Leadership

Essential Relationships

February 1, 2017 by Gindi Leave a Comment

All the elements of savvy leadership are founded on, and supported by, essential relationships.

I’ve seen at least five categories of relationships emerging and successful leaders have:

The sponsors. All the leadership research shows leaders cannot truly move forward without sponsors. A sponsor may not know about your kids and your weekend activities, and in fact they probably shouldn’t, but they’re willing to spend political capital to advance your career. Sponsors are savvy. They won’t risk their reputation unless your worth it. So for sponsors to recommend you for the promotion or project, they need to know you will over deliver and impress the executives and the clients. Sponsors don’t come overnight. You’ve proven yourself over time when these essential relationships truly grow.
The mentors. While sponsors may help you climb the ladder, mentors help you figure out what ladder, or jungle gym, or race track you need to be on. Mentors do know about your personal life and your priorities and life goals. Mentors see past immediate opportunities. They help you remember to look from 10,000 feet up to see if you’re still headed in a direction which matches your dreams and values. Mentors are never a one way relationship. In fact NO relationship should be. You should offer to support and help mentors, and sponsors, and advance their goals and achievements in any way possible. All successful relationships are founded on mutual admiration and support.
The peer network. The individuals may be in similar career stages in similar industries. These aren’t your best friends but people you enjoy hanging out with and who are in similar life stages. I have friends who are in house attorneys at energy companies with families. When we meet up, the insight we can offer one another is tremendous. We truly understand the place the other is in and the competing demands we have for our limited time.
The diverse friends. These are good friends who you can trust. They come from different backgrounds, different socio-economic experiences, different phases of your life, and do different things in different geographic regions. They help remind you your perspective isn’t everyone’s perspective. From the small things to the big things, they remind you of the world at large. They also help you to laugh and step away from the career conversations. From faith to fashion to family (just like my little blog randomness), these folks feed the important parts of your spirit and mind.
The mentees. That’s what I’ll call those you give back to. No matter whether you are a CEO of a company or a first year career hire, there are those who need your support. From school aged to soon-to-be college grads to muddled mid-year career folks, there is always someone who would love your perspective and encouragement. Just as I believe you’re never to old to be mentored, I also believe you’re never to young to mentor others. Find someone to encourage along the way this week!

Delighted to be sharing about relationships with the women of LEAD Academy this week, so I’d love to hear what you have to say. How did you find key career relationships? What do your friends do to help you keep your priorities in line? Who else should you have in your life?

Lead With Your Ears

January 8, 2017 by Gindi Leave a Comment

“No one speaks twice until everyone’s been once around.”

I’d hopped in the car to run to the grocery store when an NPR interview crackled on the radio. The conversation was well in progress as the reporter intently quizzed a Supreme Court Justice on how the court managed its differing views.

The justice explained how the nine members of the Court maintained respectful and friendly relationships even with their widely differing views. We listen to one another. No one raises their voice. And no one speaks twice until we’ve been once around the room.

He went on to explain that compromise is not just splitting the difference between the two points. It’s truly listening and understanding the other’s viewpoint and then incorporating that perspective into decisions.

Less than two days later, I heard this Bible verse recited by one of our pastors:

Post this at all the intersections, dear friends: Lead with your ears, follow up with your tongue, and let anger straggle along in the rear. (James 1 – The Message translation)

Lead with your ears.

Don’t speak again until everyone has been heard.

Can you imagine what would happen if that radical notion took hold?

2016 would have looked a lot different.

Facebook and Twitter would look a lot different.

Politics, marketing, civil unrest, the dinner table, our churches, the break room, would all look, and SOUND, totally different.

When I was interviewing women leaders for my book, Learning to Lead, one executive shared that active listening was the best advice she could give to emerging leaders. She encouraged everyone to create space for team members to be individually heard, and not shot down. Respecting other’s opinions, even if the organization didn’t ultimately agree, would develop a respectful environment and loyalty to the leader.

If everyone from a Supreme Court Justice to the Bible encourages listening as the most effective, then why are we all shouting instead?

Does it make us feel important? Heard? Understood? Victorious?

I honestly don’t know.

I know I have done it a million times before though. As someone is speaking, I’ve been thinking about a response in my head instead of singularly focusing on their words and perspective.

Let’s all try this for 2017: from social media to carpool and from the board room to the bedroom, let’s listen. Stop interrupting. Stop multi-tasking. Lead with your ears. Make eye contact. Let the person, or room know, the speaker is being heard.

What if we got crazy about this? What if we put our phones down and closed our computers when we went to a conference and actually heard what the speaker was saying? What if we listened to our children and our preachers and our friends with singular attention?

Would we hear those quiet and distant voices whispering for help? If our mouth is shut, it might be easier to hear them. We could act instead of just talk about what to do.

Listen. Lead with our ears. Watch crazy changes unfold.

