Many of us may have had the opportunity of watching one of these TV shows where contestants compete in a singing competition – “Pop Idols, Naija Sings, and Project Fame.” A few times clusters of participants are given a challenge to sing the same song, expectedly done with very different results. The same goes for trainers/teachers facilitating a workshop/class – same content, different appeal; or even business leaders reading out a speech or broadcasters reading the same news on the television. Although in all these situations, the communication is based on the same content (words), it is clear to see who is really communicating with impact, and it is beyond the words.
Effective and impactful communication therefore goes beyond your words. While the words you use are very important your audience has to sieve through the delivery of those words first, and this involves other components that you have to pay attention to. Albert Merhabian, a renowned American psychologist’s research further confirms this. According to him, an audience’s total “liking” of a message (their positive response to it) is made up of 7% verbal (words), 38% vocal (tone) and 55% facial (body language). It means therefore that beyond your words, you should be very concerned about your tonality and body language as you communicate.
Communication therefore has physical and emotional components that have to be contextualized to make it impactful. If your words are not carried within the right physical delivery and emotional context – they become merely words, sometimes empty and only with a 7% chance of being liked by your audience, no matter how much “big grammar” you use.
Going back to the example of singers, trainers, and broadcasters, you can therefore see clearly what gives the very best of these the winning edge. On a personal note, I remember my best and worst speaking events, and the difference is always about how I am able to connect with my audience emotionally, and display a physical presence and connection with them. Surely, saying the right words, and getting your diction right are important, but in the game of public speaking either as a performing musician, politician, public speaker, trainer or broadcaster, everyone expects you to have the right words and diction as a minimum pre-requisite. If you are still struggling with getting the words right, it is almost impossible for example to make it past the audition in a singing competition. In fact Merhabian’s research is gaining stronger ground these days as nobody even knows the lyrics of popular music any longer; it is much more about the beat (tone) and the performance (body language) of the artiste.
To make the emotional connection, your words have to have meaning to the audience, and this even applies in written communication. Using stories and real-life experiences or true to life examples that your audience can latch on to will help make that connection. Don’t write in too much of the abstract, bring home the story with examples that are well known to the audience, and be audience-centric. Using your personal situations and examples also helps the audience to see that your content is not too “theoretical” but that indeed you have real life personal experience – good or bad of the issues. Also, learn to vary and control the tone of your voice and capture the emotions of the underlying words appropriately as you speak. Some speakers go through emotionally charged content with the same consistent flat tone, unable to ride the highs and lows of the content as they deliver. A great remedy for this is to practice inflexion with singing, especially nursery rhymes and children’s songs that have a lot of undulating high and low notes. I think that the time spent watching and singing along on Sesame Street and the Sound of Music with my girls has helped in this regard, and is something I still do.
Connecting physically means that your body language has to be respectful, engaging and confident. Managing the thin line between arrogance and confidence is particularly important. Also, in a bid to be respectful, speakers need to manage the delicate balance between sympathy and empathy. While we empathize with our audience, we must respectfully remain in charge and not over-sympathize and yield to all their needs. You see some teachers, trainers and facilitators get so sympathetic, that they are completely worn out by their audience and this affects their physical delivery and connection. To physically connect, we also need to stay focused on the audience, make eye contact, and use an appropriate amount of gesticulation and movement to convey the words that we speak.
Making a connection with your audience - individual or a group is beyond your words. Getting the words right is important, but quite frankly almost taken for granted. The real impact is felt in the emotional and physical connection. Make sure you make the right physical and emotional connection in your next speaking event (even a one-on-one with your boss, subordinate or client), and communicate with impact!
Saturday, October 16, 2010
Friday, October 1, 2010
Leadership is a Process, by Gbitse Barrow
Do you have a boss, supervisor, manager or CEO who doesn’t meet your expectations as a leader? Are you concerned that your new boss or manager doesn’t have the right attitude, knowledge, skills and behaviour to lead, or are you worried that despite many years in a position of leadership, your boss continues to fall short of everyone’s expectations? These are real life scenarios that play out each day in our workplaces, businesses and communities. Even on a larger scale in society, how satisfied are we of our civil and political leaders and their abilities to lead us effectively and towards success?
