|
|
The FIRST thing I'd like to share this month is that my long awaited book,
LEAD LIKE IT MATTERS...BECAUSE IT DOES, McGraw Hill has arrived at Amazon and Barnes & Noble, and IBooks as an E-Book, is sitting on my dining room table, and will be shipping in hard cover in 14 days! Three years in the making and decades of trial and error, learning, and practice have resulted in a book I'm really proud of. Ok...for this month, I'm sharing my Leadership Insights 7 & 8. They are just right for this time of year. As the leaves begin to change here in the beautiful NY Fingerlakes, I am reminded of how much change is a natural part of life. Really, no matter how much we resist it, change will win out! The seasons will continue to come and go, sun up - sun down, the natural order of life on our planet means continuous evolution and continuous change.
The only question we need to consider is how we, our teams, and organizations CHOOSE to initiate, adapt, and respond to CHANGE that we initiate or that is thrust upon us. HOW we manage change speaks a great deal about the CULTURE we create within our workplaces and with the people on our teams.
Insight 7: MOST CHANGE EFFORTS FAIL AND THEY DON'T HAVE TO
Charles Darwin did not say "it's all about survival of the fittest." Someone else decided to interpret his words and really screwed things up for a lot of us, including having people use that phrase to justify a lot of bad behavior. And that's not how life truly works. What Darwin actually said is, "It's not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change."People are naturally inclined to resist change. The irony is...what you resist will persist. When change is "top-down" and those impacted feel they have no voice, people resist it even more. The wasted human energy and other resources that go down the big black sink-hole of most change initiatives is truly astounding. Do we learn from our mistakes? Sometimes - but too often not a lot, and nearly always, not enough. Leader need to be able to lead change - there's no getting around it. How well you do that part of your job will make or break your organization and maybe even you.
Here are 4 suggestions to lead change initiatives that go well and actually stick instead of being dead on arrival:
- Have and USE a change process
- Empower and engage those affected by the change process
- PULL don't PUSH change
- Communicate, communicate, then do it again and again
Insight 8: LEADERS CREATE AND DESTROY CULTURES!
I love this quote from John Mackey of Whole Foods, "If you are lucky enough to be someone's employer, then you have a moral obligation to make sure people DO look forward t coming to work in the morning."
Indeed, you have responsibility for your workplace culture wherever your "responsibility pond" may be, wherever your sphere of influence resides. It is your number one role to create, model, and support a workplace culture where the intended culture will thrive and the desired results will occur. It can take a lot of work to build and sustain a positive and productive workplace. And it can take a 'heartbeat' for one ineffective, bad, or lousy leader to destroy it. This IS your ecosystem and how healthy or toxic it is matters and you are the keeper of your "responsibility pond" no matter how big or small it may be.
The leadership revolution I want to see happen in my lifetime would mean that we each are committed to building healthy ecosystems within our workplaces for generations to come.
Here are 4 suggestions you can do to help make that happen:
- Know that the culture in your "pond" IS your responsibility
- Articulate your mission, values, and vision
- Assess, correct, assess
- Celebrate your people and your success
I'd be delighted to speak with your leaders and your organization about all 8 Leadership Insights and my book.
***************************************************************************************
There are 5 ways to connect with each other and me...
AskRoxi.com Linked In Facebook Twitter Newsletter
|
|
QUOTES
| |
QUOTES OF THE MONTH AND BOOK RECOMMENDATION
"The role of the creative leader is not to have all the ideas; it's to create a culture where everyone can have ideas and feel that they're valued." Ken Robinson
"Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or the present are certain to miss the future." John F. Kennedy
"I hope everyone reading this is having a good day. And if you are not just know that in every minute that passes you have the opportunity to change that." Gillian Anderson
MY FAVORITE BOOKS FOR AUGUST 
It's Your Ship by Captain D. Michael AbrashoffThis is a terrific book about workplace culture and how one leader changed the culture in his responsibility pond out in the middle of the ocean! What Got You Here Won't Get You There by Marshall Goldsmith Marshall's book is truly a wake up call to remind leaders to keep growing and learning or plan on getting stuck where you are or worse. How to Build a Space Station by RB Hewertson This book is by yours truly, written in parable format, all about work place values and the enormous role they play in the workplace culture.
|
|
SPREAD THE WORD!
|
I encourage you to share this newsletter with anyone you feel would enjoy it. Remember, past newsletters on a wide variety of leadership topics are located in the archive in the link above right. Just click and read. Enjoy!
See you in October!
Insightfully yours!
Roxi Bahar Hewertson
AskRoxi.com
HighlandConsultingGroupInc.com
|
|
|
Ask Roxi
SEPTEMBER
Question
|
QUESTION:
"What can I do to rebuild a team that is fractured by years of poor leadership?"
ANSWER:
This often means that the people within the team have had no good model nor have they had clear rules of engagement - or ground rules about how they need to operate as a team. So start there.
It's important to see yourself as both the leader AND the coach of this team. That means you need to set and communicate clear expectations about behaviors and results AND you need to help them learn better habits.
People need to feel safe, need to trust each other, and have a sense of group identity before anything really positive can happen.
Teams have their own personalities and levels of emotional intelligence. You will be well-served learning about both. You can do that by having the entire team take the MBTI or DiSC or similar instrument interpreted by a qualified practitioner. And you can measure the 4 quadrants of Emotional Intelligence by becoming familiar with them, looking on line, and then surveying the team about how they think and feel.
You also need to establish your team's purpose, identity, and vision for the future as well as the behavioral values that will underpin all decisions.
I know this sounds like a lot of work - it is a lot of work. And it's got to be done or you'll keep on getting what you've been getting - a dysfunctional team.
Some other things to consider are:
1. Is the membership right?
2. Are the meetings well run?
3. How do you deal with conflicts now? And what needs to change?
Building a healthy team is worth every moment you invest. And right now, given the history, you'll need to build it from the ground up. If you do it together, get everything on the table, you have a good shot at it.
Good luck!
|
|
|