I’ll Ride Up

October 27, 2016 by Gindi 1 Comment

I saw him walk into the lobby of our building. So must have my male colleague. I smiled and approached the elevator at the same time. So did my male colleague. Nearing the executive, my colleague began discussing a small work related matter with him. I waited to offer greetings until their conversation concluded. My colleague and I office on one floor while the executive offices on a higher floor. When the doors opened at our floor, I got ready to step out when I heard my colleague say, “I’ll ride up with you,” and he continued talking.

Later in the day, I had an issue I wanted to make sure I talked to a specific person in management about. He arrived to the office after meetings and was approaching my desk from the hallway. Steps away, another male colleague approached him and began a discussion. After it wrapped, the individual got ready to walk past my desk to his office. But my male colleague said, “Well, if you have another 30 seconds, let me pick your brain about this,” and continued walking with him into his office.

I consider myself pretty adept at office networking. I’m not shy about having conversations about work matters or professional development with executives. And, finally, I’m comfortable in my own skin and a skilled presenter on difficult issues in both formal and informal settings.

But this day at the office schooled me.

I have never once, in an 18 year career, said “I’ll ride up” to an executive on an elevator.

Why not? It’s an incredibly smart thing to do. You don’t inconvenience the other person and are able to address the issue with the decision maker.

I rarely take extra time, after small talk, to walk to the office with an executive to pursue a business agenda.

I try to find time on calendars or schedule meetings. I’ll make small talk at the coffee bar, but I am not regularly taking the opportunity to advance the business ball.

How do most effective leaders get what they want? All the research shows they have meetings before the meetings. The key to sustained success is previewing the issues and the solutions before ever walking into a meeting room.

And while the more I research and travel around the country speaking about leadership I find gender similarities, this is an area where gender differences persist. Regularly, many issues previously discussed as male or female, I find turn more on introvert v. extrovert or calm v. excitable or visionary v. detail oriented.

But actively “business working” in social encounters can be an area where women professionals lag.

Think back on how you work business issues. When’s the last time you went out of your way to “ride up” with someone to pursue a business case? Do you walk to the office drink station simply to make sure you engage with a hard-to-reach leader?

I recently had a friend who said, “let’s walk around the table this way so we can bump into that vice president.” If you have critical matters you are working, or need to increase your visibility, then what better way than grabbing three impromptu minutes walking to the parking garage or the salad bar?

Engage the right people without formal meetings and have brief questions ready for their feedback. Does this make sense? Does this align with the team’s priorities this year? Etc.

Being ready to engage at a moment’s notice will send your professional stock soaring, and give you the opportunity to more regularly engage with important audiences.

Next time, offer to “ride up.”

Boundary Boss, Volunteer Limits

September 15, 2016 by Gindi 1 Comment

Welcome back to our periodic column, Boundary Boss, all about setting boundaries to improve our lives.

Today we tackle how to set limits on our volunteering.

Volunteering is awesome! I am volunteer-in-chief! It’s how the non profit, church, community, school worlds go ’round. But all too often, we let volunteering take over our lives to the detriment of our family or job or health.

I had dinner with a friend one evening when she shared about recent uncomfortable conversation. She’d agreed to substitute teach when needed for a children’s Sunday School class. If you’ve ever volunteered for any kid activity, you know how generally short-staffed groups are on volunteers. The next Sunday, the organizer approached her with details of the year’s curriculum since she’d designated my friend as the class leader!

What?

My friends eyebrows shot up and she politely replied, “Oh no, I’m sorry. I volunteered to substitute if a need came up. Not to lead.”

“Oh I know,” came the pleading reply, “but we don’t have anyone to lead the class and we so desperately need you to serve this year.”

Worthy, worthy is this cause. But it wasn’t something my friend could take on. She already had competing church responsibilities not to mention a husband and kids to juggle on Sunday mornings.

She wisely replied (because this friend is SO wise), “I’m sorry. I cannot lead this class. If you need me in a pinch, please call. But I cannot serve every Sunday.”

After sharing the story, she looked at me and said, “I don’t mean to sound uncaring, but my dad taught me to ask, ‘is this my problem?’ And this was her problem, not mine.”

We have plenty of our own problems. All too often, we adopt other’s problems as ours too. But we need to ask, “Is this my problem?”

I’ve seen this happen personally. My husband agreed to help support the coach for our kids sports team. He was named head coach because “there was no one else.” Well now, that’s not exactly accurate, right? There were a dozen parents. Why did he need to serve as head coach just because he offered to help?

I’ve had this happen in organizations I work in. If you don’t lead this project/gala/fundraising, it won’t get done.

Ask yourself: is this my problem?

(That sounds so mean, I totally realize that. I wish you could hear my voice. I’m saying it all so earnestly.)

Your job, kids, marriage, health are your problems. If you can distance yourself a little from the ask, then it will help you discern the correct answer.

