Many leaders consider it their job to provide answers. And by leader we mean anyone who needs people, of any age, to follow in order to get things done. This unfortunate and common misunderstanding of the job-description creates all sorts of problems, including: poor financial results, poor employee engagement, poor loyalty, and not very much fun.
A leader’s job, rather, is to create the environment for innovation and help people discover the best possible answers that will result in the best possible outcomes. This is most likely to happen when you take the following 6 steps:
1. Seek out people completely unlike yourself in terms of experience, view of the business and client, and beliefs
2. Ask questions, listen deeply, and pay intense attention
3. Pause for reflection
4. Decide, and then act quickly on a small scale
5. Observe, learn from the results, and adjust accordingly
6. Act in a big, bold way that would have been impossible had you decided and acted alone
Seems fairly straight-forward, no? Then why do we often see this practice instead?
- Decide alone or with like minds, act, and fail to meet desired outcomes
- Repeat and talk about “holding people accountable” then
- Repeat, possibly firing people who aren’t “team players” then
- Fail on a grand scale…which leads to at least two options:
- Leave, blaming the failure on others, and repeat the process elsewhere,
or
- Try something new.
For examples of this leadership technique and its aftermath you can look to Wall Street, American auto-makers, or the Oakland Raiders since 2003, to name a few heart-wrenching examples (for a long-time Raiders fan, that is).
No leader wants to fail. So, why are so many smart, competitive, well-meaning leaders continuously trying to impose their ideas on others, wondering why people don’t always line up in compliance or why results aren’t up to expectations? Answer: years of conditioning and a millennia of programming.
Let’s briefly look at how we often get derailed on our way through the 6 steps in the high-performing process.
Step 1
First off, step 1 (seeking diverse views) is counterintuitive. Our brains are wired with a bias to surround ourselves with people like us. To engage with people unlike ourselves entails overcoming our primitive conditioning to fear or mistrust anyone “different.” It takes a very mindful and confident person to admit that he has this bias, and then act against it.
Step 2-3
Second, steps 2 through 3 (ask questions, listen, pay attention, pause) involve going slow to go fast. And Americans (among others) are generally conditioned to prefer fast. It takes incredible discipline to slow down amidst the competitive pressures and the habit of speed. The pressure to act quickly (and autonomously) is even more intense when leaders are new to a role or expectations and pressures are high.
Step 4-5
Steps 4 and 5 are all about course-correcting based on available evidence. The problem here lies in evaluating evidence objectively, instead of skewing the data (even subconsciously) to prove our assumptions and biases correct. A wise scientist once spoke: “I have trained myself to see what I observe.” One way to ensure that you “see” clearly is to consult people who see the world differently from you, then listen objectively to their feedback, ready to see flaws in your brilliant prototype. Or, you could just plow ahead with your “Flat Earth” campaign and see how that works for you.
Step 6
Finally, step 6 (acting boldly) requires leaders to take a leap of faith. Smart, analytical people can get caught up in scenario planning and fail to act. If you’ve ever been on a team that suffered from “analysis paralysis” you know how draining such inaction can be.
Though challenging and counterintuitive, it can be done: we can intentionally create the conditions for productive innovation. And recall that the first step requires us to seek out council from potentially unlikely sources.
What is possible in conversation
Otto Scharmer of the Presencing Institute describes ground-breaking work with African Leaders. They convened a forum where the most powerful leaders in Africa conversed with the least powerful people imaginable: child victims of AIDS. After one 90-minute conversation with an 11-year old girl, one ex-president changed his point of view and was ready to act differently and with passionate intent. All it took was a conversation.
Conversations with differing people are not that hard to set up, yet we tend to avoid things that slow us down in the short term. But at what cost?
The U.S. military conducts “ground truth” conversations, where the highest ranking officers seek input and listen to lower ranking troops. For, when Generals and politicians act without such insight, really bad stuff tends to happen.
How often are rich, lively, cross-functional conversations taking place in your organization? What would happen if they were commonplace?
Imagine what could be different about the conversations (and results) in your world.
Resources:
Questions for reflection and inspiration:
- How am I listening to people I disagree with?
- How readily do people bring me bad news or disagree with me?
- How am I at creating spaces of silence where reflection, thought, and inspiration can happen?
- Whom can I seek out to better understand the issue from another side?
- How do I feel about my results in all aspects of my life?
Video:
This three minute video features a leader (conductor) with his orchestra and guest star performer. Pay careful attention to the conductor at about 2:45 into the video. How is the conductor, not the vocal artist, the leader? How does the conductor let go? What arises when he lets go?
Books:
Presence, Human Purpose and the Field of the Future, by Peter M. Senge, C. Otto Scharmer, Joseph Jaworski, and Betty Sue Flowers
The Art of Possibility, Rosamund Stone Zander and Benjamin Zander
Blink, Malcolm Gladwell
Links:
Presencing Institute: http://www.presencing.com/
The World Café: http://www.theworldcafe.com/
Quotes:
No one can whistle a symphony. It takes an orchestra to play it.
- H.E. Luccock
We can’t solve problems using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.
- Einstein
Poem/Song excerpt:
Feel the pain
Talk about it…
Open hearts
Feel about it
Open minds
Think about it …
Time to eat all your words
Swallow your pride
Open your eyes…
And anything is possible when you’re
Sowing the seeds of love
Anything is possible
Sowing the seeds of love
- Tears for Fears
Our doubts are traitors,
and make us lose
the good we oft might win
by fearing to attempt.
- Shakespeare
Conversations for Brilliance
