leadership in Action Livecast on February 28!

Blanchard will host 20 authors, CEOs, and thought leaders from all walks of life as they discuss strategies and offer encouragement for leadership, learning, and talent development professionals interested in discovering more about servant leadership concepts.

The event is free, courtesy of Berrett-Koehler Publishers and The Ken Blanchard Companies. Learn more here! 

About the Author

Mary Ellen Sailer, Ed.D., is a Coaching Solutions Partner with The Ken Blanchard Companies’ Coaching Services team. Since 2000, Blanchard’s 120 coaches have worked with over 15,000 individuals in more than 250 companies throughout the world. Learn more at Blanchard Coaching Services. And check out Coaching Tuesday every week at Blanchard LeaderChat for ideas, research, and inspirations from the world of executive coaching.

Dear Madeleine,

Can you clear something up for me? I have been told by a former coach and others that I need to be more “authentic.” But I have also just received feedback in a performance review that I am too brusque, condescending, and cold. And if one more person tells me they are intimidated by me, I am going to scream.

True, I’m not warm and fuzzy—I never have been and never will be. I am extremely analytical and I do tend to cut to the chase whenever possible. I get an amazing amount of work done, I always hit my goals, and people come to me for answers. And yet, it appears that my direct reports and some peers want me to be nicer.

So which is it? Should I just go ahead and be authentic? Or should I try harder to be nice?

Confused and Fed Up

Dear Confused and Fed Up,

Oh, how I loathe the exhortation to be authentic. There are simply too many individual interpretations of what that word actually means.

All kinds of agendas are behind the call for authenticity, but the only one I agree with is that we all need to avoid trying to be something we’re not at the risk of being seen as fake or insincere.

I completely understand your confusion, so let’s clear this up: You should be as much yourself as possible—but the best possible version of it—and never totally yourself. And in your case, smile a lot more than is natural.

The key is to observe yourself. Reflect on what your true self really is and what behaviors are most natural to you. Then pay attention to what others are most comfortable with and regulate your natural behavior to the extent possible to increase their comfort level. This is called Emotional Intelligence—and the more you practice, the better you will get at it.

For a little more depth, I recommend a deep dive into understanding personality types so that you can figure out how you are different from other people, why it matters, and what to do about it. Here are a few resources:

David Keirsey on personality types

Linda Berens’ work on Temperament Theory

Jim Harden and Brad Dude’s What Makes You Tick

For example, I suspect you will find you have a dominant temperament that Keirsey calls Rational. It is driven by core psychological needs to achieve mastery, self-control, knowledge, and competence.

Your gifts of being an excellent systems thinker, a natural problem solver, and someone generally unaffected by regular conventions have a shadow side. People who are not like you (approximately 93 percent of the world) may perceive you as cold, unemotional, and condescending.

It would indeed be very inauthentic for you to try to be warm and fuzzy, but there is an argument to be made for being polite, which is simply a discipline, and kind, which may be more of a stretch and will require fairly intense self-regulation.

To avoid being fake, use your analytical skills to investigate each of your colleagues and pinpoint something to admire and thus a reason to respect them. Find something to care about for each person you work with by using your considerable intellect to put yourself in their shoes. And remember, it takes all kinds.

Do tell the truth as you see it—just not the way you are hearing it in your head. You will have to translate your thoughts; e.g.: “Good grief, that is the stupidest idea I have ever heard,” to something like “another idea might be to…”.

The good news is that you can leverage your drive for mastery and competence to become easier to get along with, without having to fundamentally change who you are—which is good, because that isn’t possible. The bad news is that it will require some effort on your part. And the other bad news is that we are all going to have to hear more about authenticity in the future.

Love, Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

For Blanchard, servant leadership isn’t just a book or a nice-to-have management concept.  Instead, he sees it as a movement—a shift from leadership that is self-focused to one that is others-focused.

“The world is in desperate need of a new leadership model. Too many leaders have been conditioned to think of leadership only in terms of power and control. But there is a better way to lead—one that combines equal parts serving and leading.”

For this new book, Servant Leadership In Action, Blanchard invited more than 40 leaders from all types of organizations to share their experiences putting servant leadership concepts to work.

Blanchard points to companies like Southwest Airlines, Synovus Financial, WD-40 Company, and Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen as companies who have used servant leadership principles to build strong internal cultures that bring out the best in people in service to customers.

Blanchard also shares stories of his own servant leadership journey, tracing it back to a meeting with Robert K. Greenleaf, who first coined the term “servant leadership” back in the early 1970s.

Blanchard believes that servant leaders are constantly trying to find out what their people need to perform well and to live according to their organization’s vision. Rather than wanting people to please their bosses, servant leaders want to make a difference in their employees’ lives and in their organizations. In top organizations, leaders believe if they do a good job serving their employees and showing they truly care about them, the employees will, in turn, practice that same philosophy with customers.

Dear Madeleine,

I am a fairly new marketing manager for a large consumer goods firm. I have three great people who work for me—I inherited them, so I lucked out. We function like a well-oiled machine.

The problem is my boss. She was promoted about two years ago and now oversees several managers of different teams. She has always been a great boss and excellent work partner. She is smart, creative, and talented—everybody acknowledges that. However, over the last year she has become progressively more difficult. I send her drafts for feedback and she doesn’t get back to me until way after the agreed upon deadline, if at all.

Because our pieces are always part of something larger, we often have to submit our work without her feedback. But then she gets upset and wants to make changes, which puts the whole marketing department in an uproar. On top of everything else, her feedback is often inconsistent with what she had said she wanted in the first place.

I know she has a lot on her plate and is probably overwhelmed, but this situation is causing serious stress for me and my team.