If you are dealing with a leader similar to the ones described above, or you suspect that you may be indeed that positional leader who is falling short of the expectation, one of the most important lessons you must learn about leadership is that it is a process, and not an event. Leaders grow each day, and leadership is in itself a journey. The mere fact that you have won an election, started a new business, married a wife,gotten a promotion, or arrived at a position of leadership doesn’t make you a leader. Authentic leadership is about a life-long commitment to learning and transformational change, which is required for you to create the positive influence and success required of you as a leader.
Some of the challenges we have with ourselves as leaders, as well as with our positional leaders is because we haven’t recognized and understood that Leadership is a process and a journey. Through this journey of leadership leaders need to grow and become more aware of themselves by reflecting, asking questions, and getting feedback from the people they lead. The new learnings from this process will enable them adopt different styles and approaches and engage their followers more effectively. A lot of leaders jettison this process, and believe that having arrived at their positions they would all of a sudden achieve a “god-status”, and that all the powers and successes that “leaders” have will suddenly become theirs.
A great example of what I am describing can best be seen when a new leader is promoted from within the team. How can you be so myopic to believe that from the first day you will gain everyone’s respect or buy-in; how can you fit into the shoes of the previous leader so quickly; how can you heal all the wounds of the past and move forward? Honestly, these things take time, which if you do not apply yourself to as a systematic process, may indeed take forever, or actually never happen. A lot of new leaders who were great team members and performers fail to recognize this and fail woefully in their first leadership assignments. I have seen people fall into this trap, and struggle to retrace their steps quickly enough and learn the competencies required to be leaders. Some of them escape, wobble and fumble along to higher positions of leadership, but carry with them forever, the scars of their leadership events, rather than the learnings and changes required of a leadership journey.
Look around today, and think about those examples of positional leaders who are not effective leaders, there is perhaps a lesson or two that can be learned from their first leadership events or positions. As you look at newly appointed or elected leaders who seem not to have what it takes – do endeavour to give them a chance and support them through their journeys. If they are committed to life-long learning and transformational learning like all great leaders should be, then their journey to leadership, although challenging will be blessed with success in the long-run.
As we look around us, we must also look at ourselves, and ask the pertinent questions – How have I dealt with my past and current leadership positions? Is leadership just an event, or am I in a committed systematic process of growing each day as a leader? Whatever your answers may be, just remember that you can re-trace your steps and create a real leadership journey as you continue to grow as leader. Focus on continuous learning, feedback and a willingness to change, and be committed, deliberate and systematic about it!
If you are dealing with a leader similar to the ones described above, or you suspect that you may be indeed that positional leader who is falling short of the expectation, one of the most important lessons you must learn about leadership is that it is a process, and not an event. Leaders grow each day, and leadership is in itself a journey. The mere fact that you have won an election, started a new business, married a wife,gotten a promotion, or arrived at a position of leadership doesn’t make you a leader. Authentic leadership is about a life-long commitment to learning and transformational change, which is required for you to create the positive influence and success required of you as a leader.
Some of the challenges we have with ourselves as leaders, as well as with our positional leaders is because we haven’t recognized and understood that Leadership is a process and a journey. Through this journey of leadership leaders need to grow and become more aware of themselves by reflecting, asking questions, and getting feedback from the people they lead. The new learnings from this process will enable them adopt different styles and approaches and engage their followers more effectively. A lot of leaders jettison this process, and believe that having arrived at their positions they would all of a sudden achieve a “god-status”, and that all the powers and successes that “leaders” have will suddenly become theirs.
A great example of what I am describing can best be seen when a new leader is promoted from within the team. How can you be so myopic to believe that from the first day you will gain everyone’s respect or buy-in; how can you fit into the shoes of the previous leader so quickly; how can you heal all the wounds of the past and move forward? Honestly, these things take time, which if you do not apply yourself to as a systematic process, may indeed take forever, or actually never happen. A lot of new leaders who were great team members and performers fail to recognize this and fail woefully in their first leadership assignments. I have seen people fall into this trap, and struggle to retrace their steps quickly enough and learn the competencies required to be leaders. Some of them escape, wobble and fumble along to higher positions of leadership, but carry with them forever, the scars of their leadership events, rather than the learnings and changes required of a leadership journey.
Look around today, and think about those examples of positional leaders who are not effective leaders, there is perhaps a lesson or two that can be learned from their first leadership events or positions. As you look at newly appointed or elected leaders who seem not to have what it takes – do endeavour to give them a chance and support them through their journeys. If they are committed to life-long learning and transformational learning like all great leaders should be, then their journey to leadership, although challenging will be blessed with success in the long-run.