If you say yes to someone else’s problem, then you say no to something on your plate for which you do have principal responsibility.

So the next time an ask is pressed on you, ask yourself some key questions:

Do I want to do this? Would I enjoy it? Does it fit my skill set?
Is this my problem? Do I have direct responsibility for the outcome?
What do I sacrifice with my yes? Who suffers if I agree?
Do I really have time?

Take a step back and don’t allow yourself to give a response on the fly. Think about it. Set boundaries. Your life will be the better for it!

Boundary Boss: Kick the Mommy Guilt

August 25, 2016 by Gindi Leave a Comment

Welcome back to our periodic installment of Boundary Boss: advice on setting boundaries which inevitably disappear around us.

I’ve got a doozy for you today: setting boundaries so you can kick that mommy guilt out the door!

There are so many rabbit trails this could take, including how to free yourself of feeling bad you don’t grow and make your own organic food, but that’s not what we’re tackling here.

Today we’re tackling the ‘we-have-to-do-all-the-crap’ syndrome a lot of us suffer under.

Let me lead with the punchline: Say. No. Hear this sweet momma of a toddler or momma of six kids ranging from 5 to 19: you do not have to do all the crap. Your kid will be okay. In fact, your kid will probably be better than the kid of the mom who does all the crap because she’s so stressed out.

How did this topic come to be? Aside from the fact that I may or may not have suffered from this syndrome and it’s accompanying guilt when I do not do all the crap?

Well, I received two messages yesterday. One on vox from a friend of mine and one a text. These are exact quotes:

Mommy A: Ahhhh! It’s so hard! Attended a informational breakfast meeting this morning at school. I don’t know about you but I am always so tempted to jump in and volunteer to lead so much – room mom, Girl Scouts, etc. I’m really trying to do less this year. Quality versus quantity. Have another school meeting next week. Lord help me. Restraint is not easy. Stepping back is not my strong suit.

Mommy B: I have had to set an appointment with myself which has come at the cost of other’s people’s plans. And it’s interesting to see people’s reactions to this. What I’m finding is the people who have the most shocked reaction, like ‘what do you mean,’ are the people who do the same thing. They’ve learned to set boundaries, and they’ve held to them, but apparently can’t accept anyone else’s. I’m sorry everybody in the world, I have to take the summer off. So, whatever that means for everything else, so sorry, see you when we start back. I have had to tell people no! Sorry, I don’t know what to tell you, I’m not going to feel guilty.

Isn’t that fascinating??? Don’t you relate to every single word of Mommy A and don’t you want to figure out how to get to where Mommy B did?

Some of you have no problem saying no. You can dole out the no’s without flinching. But a lot of us, especially when it comes to stuff for our kids, are spitting out yeses through gritted teeth even when we know no is the right answer.

Yet a yes, even though we’re doing it “for” our kids, actually becomes a no with our availability or bandwidth or patience for our kids. I remember attending a leadership conference in New York, and one of the speakers wrote this book called The Smartest Kids in the World. She traveled the world to understand why other countries were ahead of the U.S. in educating children. I vividly remember this remark: studies show that the smartest and most engaged kids are not the ones whose parents were PTA moms or class parents, but rather kids whose parents read to them and read themselves. Afterwards, I walked up to her and said, THANK YOU, I READ, MY KIDS WILL BE FINE!

I am not saying don’t volunteer. Lord help us if parents didn’t volunteer. I’m saying, don’t volunteer for everything. Here are a few tips:

Decide what’s important to you, and do that. That one thing. For me, it’s Christmas parties. I adore school Christmas parties. I like to organize the activities and make special themed treats and volunteer during the party. So every year I email the teacher on the first day of school and ask how I can run or help with the Christmas party. It’s my thing. I basically don’t do anything else.
Let go off the mom guilt over the other stuff. I actually almost deleted that last sentence because I thought it made me look like a bad mom (even if it was true). Take a page from Mommy B’s playbook and say “whatever that means for everything else, so sorry.” Some of us can do more than others. Do what you can do and do what you are passionate about doing, but don’t do what you feel guilty about not doing.
Support the others running the show. If you do not run the show, you do not get to criticize the sweet soul who volunteered to run it. Don’t like the structure of field day? Feel super passionate about that? Then that’s your volunteer thing next year but don’t you say a peep about this year’s event. Snack mom brought goldfish and gummies and you only allow your kiddos to have yogurt and apples, then bring your own or take over snacks (but make it your ONLY thing).

[On a separate but related note: If any of you are control freaks (because I may or may not know someone, let’s just say a dear friend whose name starts with a G and has five letters) trying to run everything because you think you can do it best, you are crazy. Get some therapy. Your way is not the only way. The kids do not notice.]

Pick your thing. Not everything. You cannot do it all and you shouldn’t. Let go of the guilt. Learn to say no. Set some boundaries and I promise your kids (and your husband, and your friends, and your colleagues…) will thank you.

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