Boss Acting Weird

Dear Boss Acting Weird,

You are probably right about your boss having too much on her plate and being overwhelmed. Being a senior marketing leader is a massive job. The field has become complicated and consumer goods is a fiercely competitive area. In addition, it sounds as if she might have something going on at home or with her health that she isn’t talking about. I hate to speculate, but this is usually the reason dependable people suddenly change their pattern.

So first, I would say: cut her some slack.

Second, because of your long history together, I think you owe it to your boss to ask for a one-on-one and share your concerns with her. If no one is giving her feedback, she may think she is coping better than she actually is. This plan, of course, is risky. Practice what you might say to make sure you don’t sound critical—no one likes to be criticized. Stay focused on events that have transpired and the effect they have had on your team. Be clear and concise and don’t repeat yourself. Tell your boss that you are sharing with her not to complain but because you thought she would want to know.

You may choose to do nothing, but that would be easier to do if you were the only one who was suffering. Ah, the joys of leadership. At the risk of repeating myself in every column, communication is almost always the solution, and in this case it will uncomfortable but will most probably pay off.

Love, Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

Dear Madeleine,

I recently found, left behind on the photocopier, a list of performance evaluations, pay, and bonuses for all of my coworkers.

Turns out new hires are being brought in at substantially higher pay and bonuses than what the old timers are getting. Also, a person who is universally viewed as a total slacker is getting paid more than some of the really good employees, including me.

I have been here several years and am well regarded—but I am in the middle of the heap in terms of salary, not near the top where I would expect to be. Now I am wondering why I bother spending all of those extra hours, nights, and weekends going the extra mile.

 I am tempted to pass this information around so everyone knows about this injustice, which seems to be borderline unethical. I am also considering just quitting and finding a job where I am truly valued for my talent and hard work.

Should I hit print and spread the word? Should I meet with my boss and demand a raise? Should I quit?

Really Ticked Off

Dear Really Ticked Off,

It can be painful, stumbling over an unpleasant truth. And my response may not make you feel better, so buckle up.

First some questions: did your company ever promise to be transparent about salaries? Did it ever promise that salaries would be commensurate with talent and effort? Does the organization pride itself on being a meritocracy?

No. No. And No.

Some more modern companies do promise this, so if you stumbled over this kind of information at Qualtrics or Buffer, for example, you would be right to be furious and self righteous about it and you would foment a revolt.

However, it appears that you work for a fairly normal organization, where salaries for similar job titles and roles fall within a wide band. The reason executives don’t want the natives talking about salaries is because compensation is usually unjust. Why?

• People who negotiated for a higher salary in their very first job will have a huge advantage by the time they get to their third or fourth gig. Men in particular tend to negotiate at every step of their career. It can add up to more than million dollars over a career. It might be maddening, and feel unfair, but all it really means is that nobody gets what they deserve, they get what they negotiate.
• Newer employees are probably getting paid more because it is what marketplace benchmarks are dictating. The organization will pay whatever it needs to acquire new talent and grow headcount as required in the moment.
• Perhaps there is shortage of talent in your geographical area, or of people with the desired skill and experience set at this particular time. This will benefit you if you want to look for a job elsewhere.

If you are in the middle of your pay band, it is probably because you have not negotiated your salary at every step, that you have settled for what you were offered, possibly even from your first job out of school. I am sure your employers are delighted to have such a hard worker for such a reasonable price. Put yourself in your boss’s shoes – he or she is managing a budget and is always looking for ways to trim. I hate to say it, but as a manager, I will pay as little as an employee will tolerate, because it helps my budget, and might even mean I can afford an extra person. Don’t tell anyone.

On the ethics question I would offer the following: consider the repercussions of sharing information you found on the copy machine. What could happen? Possibly the careless person responsible could be fired. How would make you feel? It could unleash chaos; if everybody revolted and demanded a higher salary it could tank the budget and result in a layoff. Would that be a good thing? One of the best ways to parse an ethical question comes from the book Ken Blanchard wrote with Norman Vincent Peale, The Power of Ethical Management. Would you be pleased to see the story of what you have done pop up as the lead story on Google news? If you say “No!” you have your answer. A good rule of thumb when you think something is borderline is to err on the side of caution.

Once you have considered all of this perspective, if you still feel strongly about it, go talk to your boss. I would say that “demanding” is probably not the best approach, but do be prepared to negotiate hard. Read up on negotiation tips—the internet is bursting with them. Practice with a friend before going in so you feel confident. Also, it would give you leverage to have an offer on the table from a competitor for the salary that feels fair. If your boss agrees with your assessment of your value, great—he can match the offer. If not, you can leave knowing that you used serendipitous information to bravely and ethically stand up for yourself.

Love,

Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

Step 1: What is the goal? What outcomes do you want coaching to achieve? Is a behavior change required? Is a shift in thinking necessary? What exactly has to change? Being specific about outcomes is surprisingly hard for people. Earlier this year, we worked with an organizational sponsor to set up coaching for an executive. When we asked the desired outcome, the sponsor replied, “I’ll know it when I see it.” Needless to say, the target was constantly changing. Coaching is an exploratory process but it must be done with a clear target in mind.

Step 2: Prepare the person to be coached. This includes going over a set of expectations prior to the launch of coaching. Be sure to include expectations around feedback. Share that requests for behavior change will be made in a clear and specific manner along with discussions that ensure feedback is understood and acted upon. Discuss how to create the space for the person being coached to reflect how they might best use coaching and what outcomes they want to achieve.

Step 3: Stick with it. Discuss follow-up. Organizations often expect overnight results. Coaching does not replace the need for internal organizational support—in other words, the manager of the person being coached is not off the hook. In fact, this is a time for the manager to step up, lean in, and follow through. Set up a plan to recognize and acknowledge the growth of the coachee and then support that growth with positive and specific feedback.