As we look around us, we must also look at ourselves, and ask the pertinent questions – How have I dealt with my past and current leadership positions? Is leadership just an event, or am I in a committed systematic process of growing each day as a leader? Whatever your answers may be, just remember that you can re-trace your steps and create a real leadership journey as you continue to grow as leader. Focus on continuous learning, feedback and a willingness to change, and be committed, deliberate and systematic about it!
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
The 30 Second Rule
Have you ever wondered what it will feel like to be regarded as a master conversationist and what a tremendous difference it will make in your work or life? Imagine the most successful business and political leaders, sales and marketing professionals, pastors or imams who have mastered the art of great conversations. First impressions they say – last the longest, and create the most impact. Master conversationists like John C Maxwell have further realized that the first 30 seconds can make or mar a conversation and an entire relationship.
When sales people engage a prospect or a client, or when business or political leaders meet and speak to their people, or when service personnel interact with a client, the first 30 seconds makes a great difference. So, how do we typically open a sales call, or a performance feedback session, or a letter or email to a client? Often times we focus on ourselves, hoping to hit the nail on the head and score the much required quick win in the first few seconds of our verbal and written communications. Great conversationists instead of bragging about themselves, their achievements, products or services, spend the first 30 seconds making the other person feel good about themselves.
The golden rule teaches us to treat others as we will like to be treated, so tell me who wouldn’t like to hear something encouraging, thoughtful or even mildly flattering at the beginning of a conversation. When we open our letters, wouldn’t it be great to get a note of thanks from the writer about our previous meeting or letter; when we sit in an appraisal, wouldn’t we like to have our manager open with some encouraging remarks about our work and achievements to date. Well if the answer is yes, then this is exactly the discipline we must learn about opening our own conversations with others.
People feel good when you give them your attention at the beginning of a conversation, and when you are actually focused on them, and not yourself. The 30 second Rule according to Dr Maxwell requires us to spend the first 30 seconds of every conversation giving your attention, providing affirmation, and showing your appreciation to the next person. Each time we do this, you can just feel the person’s energy level and motivation hitting the roof. People who have mastered this art, are always liked and likeable, because everyone loves people who raise their spirits, energy levels and levels of motivation.
People matter, and to win with people requires some deliberate effort in making the best impression right at the beginning. Many people misconstrue putting your best foot forward, as being aggressive about your accomplishments or positive qualities – nothing could be much farther from the truth. Be deliberate; spend time thinking about that other-person-centric opening that you will give to your next conversation. I tried one today, and it really worked – “Hi, I really love the decor in your office, very impressive”, as I made my way into a prospect’s office. The key is to be realistic, spontaneous, yet authentic. Be careful not to come across as rude or over-flattering, but most importantly just do it, and WIN with People!
When sales people engage a prospect or a client, or when business or political leaders meet and speak to their people, or when service personnel interact with a client, the first 30 seconds makes a great difference. So, how do we typically open a sales call, or a performance feedback session, or a letter or email to a client? Often times we focus on ourselves, hoping to hit the nail on the head and score the much required quick win in the first few seconds of our verbal and written communications. Great conversationists instead of bragging about themselves, their achievements, products or services, spend the first 30 seconds making the other person feel good about themselves.
The golden rule teaches us to treat others as we will like to be treated, so tell me who wouldn’t like to hear something encouraging, thoughtful or even mildly flattering at the beginning of a conversation. When we open our letters, wouldn’t it be great to get a note of thanks from the writer about our previous meeting or letter; when we sit in an appraisal, wouldn’t we like to have our manager open with some encouraging remarks about our work and achievements to date. Well if the answer is yes, then this is exactly the discipline we must learn about opening our own conversations with others.
People feel good when you give them your attention at the beginning of a conversation, and when you are actually focused on them, and not yourself. The 30 second Rule according to Dr Maxwell requires us to spend the first 30 seconds of every conversation giving your attention, providing affirmation, and showing your appreciation to the next person. Each time we do this, you can just feel the person’s energy level and motivation hitting the roof. People who have mastered this art, are always liked and likeable, because everyone loves people who raise their spirits, energy levels and levels of motivation.
People matter, and to win with people requires some deliberate effort in making the best impression right at the beginning. Many people misconstrue putting your best foot forward, as being aggressive about your accomplishments or positive qualities – nothing could be much farther from the truth. Be deliberate; spend time thinking about that other-person-centric opening that you will give to your next conversation. I tried one today, and it really worked – “Hi, I really love the decor in your office, very impressive”, as I made my way into a prospect’s office. The key is to be realistic, spontaneous, yet authentic. Be careful not to come across as rude or over-flattering, but most importantly just do it, and WIN with People!