Step 4: Gather success stories. Ensure your coaching interventions have some method or process to capture the successes brought about by coaching. Use a post-coaching interview process to capture the changes made and their impact on not only the person being coached but also those around her. Help the coachee to link those successes to business strategies or imperatives. Document the successes and leverage them as a way to influence others to take advantage of coaching.

Coaching will have an impact on people who engage in the process. Careful thought, planning, and follow-through can dramatically increase the effectiveness of coaching, which will pay off a hundred fold in your organization.

About the Author

Patricia Overland is a Coaching Solutions Partner with The Ken Blanchard Companies’ Coaching Services team.  Since 2000, Blanchard’s 150 coaches have worked with over 14,500 individuals in more than 250 companies throughout the world. Learn more at Blanchard Coaching Services. And check out Coaching Tuesday every week at Blanchard LeaderChat for ideas, research, and inspirations from the world of executive coaching.

I once conducted interview-based 360-degree assessments with three executives in the automotive industry.

Coming in as a third party consultant, I perceived a cautious skepticism from the leaders under review.

I decided, right at the onset, to create an environment conducive to their learning from the feedback they would be receiving. My goal was to help them be receptive to the comments and to avoid the thought that often comes by default when reading negative feedback: Who could have said that?

My clients and I worked together during the first meeting and agreed to navigate the process while bearing in mind the following three principles:

1. The feedback you will receive is not you. It is how others observe you. As Ken Blanchard and Spencer Johnson discuss in their book The New One Minute Manager®, when giving negative feedback—a re-direct, as they call it in the book—you want to get rid of the bad behavior but keep the good person. As soon as I said this to my clients, their sense of relief was noticeable even over the phone. I even pictured them nodding in agreement as they thought about the separation between who they are and how others may perceive their behaviors. I could feel them becoming more relaxed as they began to open up and ask vulnerable questions.
2. Intention + observable behaviors = impact. I developed this equation as a simple illustration for myself and others of how, by aligning our observable behaviors with our intention, we can generate the impact we desire. Interestingly, after I shared this equation, the leaders identified on their own the behaviors they needed to improve to increase their impact and performance.
3. Don’t waste energy trying to identify who said what. Although the 360-degree assessment is a tool for development, not for performance review, it is natural to respond with some emotion when receiving the feedback. It often triggers a fight-or-flight response. To help my clients avoid worrying about who said what, I asked them to focus instead on thinking: If this feedback were true, what could I learn from it? The leaders found this thought very liberating. They realized the exercise was not about finger-pointing. This way of thinking reassured them that the process was for them to learn about and become aware of areas for improvement.

After looking at the feedback with these principles in mind, the leaders expressed their enthusiasm for the process and saw it as an opportunity to further develop their leadership skills. Because of their positive attitude, the debriefs went smoothly—even though the feedback included acknowledging some hard truths.

One client stated, “This has been the best feedback exercise I’ve experienced. I now know the behaviors I need to work on when crafting my development plan.”

I have used and shared these three principles with many clients, with great results. I’m certain you’ll find similar success in feedback sessions you are facilitating. Have you used similar principles in the past? Try it! And please share your experiences in the comments section.

About the Author

Antonio Estrada, MBA, Engineer and Certified Professional Coach is a member of Blanchard Coaching Services network of executive and leadership coaches.  Since 2000, Blanchard’s 130 coaches have worked with over 14,500 individuals in more than 250 companies throughout the world. Learn more at Blanchard Coaching Services.

Building on the concepts he first explored in his best-selling first book,The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, Lencioni recommends taking a moment to consider your own behaviors when working on a team. He teaches how using a Humble—Hungry—Smart model can help you and others become more effective team members.

Lencioni shares how leadership development experts can identify these traits in potential new hires along with sharing his own personal story of using these principles in his work and other areas of his life.

Be sure to listen to the very end of this 30-minute interview to hear Ken Blanchard share his key takeaways and the areas that he most plans to work on.

Listen to the podcast here:

Dear Madeleine,

I work in HR in a small company and recently had to let someone go. The process is never pleasant—and to make matters a bit more complicated, the terminated employee was a bit of a gossip. 

Now that she is gone, many employees are upset and have been speculating out loud about the reason she was terminated. Those who were involved in the decision are professional enough to not share the details that would make the reason clear—and, of course, as an HR professional I am also unable to do that. 

The objective side of me sees that I cannot be responsible for the perceptions of so many people and that I need to accept the damage that has been done, keep a strong visage, and stand by the company’s decision. However, I am human and I cannot help but feel that the loaded comments and meaningful glares I’m receiving are unjustified and there has to be some solution. I knew coming into the HR field that not everyone would like me, but in a small company I feel this could have a lasting negative impact on my image. 

What do you think? 

Quite Vexed

Dear Quite Vexed,

Being in HR is tough. You know way more about people than you ever wanted to know, and you have to keep it all to yourself. You are constantly fighting a deep psychological need to be included as part of the “in group”—a need that will never be adequately met at work.

I recently read a thread on a LinkedIn HR group about being friends with people at work. The folks in that group definitely seemed to agree that when you are in HR you can’t be true friends with anyone at work, although you can have friendly acquaintances. I have received the same advice being married to an owner of a family run business—but I will confess that I am hopeless at not bonding with people I really like and respect.

Your solutions, I would say, are as follows:

If in fact the employee was fired for cause, then you do have a problem because you really can’t share details.

If it was a position elimination, work with your colleagues to craft a statement explaining the business reason for the change. In the absence of information people make things up, and what they make up is usually way worse than the truth. People might be treating you poorly because they are afraid about their own jobs, so it would help a lot if people knew that their jobs were safe. Providing some kind of brief, reasonable explanation will help.

If this person was fired for being a nasty gossip and there is nothing you can say, you must face the comments and the looks head on. Get the veiled aggression out on the table by saying something like “Please don’t judge me based on assumptions you are making.” The response will almost certainly be denial, but this should stop the behaviors. When you feel as if you are being subtly bullied, calling the bully out is often the best way to make him or her back down.

Finally—and this is the most critical thing—remember that to survive in HR you are going to have to develop a very thick skin—thicker even than you expected. You also must take care of yourself by building and nurturing a very strong network of friendships outside of work so that you can get your needs for inclusion and social connection met.

You can also develop connections with others of your HR tribe online. Check into the LinkedIn group I mentioned: Linked: HR #1 Human Resources Group, or find a group like it.

There are a lot of people out there like you, many in small companies feeling a little lost, lonely and isolated. And there is a lot of support to be had.

Hang in there!

Love, Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan-Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

Cloud shares the importance of recognizing the impact that others have on your success. He explains how every significant act in your life always includes someone else.  How are you being influenced by others—and how are you influencing the key people in your life?

Cloud also shares a unique “four corner” model that helps you identify relationships that are toxic and lead to feelings of disconnectedness, inferiority, or feeling fake.  He describes how to move beyond these three negative corners and lead yourself and others into honest, authentic relationships where people thrive.

Cloud discusses strategies for moving beyond a good/bad mindset by creating a language and using a process that leads to real conversations that help people move forward. Whether it’s in a one-on-one conversation, or in a team setting, you’ll learn strategies to improve trust, feedback, and performance.

And don’t miss the final minutes of the podcast when Ken Blanchard joins in at the end of the interview to share his thoughts and key takeaways!

Listen to the podcast here:

I had a chance to experience both of these things when I recently accepted a new position with my company.  Eight months ago, I stepped into a new leadership role supporting a team in Asia Pacific.

It required me to up my game in three critical areas—increased transparency, response to feedback, and commitment to growth.

Here’s what I learned.  See if it might help you.

Increased transparency.  We take our leaders and clients through a process we call Leadership Point of View where leaders take a look back through their leadership journey—the people and events that have shaped them, their values, and what they expect of themselves and others—and create a story about themselves they can share with people and teams they lead.  Because I had the good fortune of going through this process more than seven years ago, I was able to share my Leadership Point of View with my new team. In sharing, I set the stage for each person to have a better understanding of me as their leader that, because of the distance between us, would have taken months if not years to learn through our interactions.  How well does your team know you?  What could you do to increase your transparency?

Response to feedback.  Getting a read on the impact you are having can be a challenge when you are in a position of leadership.  Very few people are comfortable speaking truth—especially negative feedback—up the leadership hierarchy. In my case, I was stepping into a new position with a team located across the ocean on another continent with a different culture.  How could I create an environment where people would feel comfortable speaking up and sharing their thoughts about change?  What was the best approach to being culturally sensitive in China or in Japan?  I relied heavily on my internal teammates to guide me.  I sought feedback following meetings and also asked for patience from my colleagues as I learned about working in Asia Pacific. Are you comfortable enough to be vulnerable and ask your people for feedback?

Commitment to growth.  Growth comes in many forms, including identifying what’s not working, trying on new behaviors, committing to change, and then setting up both the direction and support for doing it all.  Through coaching, I was able to practice new behaviors that had been outside of my comfort zone or different from what my typical style would be.  I also have continued to seek guidance from people on the Asia team to get their input on how I can best serve them and their colleagues throughout the region.

I know my growth in the next year will put me leaps ahead of where I am today. It’s exciting to think about how much more equipped I will be to serve the region and the team. In the meantime, I am on a steep learning curve—but one that is backed with a commitment to serve, which will help me make incremental changes that will eventually feel normal and comfortable. How open are you to growth and change?

For me, a commitment to learning, growing, and evolving to meet the needs of my environment is the formula for success.  See if it can work for you as well!

About the Author

Joni Wickline is Vice President, International Growth with The Ken Blanchard Companies. You can read Wickline’s posts as a part of Coaching Tuesday here at Blanchard LeaderChat for ideas, research, and inspirations from the world of executive coaching.

In an article for Forbes, David Horsager, author of The Trust Edge: How Top Leaders Gain Faster Results, Deeper Relationships, and a Stronger Bottom Line shares that anyone in a leadership role can have a compelling vision, excellent strategy, flawless communication skills, insight, and hard-working direct reports, but if people don’t trust them, they’ll never get the intended results.

At the same time, research by Towers Watson identifies that only 55% of employees trust senior management, and only 52% of employees think their leaders are aware of how their actions impact the thoughts and emotions of other workers.

Business leaders need to be skilled in the art and science of trust if they are going to succeed in engaging the hearts and minds of those they lead.

So how can a leader build trust?  Here are five places I’d start.  See how this matches up with your experience.

1. Increase self awareness, and living with core values.

A good leader needs to know themselves well, and understand their own behaviors and actions. Becoming more aware of their own moral values and personality traits allows a leader to identify assumptions and behaviors that might hinder their ability to lead effectively.

2. Avoid breaking promises.

Leaders who keep their word build trust because people know what to expect from them. Leaders can avoid breaking promises by learning to say “no” if necessary; only making promises they intend to keep in the first place, and keeping agreements clear and precise. If something comes up that requires a change, share any setbacks early on.

3. Being honest and upfront.

Trustworthy leaders keep their team members informed as much as they can—sharing information openly and honestly—even if this means having a difficult conversation. Honesty and openness increase trustworthiness because employees know that their leader isn’t intentionally hiding information.

4. Approachability and mutual respect.

A trustworthy leader needs to be approachable. Team members won’t approach their leader if they can’t predict how the leader will react, or what kind of mood he or she will be in. This consistency in reaction should be applied to everyone on the team (and not just the people they like the most!)