It's not about You!
I haven’t shared this story with many people, but I almost gave up on studying accounting after two years at the University of Lagos. I was doing quite well in the more general subjects, but was struggling in my core accounting subjects. Our financial accounting lecturer contributed in no small measure to this. He was obviously a well-grounded lecturer in accounting, but spent most of the lecture time facing the chalk board, and racing from one end of it to another, turning back once in a while to see most of us utterly confused or making jest of the entire classroom proceedings. As the lectures went on, he would ask questions, and inevitably answer them himself. His teaching style was focused on himself, and it was no surprise that yours truly and quite a good number of his students were not connecting to his classes, and were lagging behind in our grades.
On a more personal note, I learned in my years as a facilitator, and public speaker to be more audience centric drawing from that experience from Unilag. In the early years of the pension industry in Nigeria in 2006, rival Pension Fund Administrators (“PFAs”) would typically be given an opportunity to pitch their services to staff members of the prospect-organization in a town-hall “contest”. Those were perhaps the most fun days of my banking career. I do remember a particular occasion where the number of PFAs had grown from about 7 to 12 or thereabouts, and our host organization had to prune the time slots allotted to each PFA from the usual 30 minutes each to about 10 minutes. It was interesting to watch my colleagues from other PFAs struggle to go through their 72 page power-point slide decks in 10 minutes. Impossible – Yes, but they weren’t thinking too seriously about the audience, and thought that perhaps they could over-run the time, or perhaps do the impossible and squeeze in all that detail into 10 minutes. For most it was a disaster!
As I led our presentation, I decided to ditch power-point, to the great surprise and trepidation of my colleagues, and jotted down 5 points on a piece of paper which later became – ‘the 5 reasons to choose IBTC”, and just spoke to the audience. We delivered in 7 minutes, the clients were happy, we were happy, and trust me, we won! As the industry grew larger and more competitive, we cut down our slide deck into a 5 minute presentation, and named it “IBTC Presentation – 5 minutes”, all in a bid to be audience-centric. Two or three years later when I was leaving the industry, I still found that some of our rival PFAs were still using their 72 page slide decks for 5 minute time slots, but thankfully, a number of them had caught on to the 5 minute presentation templates with fewer slides.
The point is simple – communicating and connecting with people is not about you, your slides, or your fancy presentation. Your audience, be they your students, colleagues, prospects or clients should be the center and focus of your presentation. A combination of immaturity, ego, insecurity or an absolute lack of creativity and out-of-the-box thinking sometimes forces us to focus too much on ourselves while communicating, rather than on the audience.
Earlier on in my speaking career, when I was younger, I often felt so good about the content I was delivering that I seldom cared about whether or not my audience was participating. I just delivered my “perfectly scripted” presentations and awaited the applause from the audience. I often spoke too much and outside the allotted time, and tried to use my talkative nature as an excuse. Somewhere between my ego and immaturity, I like many others just loved to hear my own voice. Nowadays as I facilitate, I take a 2 minute break every 20 minutes to ask – “any questions”, and really try to encourage participation from the audience. I currently employ a variety of engagement approaches including walking around, sitting in the middle of the class, and getting participants to co-facilitate, and most importantly, I try to keep within the allotted time, and indeed talk less. In one-on-one conversations, I often used to dominate every conversation, and was very opinionated. As I built my interest in coaching, I learned that asking engaging questions, practicing active listening and being less prescriptive actually allowed people to “Think for a Change”, and come to realize their full potential by themselves, rather than rely on your “expert” opinions. I also found there was so much more to learn from others.
According to John Maxwell, every time we are in front of an audience – our clients, prospects, colleagues or students, we should reflect on three questions that the audience will like to see you answer in the affirmative before you can make a real connection:
• Do you care for me?
• Can you help me?
• Can I trust you?
If your communication style doesn’t show a genuine care for people, a desire to help them or the fact that you are authentic and can be trusted, it is no surprise that you aren’t winning the hearts of the people you are engaging. The key to impactful communication is not in just being eloquent or having a good command of language. It is really about showing that you care by being audience centric, providing help in a non-prescriptive manner, and building trust by being open about your foibles, and sharing some of your personal struggles and stories.
Remember these three audience expectations next time you have a one-on-one or group conversation, and watch your connections grow!