5. Being firm, but fair.

Leaders need to be clear on their expectations and then be available for course corrections as needed. If a leader sees someone off course, tell them right away. Be honest and upfront but also be prepared to listen carefully and really understand the reasons why a direct report is not meeting the expectation set.

Trust is a key element of success in today’s business environment.  When everything is moving quickly, you need people you can count on, and people need leaders they can trust.  Without it, things grind to a halt and even the simplest of tasks takes forever.

Leaders have a major role to play in setting the tone for their team, department, or organization. I hope these five points get you thinking about ways you can improve trust in your organization.  Any additional ideas?  Be sure to share them below.

This powerful moment in the film sheds light on the fact that leaders don’t apologize much, making this scene even more striking. And yet, there are times where leaders make mistakes—and in those moments, it can be difficult to apologize. Whether it is ego, whether it is because they had been confident of the process and outcome, or whether it is simply forgetfulness, apologies are not commonplace.  Still, there are many dissatisfied employees in workplaces today who may feel they are deserving of an apology.

Even though it’s not easy to apologize, saying “sorry” can make you more transparent and allow a deeper level of trust to occur between you and your direct reports. It can also show that you are relatable and human, as well as demonstrate your integrity and willingness to change. Of course, this doesn’t mean you should apologize every day—but sometimes when a mistake is made an apology should follow.

Have you done something that led to a less-than-favorable outcome? Perhaps you passed a person up for a raise, reprimanded someone a bit too harshly, or gave a direct report so much work they became overwhelmed and stressed. Remember that even if your intentions weren’t to harm, if the other person perceives your behavior as hurtful they will feel hurt. In these moments an apology is important. It acknowledges your own wrongdoing and communicates to the other person your commitment to growth and improvement.

When you do apologize:

1. State the context. Outline the situation by starting with phrases like “Remember when…” or “That other day when…” and describe the behaviors that took place. Especially if the event happened a while ago, it may be good to refresh the person’s memory.
2. Acknowledge the other person by stating the impact of your behavior on them. Say, “When I did that, you looked…” or “I noticed you didn’t go to lunch like you usually do after what happened.” Remember to be objective and focus on the behaviors you directly observed, leaving out any inferences.
3. Avoid explanations and focus on the future. No one wants to hear an apology that is followed by the word but. Don’t offer reasons for what you did—instead, provide reassurances that you are working to grow and improve so that such an event doesn’t happen again.

Apologizing is not easy, but when you learn how to do it properly, it becomes less difficult over time. And when you do say “sorry,” you—and the person you say it to—will be glad you did.

Dear Madeleine,

I read last week’s column with interest because I am also a fairly new manager in a small organization who isn’t sure whether to speak up about a problem. I have five direct reports. Two of them have come to me to say they have seen an employee who reports to another manager stealing things such as office supplies, toilet paper, and teabags and coffee from the break room.

I was going to stay out of it—until I actually witnessed her emptying half a box of artificial sweetener packets into her purse! I was sitting close by, and she didn’t even seem to care that I saw her do it.

This behavior strikes me as really odd. I would assume people know they are not supposed to help themselves to items meant to be used by people at work.

I have no experience in how to deal with this. Should I tell my manager? Should I tell the person’s manager? I kind of hate to get her in trouble, but I also don’t want to send the message that the behavior is okay.

Unsure

Dear Unsure,

You really need to say something. As a manager, you represent the organization so your silence has power. Now that you personally witnessed this behavior, to not report it would be seen as condoning stealing. Stealing is a strong word for this kind of petty theft, but it is technically the truth.

I guess it might be possible the offender doesn’t realize what she is doing is wrong. It may simply be that her own manager needs to talk to her about it.

The more likely scenario is that she does know it’s wrong and either has some kind of underlying compulsion she needs to deal with or is hostile in some way toward the organization. Perhaps she feels she is underpaid and therefore entitled to these extras.

So you need to tell someone—it could be your own manager, the manager of the offending party, or if you have an HR person you could start there. Even if you feel a little like a rat, it is the right thing to do.

Love, Madeleine

About the author

Madeleine Homan-Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

In a paradoxical twist, as it seems to always happen, she had some amazing insight that has helped me understand my value both professionally and personally.

She told this story:

In the 80s my father was invited to interview at a well known Wall Street firm. He said the interview went well. As they were wrapping up, he felt that they may be on the fence and he wanted to close the deal.

So at the end of the interview he said, “Here’s what I’ll do. I will work for free for you for 90 days, and after 90 days, if you don’t think I’m worth it, you can let me go.”

And that’s exactly what happened.

He worked at the firm with no pay for 90 days—and then they let him go. 

He was stunned.

So he went back to the executive team and asked, “How can you let me go after I delivered on every single aspect of the job? I did everything you asked me to do and worked really hard to prove myself to everyone.”

After hearing him out, finally one of the executives said, “We are letting you go because, if you don’t know your worth, we don’t either.”

If you don’t know what you are worth, either professionally or personally, someone definitely will tell you. My friend and I were discussing salary, but the value of knowing your worth transcends work and relates to all avenues of life. What would happen if you truly evaluated your worth? What would you do differently?

Know your worth. Know who you are. And don’t apologize for it. Go out and be you, and dare others to stop you. You’re worth it!

Dear Madeleine,

I am a manager with a team member who is a manipulator. He uses people to get what he wants, especially if he knows his idea is unacceptable or not within the process. And he finds ways to get even with people who won’t go along. He also has the habit of saying negative things about someone in the team to others.

My dilemma is that I have not witnessed these events firsthand—this information was shared with me by a person who was initially a close friend and colleague of the manipulator. I would normally brush it off since I don’t have any real proof, but deep inside I know what he is doing isn’t right and is unhealthy for the team. What can I do? Did I fail as a leader? Thanks.

What to Do

Dear What To Do,

You haven’t failed yet. This appears to be an ongoing situation—a tricky one. The fact that you see this as your problem is a good sign that you take your leadership role seriously.

It does sound as if you have a bad apple on your team. This kind of underhanded nastiness will erode trust and goodwill faster than just about anything. Here is the thing, though—you aren’t sure whether this behavior is really happening. If you haven’t heard a similar charge from anyone else and haven’t personally witnessed this behavior, it could be hearsay from only one person. How do you know that the person giving you the scoop doesn’t have their own agenda? People who value expedience and are good at getting things done efficiently can be viewed as manipulative by some. The key here is to establish malicious intent by the person whose behavior is in question.

Years ago I worked on a small, high functioning team where we excelled at getting results together. At some point as the company grew, people on our team started getting testy and annoyed with each other. It took us a while to realize that the friction was being caused by a new person who was playing us all against each other. As it turned out, she was doing it all over the company! Apparently she did it for sport; I never understood what she had to gain from it. Fortunately, she didn’t last—our CEO had a zero tolerance policy for drama.

The best way to get feedback is to engage in a 360-degree feedback process—ask your HR group to help you with it. You can also ask for feedback from everyone on the team as you gather information for the alleged manipulator’s performance review.

The biggest effect you can have as a leader is to establish and reinforce the culture of the team. Explain to all direct reports what you expect from the team and what they can expect from you. You are clear in your own mind which behaviors are desirable and which are unacceptable; it’s time to make this information explicit with your team.

Finally, it’s your job to protect your people from a bad employee. Do whatever you can to gather intel and get to the bottom of the situation. If it turns out that the person is really as nasty as he sounds, do not hesitate to release him to be dastardly elsewhere. Your people will appreciate it—and you will never look back.

About the author

Madeleine Homan-Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

Check yourself against this list to see how many of the 10 Commandments of Communication you adhere to:

1. Thou shalt demonstrate genuine care for the other person – People can see right through a phony. If you don’t genuinely care for the other person in the relationship it will show in your words and actions. If it’s important for you to build trust with someone, then you should find ways to genuinely care about them. Examine the relationship to see what it is about the person, or the role they play in your organization, that you appreciate and value. Focus on those aspects of the relationship in an authentic and genuine way.

2. Thou shalt listen to understand, not to respond – Most of us have poor listening skills. Instead of listening to someone to understand their point of view, we spend our mental energy formulating a response. Practice active listening techniques such as asking open-ended questions/statements like “Tell me more” or “How did that make you feel?” Paraphrase key points and check for understanding throughout the conversation and listen with the intent to be influenced by the person speaking, not with the intent to argue or debate. Listening can be one of the easiest and quickest ways to establish trust with someone.

3. Thou shalt use open body language – Studies have shown that 70% or more of communication is nonverbal. Our body language often conveys much more meaning than our words so it’s important than your body language is in alignment with the intent of your words. If at all possible, eliminate physical barriers, like a desk, between you and the person you’re speaking with. Sit side by side or in front of each other, don’t cross your arms, roll your eyes, or grimace. Be sure to smile, nod in understanding, and verbally respond with phrases like “I hear you” or “I understand” to show the other person you’re tracking with the conversation.

4. Thou shalt look for commonalities with the other person – People intuitively trust people who are similar to themselves. When first establishing the relationship, emphasize things you have in common such as where you grew up, went to school, common hobbies/interests you have, or the activities/sports of your children.

5. Thou shalt express empathy/mirror emotions – You’ve probably heard the old saying, “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.” Expressing empathy toward another person is an excellent way to show you care, particularly if you mirror their emotions. Neurological studies have shown our brains contain “mirror neurons” that have the capacity to help us feel the emotions being expressed by another individual. I’m not suggesting you mimic the emotions of others in an attempt to manipulate them into trusting you, but rather taking genuine interest in their plight and letting your natural empathetic instincts express themselves.

6. Thou shalt be transparent and show vulnerability – Establishing trust in a relationship requires one person to make the first move in extending trust. Someone has to make him/herself vulnerable to another and one way to do that is to be transparent (appropriate for the context of the situation) in sharing information. A lack of transparency or vulnerability breeds suspicion in the relationship and is usually the result of one party wanting to minimize risk and maximize control.

7. Thou shalt be positive and respectful – Right or wrong, people will judge the quality of your character by how you speak about and treat others. If you are positive and respectful in your words and actions, people will trust that you will treat them the same way. The opposite is also true. If you speak disparagingly about others or treat others as “less than” yourself, people will not trust you will act with fairness and integrity in your dealings with them.

8. Choose the right time, place, and method to communicate – Just as the secret in real estate is “location, location, location,” the secret to trust-building communication is “timing, timing, timing.” In addition to finding the right time to communicate, it’s important to choose the proper place and method. If your communication involves sensitive personal information, have a face-to-face conversation in a private location. Use email, phone, and other methods of communication that are appropriate to the specific situation.

9. Thou shalt look for opportunities to build up the other person – Your words can be used to build other people up or tear them down. Which do you think will build trust? Building them up, of course. Look for every opportunity to use your communication to help others learn, grow, and become the best version of themselves possible. Doing so will cause people to see that you have their best interests in mind, a key driver of deciding to place their trust in you.

10. Thou shalt own your words – Say what you mean, mean what you say, be forthright, honest, compassionate, caring, and responsible with your communication. If you say something that harms another, apologize sincerely and make amends. It’s really that simple.

Randy Conley is the V.P. of Client Services and Trust Practice Leader at The Ken Blanchard Companies and his LeaderChat posts normally appear the fourth or last Thursday of every month. For more insights on trust and leadership, visit Randy at his Leading with Trust blog or follow him on Twitter @RandyConley.

New leaders need to take the time to share information and build trust says Dessalen Wood, VP of Talent Development at Cineplex Entertainment. In an interview for the June issue of Ignite she shares a personal example to illustrate her point.