On a more personal note, I learned in my years as a facilitator, and public speaker to be more audience centric drawing from that experience from Unilag. In the early years of the pension industry in Nigeria in 2006, rival Pension Fund Administrators (“PFAs”) would typically be given an opportunity to pitch their services to staff members of the prospect-organization in a town-hall “contest”. Those were perhaps the most fun days of my banking career. I do remember a particular occasion where the number of PFAs had grown from about 7 to 12 or thereabouts, and our host organization had to prune the time slots allotted to each PFA from the usual 30 minutes each to about 10 minutes. It was interesting to watch my colleagues from other PFAs struggle to go through their 72 page power-point slide decks in 10 minutes. Impossible – Yes, but they weren’t thinking too seriously about the audience, and thought that perhaps they could over-run the time, or perhaps do the impossible and squeeze in all that detail into 10 minutes. For most it was a disaster!
As I led our presentation, I decided to ditch power-point, to the great surprise and trepidation of my colleagues, and jotted down 5 points on a piece of paper which later became – ‘the 5 reasons to choose IBTC”, and just spoke to the audience. We delivered in 7 minutes, the clients were happy, we were happy, and trust me, we won! As the industry grew larger and more competitive, we cut down our slide deck into a 5 minute presentation, and named it “IBTC Presentation – 5 minutes”, all in a bid to be audience-centric. Two or three years later when I was leaving the industry, I still found that some of our rival PFAs were still using their 72 page slide decks for 5 minute time slots, but thankfully, a number of them had caught on to the 5 minute presentation templates with fewer slides.
The point is simple – communicating and connecting with people is not about you, your slides, or your fancy presentation. Your audience, be they your students, colleagues, prospects or clients should be the center and focus of your presentation. A combination of immaturity, ego, insecurity or an absolute lack of creativity and out-of-the-box thinking sometimes forces us to focus too much on ourselves while communicating, rather than on the audience.
Earlier on in my speaking career, when I was younger, I often felt so good about the content I was delivering that I seldom cared about whether or not my audience was participating. I just delivered my “perfectly scripted” presentations and awaited the applause from the audience. I often spoke too much and outside the allotted time, and tried to use my talkative nature as an excuse. Somewhere between my ego and immaturity, I like many others just loved to hear my own voice. Nowadays as I facilitate, I take a 2 minute break every 20 minutes to ask – “any questions”, and really try to encourage participation from the audience. I currently employ a variety of engagement approaches including walking around, sitting in the middle of the class, and getting participants to co-facilitate, and most importantly, I try to keep within the allotted time, and indeed talk less. In one-on-one conversations, I often used to dominate every conversation, and was very opinionated. As I built my interest in coaching, I learned that asking engaging questions, practicing active listening and being less prescriptive actually allowed people to “Think for a Change”, and come to realize their full potential by themselves, rather than rely on your “expert” opinions. I also found there was so much more to learn from others.
According to John Maxwell, every time we are in front of an audience – our clients, prospects, colleagues or students, we should reflect on three questions that the audience will like to see you answer in the affirmative before you can make a real connection:
• Do you care for me?
• Can you help me?
• Can I trust you?
If your communication style doesn’t show a genuine care for people, a desire to help them or the fact that you are authentic and can be trusted, it is no surprise that you aren’t winning the hearts of the people you are engaging. The key to impactful communication is not in just being eloquent or having a good command of language. It is really about showing that you care by being audience centric, providing help in a non-prescriptive manner, and building trust by being open about your foibles, and sharing some of your personal struggles and stories.
Remember these three audience expectations next time you have a one-on-one or group conversation, and watch your connections grow!
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Influence Matters
Organizations often make the mistake of promoting very good sales or technical people to leadership positions without addressing the core issues of their leadership competencies. An excellent sales or operations officer will not necessarily become a great Sales Manager or Operations Director – as there is much more to being a leader than being competent at what you do. Organizations expect that when people arrive at positions of leadership, they will suddenly become leaders, but we all know it doesn’t work out that way. It is no surprise therefore that we often talk about a lot of technically competent people who are not very good at managing teams and leading people. A look around our organizations will reveal that a good number of our positional leaders have no business being in leadership positions at all, and a lot of time is spent by very senior leaders, human resources professionals and coaches to try to build leadership competencies in people who already occupy leadership positions but are already falling short of the expectations, at a huge cost and loss to the organization, and much to the detriment of the lives and careers of the people who they have to lead.