”At Cineplex I was hired to replace someone who had been with the company for 20 years. Two of my new direct reports were senior people who had been working with the outgoing leader for close to 15 years. I was at the end of the interview process when the hiring committee let me meet the team as the preferred candidate so that we could get to know each other.

“So I sat down with them and said, ‘What would you like to ask me?’ Like most people, they wanted to know what I was going to be like as a leader.”

Wood knew she had an opportunity to share a model of what their leadership journey would look like. Using the only piece of paper available—a napkin—Wood quickly drew a box and divided it into four quadrants which she labeled S1, S2, S3, and S4 to correspond to a Directing, Coaching, Supporting, and Delegating leadership styles. Next Wood shared that her natural style of leadership was the S3 Supporting style.

“I pointed to the quadrant labeled S3 Supporting and I said, ‘This is who I am. I like to participate in your decisions and support you in your decision making. I love to chat and I love to understand and I’m really excited about what you are doing. I want to support you.’

“’But here’s the catch,’” Wood continued. “‘That is the type of leader I am when I know how to do my job well and I am very comfortable in my environment. That’s who I am going to be. But the person you are going to be working with for the next few months is going to need a lot of details and information, which will look more like S1 or S2, or what you would call a micro-manager. The S3 Supporting and S4 Delegating leadership style, which is who I really am, will come only after I have a lot of trust and faith and feel I can responsibly let go.’”

This is important to identify and call out early, explains Wood. Even leaders who are by nature more hands-off and delegating will appear more hands-on and micromanaging when they step into a new role. That’s not because they’ve changed who they are. It’s because they are new to the situation and need more information and understanding before they can responsibly delegate.

Wood’s recommendation?  Help new leaders get off to a fast start by discussing the leadership journey early in the on-boarding process. Then encourage new leaders to share what they’ve learned with their direct reports. Wood even goes so far as to suggest leaders set a “go live” date when they expect to be leading as their real selves.

“People need to see new leaders as learners on their own development journey and understand that the leadership style they are displaying when they are new and a learner is not necessarily going to be the inspiring and wonderful leadership style they’ll use later. This allows the natural empathy and optimism to come out—which is so important in a new relationship. It helps both parties build a really wonderful bond.”

Interested in helping your leaders to a faster start?  You can learn more about Wood’s recommendations by reading her complete interview in On-Boarding New Leaders, Also be sure to check out the complimentary webinar Wood is conducting on June 24 where she will be sharing more information on taking a development-based approach to on-boarding mid-to-senior level leaders.

I’ve been with a small and very successful business for fifteen years and am a senior manager. Every time we want to try something new, I am asked to be in charge of it—even though I already have a full-time job and am running all the other initiatives and programs I’ve successfully started for the company. I keep saying yes because I enjoy the new projects and am good at them.

However, I’m starting to feel that I’m being pushed to my limits and that I’m not able to keep up my standards on my work product, which makes me anxious.

My bosses keep piling on more, which I understand. We are a slow growing company and it’s hard to find the money to pay for more people. I love my job and I have a lot of flexibility, which is super important to me. My spouse tells me to just say no, but I don’t seem to be able to. What do you think?

Can’t Say No

_________________________________

Dear Can’t Say No,

The thing to realize about this situation is that you have allowed it to happen. In doing so, you have trained your bosses to depend on your ability to take it all on and do it all well.

The good news is that you can un-train them—but to do that you will need to understand what has been driving you to take it all on in the first place. What’s the payoff for you? Once you uncover the needs of yours that are being met by always saying yes, you will be able to find a way to get those needs met in a way that doesn’t exact such a high cost on you.

I would guess that you are a high achiever, always have been, and that others sometimes call you a perfectionist. So that might be one need that is driving your behavior. You also may have a need for variety or a need to innovate, and those needs are met when you take on all the new fun things. I recommend you discuss this idea with people who know you well. They will probably have insights for you.

Once you better understand your own needs, here are a couple of other ideas to try on:

• Delegate more. People in senior positions who are high achievers have a hard time letting things go. They fear others will do things differently and perhaps—heaven forbid—not as well. This is part of being a senior leader. It’s time to unload a couple of projects.
• Lower your standards. We all have been inspired by the adage “good is the enemy of the great” because, in some cases, it’s really true. However, in other cases, done is better than perfect and good enough is fine. Take a few moments to look at how you might cut corners in places nobody else really cares about.
• Force a change in habits. Your current habit is to jam as much into a time frame as possible. A new habit would be to build a reserve of time into your schedule.

Alternatively, you can keep going like this until something breaks—like your health or your marriage—and circumstances will fix the situation for you. But wouldn’t you rather be the captain of your own ship, and not at the mercy of your needs and your habits?

Hope to hear how it goes!

About the author

Madeleine Homan-Blanchard is a master certified coach, author, speaker, and cofounder of Blanchard Coaching Services. Madeleine’s Advice for the Well Intentioned Manager is a regular Saturday feature for a very select group: well intentioned managers. Leadership is hard—and the more you care, the harder it gets. Join us here each week for insight, resources, and conversation.

Got a question for Madeleine? Email Madeleine and look for your response here next week!

During our work together, the learning leaders and several senior leader pilot participants got into a fascinating debate about the qualities of a great coach.

One participant kept trying to get across his concept that the coach must have positive intent and must care about the person being coached, but seemed to have trouble finding the right language. He finally blurted out, “Loving. A coach should be—loving.”

There was silence in the room and then everybody turned to me, the subject matter expert. What could I say? First, I laughed—and then I admitted he was right. In my opinion, the coach who’s going to make the biggest difference is the one who loves the people who are being coached. Love is the secret ingredient almost no one talks about. It’s one of the dirty little secrets of coaching—and you can’t really teach it. It’s certainly not considered an appropriate topic of conversation in most corporate settings.