It is also interesting to hear people generally think of leadership training in terms of being focused on people in positions of leadership, rather than thinking about how to build leaders throughout the organization. I have even heard people argue that it is unwise to have too many leaders in an organization (what they must really mean is having too many positional leaders, as we will see below – can you ever have too much of a really good thing?). At the heart of this misnomer is the fact that most people are not clear about what leadership truly is, and how to measure it. On a personal note, my first experience in a leadership position was quite challenging, as I expect it would be for most 25 year olds given the responsibility of supervising 5 people who are all older than they are. I think I was really lucky to have soon learned what leadership really was and how to focus on that most important part of leadership. I didn’t become a leader when I became a Regional Manager, that actually only happened when I began the journey to becoming a person of influence, a journey which is continuous and will God-willing continue all through my life.
Leadership in the words of John Maxwell is Influence – nothing more and nothing less. The earlier we learn how to become a person of positive influence, the better we will be able to cope in leadership positions and grow progressively in our institutions. Forward thinking institutions and leaders must realize that influence skills need to be pervasive in the workplace for the organization to meet its objectives. Influence is about connecting with people, and getting them to achieve the organization’s goals. Influence matters and is applicable to entry level, senior, middle management, executives; as well as to sales people, middle-office or back-office employees. Influence is about making things happen in a broader organizational context – and that is exactly what real leaders do, irrespective of what position they occupy!
Quite an interesting number of organizations tout ‘leadership” as one of their core values or strategies but myopically think about it as something that people become when they attain a particular status or somewhere the organization gets to when it attains a position in its industry.
There needs to be a paradigm shift around what leadership means to individuals and organizations, and we all need to do a bit more to actually build influence throughout our organization and people, irrespective of their positions or titles. Early investments in leadership development and influence skills for younger professionals or even for students will go a long way in ensuring that when people do arrive in positions of leadership, they have already climbed up a few steps to higher levels of leadership. In fact, positional leadership is the most pedestrian level of leadership. Everyone occupies a leadership position – father, mother, husband, wife, teacher, trainer, director, manager, pastor, and priest – but how many of us are real leaders? Our people need to grow beyond their positions or lack thereof, and learn to lead by permission, production, people development and ultimately by personhood – the highest level of leadership where we sit at the height of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and allow our self actualization to reflect in all our relationships and interactions.
We have learnt that like life, leadership is a process, and not a series of events, and our commitment to building influence matters and needs to start earlier rather than later. So if you haven’t started, NOW is a great time!
It is also interesting to hear people generally think of leadership training in terms of being focused on people in positions of leadership, rather than thinking about how to build leaders throughout the organization. I have even heard people argue that it is unwise to have too many leaders in an organization (what they must really mean is having too many positional leaders, as we will see below – can you ever have too much of a really good thing?). At the heart of this misnomer is the fact that most people are not clear about what leadership truly is, and how to measure it. On a personal note, my first experience in a leadership position was quite challenging, as I expect it would be for most 25 year olds given the responsibility of supervising 5 people who are all older than they are. I think I was really lucky to have soon learned what leadership really was and how to focus on that most important part of leadership. I didn’t become a leader when I became a Regional Manager, that actually only happened when I began the journey to becoming a person of influence, a journey which is continuous and will God-willing continue all through my life.
Leadership in the words of John Maxwell is Influence – nothing more and nothing less. The earlier we learn how to become a person of positive influence, the better we will be able to cope in leadership positions and grow progressively in our institutions. Forward thinking institutions and leaders must realize that influence skills need to be pervasive in the workplace for the organization to meet its objectives. Influence is about connecting with people, and getting them to achieve the organization’s goals. Influence matters and is applicable to entry level, senior, middle management, executives; as well as to sales people, middle-office or back-office employees. Influence is about making things happen in a broader organizational context – and that is exactly what real leaders do, irrespective of what position they occupy!
Quite an interesting number of organizations tout ‘leadership” as one of their core values or strategies but myopically think about it as something that people become when they attain a particular status or somewhere the organization gets to when it attains a position in its industry.
There needs to be a paradigm shift around what leadership means to individuals and organizations, and we all need to do a bit more to actually build influence throughout our organization and people, irrespective of their positions or titles. Early investments in leadership development and influence skills for younger professionals or even for students will go a long way in ensuring that when people do arrive in positions of leadership, they have already climbed up a few steps to higher levels of leadership. In fact, positional leadership is the most pedestrian level of leadership. Everyone occupies a leadership position – father, mother, husband, wife, teacher, trainer, director, manager, pastor, and priest – but how many of us are real leaders? Our people need to grow beyond their positions or lack thereof, and learn to lead by permission, production, people development and ultimately by personhood – the highest level of leadership where we sit at the height of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and allow our self actualization to reflect in all our relationships and interactions.
We have learnt that like life, leadership is a process, and not a series of events, and our commitment to building influence matters and needs to start earlier rather than later. So if you haven’t started, NOW is a great time!
Saturday, August 28, 2010
Win With Yourself
People matter - it is no surprise therefore that at the heart of every significant success or woeful failure is a great relationship or a damaged one, respectively. Success therefore lies in your ability to win with people - your clients, prospects, colleagues, staff members, regulators, everyone and anyone. But before we start looking out to win with people, an important first step is to WIN with OURSELVES!
There are many common sayings that reflect the truism behind this thought - "you cannot give what you do not have", "love your neighbour as you love yourself" (you have to love yourself first). It's interesting but true - I watched a TV documentary the other day when a fireman asked the presenter - 'What do you think is the number one lesson you learn as a fireman?", and the presenter answered - "To save other people", "Wrong" responded the fireman, "you learn to save yourself". After all how can you save others if you haven't saved yourself? "Remove the speck in your eye before you talk about the log in others".
To win with you begins with four critical steps in self-discovery around your value. Think about a N500 note for a second, like the one crumpled and stashed away in the Sunday collection box, or twisted and curled up in the satchel around Mama Put's waist. Like it or not that N500 remains N500, no matter how rumpled and squeezed it is. Its value is not determined by its physical state or beauty, instead it is a function of what it is really worth, and what it can achieve. So too is the value of a human being, and indeed ourselves. We need to RECOGNIZE our value and see it beyond our physical looks, external appearances or material well-being. We must define our value based on who we truly are, what we represent, and what we can achieve.
An interesting part of our humanity are our insecurities and foibles, the things we are not very good at, which often create negative thoughts around our self-worth. Despite these "issues" that life brings, we need to ACCEPT our value, and who we really are. Too many times we get distracted by our insecurities, rather than face them and get better at them. To Win with ourselves we need to move further and INCREASE our value by getting rid of the self-limiting beliefs that these insecurities bring. I have heard people say things like - I am just a secretary, I am not an oga; I don't like maths; I am afraid of speaking in public. Remember, you said it, not anyone else. These self limiting beliefs place a lid on yourself and constrain your ability to increase your value.
The final step is to BELIEVE in your value. Package it, refine it, sell it and get paid for it. Never sell yourself cheap or short. You have a unique value that you bring and it is critical to reflect this as you go on along the journey of life. I remember struggling earlier in my career with getting appointments to see Chief Executives of Government parastatals, and getting through their secretaries. I later learned to wear a smile, pray, and think well of myself, and the value that my bank and I were bringing to the parastatal. Once I did, and won the battle within myself, my value began to work for me, as I am sure it would for you.
There are many common sayings that reflect the truism behind this thought - "you cannot give what you do not have", "love your neighbour as you love yourself" (you have to love yourself first). It's interesting but true - I watched a TV documentary the other day when a fireman asked the presenter - 'What do you think is the number one lesson you learn as a fireman?", and the presenter answered - "To save other people", "Wrong" responded the fireman, "you learn to save yourself". After all how can you save others if you haven't saved yourself? "Remove the speck in your eye before you talk about the log in others".
To win with you begins with four critical steps in self-discovery around your value. Think about a N500 note for a second, like the one crumpled and stashed away in the Sunday collection box, or twisted and curled up in the satchel around Mama Put's waist. Like it or not that N500 remains N500, no matter how rumpled and squeezed it is. Its value is not determined by its physical state or beauty, instead it is a function of what it is really worth, and what it can achieve. So too is the value of a human being, and indeed ourselves. We need to RECOGNIZE our value and see it beyond our physical looks, external appearances or material well-being. We must define our value based on who we truly are, what we represent, and what we can achieve.
An interesting part of our humanity are our insecurities and foibles, the things we are not very good at, which often create negative thoughts around our self-worth. Despite these "issues" that life brings, we need to ACCEPT our value, and who we really are. Too many times we get distracted by our insecurities, rather than face them and get better at them. To Win with ourselves we need to move further and INCREASE our value by getting rid of the self-limiting beliefs that these insecurities bring. I have heard people say things like - I am just a secretary, I am not an oga; I don't like maths; I am afraid of speaking in public. Remember, you said it, not anyone else. These self limiting beliefs place a lid on yourself and constrain your ability to increase your value.