Here’s the most interesting part: I was in the room with a group of senior level medical engineering geniuses who all began to nod their heads yes. The group ended up deciding not to actually write the word loving in black and white in the participant materials, instead opting for more indirect ways of expressing it. But there was an implicit agreement among the group—all of whom have self selected to be role models for coaching—that loving is, in fact, a quality they will be cultivating. And do you know what? I believe they actually have a chance of shifting their culture.

About the Author

Madeleine Blanchard is the co-founder of The Ken Blanchard Companies’ Coaching Services team.  Since 2000, Blanchard’s 130 coaches have coached over 14,500 individuals in more than 250 companies throughout the world. Learn more at Blanchard Coaching Services. And check out Coaching Tuesday every week at Blanchard LeaderChat for ideas, research, and inspirations from the world of executive coaching.

We all know leaders aren’t perfect. But why do they continue to hold those interminable, aggravating, and results-free “walks in the park”? One theory is that leaders use meetings to provide confirmation of decisions they’ve already made. Consciously or subconsciously, they push conformance to their decisions and plans—and that occupies a lot of meeting time.

So attendees, wanting to “get this thing over with,” learn to become members of the dutiful herd. They go along with whatever seems to be the politically safe outcome.

A Brief History of Herd Behavior

Let’s recount a summary of Dr. Solomon Asch’s research on conformity and herd behavior, starring you. (Asch was a social psychology pioneer in the mid- to late twentieth century.) Dr. Asch puts eight people, including you, around a table in a meeting room. You think all attendees are just like you, but actually the other seven are actors. Asch has scripted their roles. So you’re the only real subject.

Photo by Nyenyec Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0

Asch walks to the front of the room and says he wants to find out about visual perceptions. He puts two posters in front of the group: a benchmark poster depicting a single vertical line, and a selection poster showing three lines of different lengths that are labeled A, B, and C.

Then Asch asks all eight attendees, individually, to select which of the three lines (A, B, or C) on the selection poster match the length of the benchmark line. He repeats this through several trials, with different posters. You are positioned so you hear most of the actors’ answers before you choose. Sometimes the others unanimously select what is clearly the wrong answer, all of them choosing the same distractor.

What would you predict happens in this experiment?

One-third of the “lone” subjects select the same wrong answers the actors choose. They cave in and join the herd.

Three-quarters of the lone subjects conform with the wrong answer at least once.

Separate research at New York University comparing “yes-sayers” to “straight-shooters” corroborates Dr. Asch’s findings.

Remember that in Asch’s research, the wrong answers were obviously incorrect. Most topics at meetings are nowhere near as tangible. Imagine how much easier it would be to go with the herd on issues that were more vague, particularly when the leader has taken a firm position. If the meeting were addressing strategies or mission accomplishment or similar topics, it would be much easier to abandon one’s position and elect a compromised solution.

Three Tips for Better Meetings

Here are three steps to counteract the tendency toward herd behavior at meetings:

1. Concentrate. There must be a focused clarity on the real issue. This should begin with pre-meeting agendas as much as possible, so people can start objectively thinking about potential positions to take. At the meeting, keep the focus on the agenda item under discussion.
2. Collaborate. Communication and idea sharing need to occupy a major part of the meeting. Leaders should encourage people to stand up and be counted. Add transparency to your team’s group norms. Hold each other accountable for candor. Anything else is unethical. Fraudulent. Unacceptable.
3. Initiate. Meetings ultimately should result in an action plan for the team—a roadmap that includes who, what, and when. If you employ laser clarity on post-meeting behavior, chances are high that the team will deliver to the meeting’s expectations.

When describing the attributes of an outstanding team member, we frequently include the word loyalty. Some well meaning leaders see candor and honesty as potential indicators of disloyalty—but actually, it’s the other way around. Pioneers should be honored, but frequently they are punished. Leaders should be informed, but frequently they are shielded. High performing teams are willing to tell it the way it is. This may be uncomfortable initially, but the long term payoffs are priceless.

About the author

Dr. Dick Ruhe is a best-selling author, keynote speaker, and senior consulting partner with The Ken Blanchard Companies.

1. It would demonstrate greater transparency within the organization.
2. It would provide the leader(s) with the ability to keep a pulse on how others in the organization feel about their overall job performance.

Now, keep in mind that the idea is to have a quick, timely snapshot of public opinion. The intention here is not to do an in-depth analysis with detailed feedback. What we want is a very simple, broad overview. To obtain the information we’re looking for, there is really only one question we need to ask:

Do you approve or disapprove of the way ‘LEADER’ is handling his/her job as ‘TITLE’?

If that question sounds familiar, that’s because it’s nearly identical to the question posed to respondents polled by the Gallup organization. It’s quick, it’s to the point, and it gives you the broad overview you’re looking for.
Continuing with the K.I.S.S. theme, it would also be very easy to set-up and maintain. Consider the following:

• Delivery Method – Choose your favorite free survey software and send out an anonymous survey.
• Frequency – Try every two weeks. Once a month doesn’t seem frequent enough and every week feels a tad excessive. Whatever you decide, just make sure to stay consistent.
• Respondents – Send it to everyone in the organization that you interact with. This includes direct reports, peers, and those above you.
• Accountability – Display the results someplace visible to the organization.

Obviously there would be some other kinks to work out as you go. For instance, you’d need to determine your baseline number of respondents. You might also consider asking a qualifying question (such as, “direct report, peer, senior executive”) so that you could make sure your getting a decent cross-section of respondents. That said, being an early adopter should allow you some leeway with colleagues until you perfect the process.
You’ve heard the pitch, so what do you think? If you like the idea, make sure to tell a friend…my Klout score could really use some help.