The final step is to BELIEVE in your value. Package it, refine it, sell it and get paid for it. Never sell yourself cheap or short. You have a unique value that you bring and it is critical to reflect this as you go on along the journey of life. I remember struggling earlier in my career with getting appointments to see Chief Executives of Government parastatals, and getting through their secretaries. I later learned to wear a smile, pray, and think well of myself, and the value that my bank and I were bringing to the parastatal. Once I did, and won the battle within myself, my value began to work for me, as I am sure it would for you.
Influence Brings Recognition, by NIKE Oni
"One is too small a number to achieve Greatness" John Maxwell
The entire concept of a "self-made man" is one of the greatest fallacies of life. Indeed, one is too small a number to achieve success, and if we think about it, all the greatly successful people we know worked with a team to achieve their success. Even as he sat alone in solitary confinement for a good part of his prison life, Mandela's success could not have been achieved without the "team" of ANC members inside and outside the prison, who he frequently communicated with using secret letters and messages. Even when the means of conveying these secret messages was truncated, the virtual team work continued, as the team understood each other so well.
In the workplace, we find many managers who supposedly lead a team, but in reality are lone rangers. It is no surprise therefore that they struggle to achieve success, and gain the recognition for all their toil and hard work. The problem isn't that they are not smart or hard working; it is rather that they are attempting to achieve success without involving their team. Like Mandela, great team leaders not only achieve success, but actually get most of the recognition and attention, which as hard as they try to share with the rest of the team; the world continues to give them the accolades.
If you are struggling with success in your team at work, perhaps you should start asking; how much of a team player or team leader you really are? There are four clear reasons why many of us fail to leverage the full potential of our teams and by extension limit our success potential. Some of us are caught up in our ego. I once heard a CEO say to his management team that I am always right, I have all the ideas, all the solutions, and with or without you, I will be fine". It's no surprise that his team is not very creative, does not challenge his thinking, and that the company's potential is limited. There are other leaders who are just naïve about the limitations of their capabilities, and never tap into the potential and prospects of their teams. In their naivety, they find out way too late, that indeed the world does not revolve around them.
The worst case of this problem is with leaders who are insecure. Their greatest fear is that one of their team members will surpass their abilities. Leaders who are insecure are really lazy and incompetent, and are not willing to take up new challenges, or break new barriers. Even if your staffs tries to catch up with you because of what you have invested in them, you will always be on the lead yourself, because as you let go of smaller things, you will rise to greater ones.
Sometimes our natural temperament and disposition, do not allow us to get the best of our working with others in a team. A great example of someone who must have over-come this, is Mr Bill Gates himself, who is reputed to have Asperger syndrome, which is a condition that naturally limits social skills in people. Despite Asperger, Mr Gates has gone on to build perhaps the most potent team in the world by gathering people of diverse skills, and interests, buying out young innovators and integrating them into the Microsoft team.
Personally, I have had situations in my former place of work, where my temperament had not allowed me to connect with my team. Yes, I had it all within me, but found it quite difficult to relate ideas with my team because I always felt they were insignificant to the work in question, only to find out when it was too late that, just that 'little' could have made a great impact.
Dear Manager, struggling to achieve success all by yourself, even those with naturally mitigating factors like Bill Gates have conquered their temperament, and built great teams. I think it's time to link up and subdue your ego, rise above your naivety, and set aside your insecurity, to build your team, achieve the success that seems to elude you, and get the recognition that you desire.
The entire concept of a "self-made man" is one of the greatest fallacies of life. Indeed, one is too small a number to achieve success, and if we think about it, all the greatly successful people we know worked with a team to achieve their success. Even as he sat alone in solitary confinement for a good part of his prison life, Mandela's success could not have been achieved without the "team" of ANC members inside and outside the prison, who he frequently communicated with using secret letters and messages. Even when the means of conveying these secret messages was truncated, the virtual team work continued, as the team understood each other so well.
In the workplace, we find many managers who supposedly lead a team, but in reality are lone rangers. It is no surprise therefore that they struggle to achieve success, and gain the recognition for all their toil and hard work. The problem isn't that they are not smart or hard working; it is rather that they are attempting to achieve success without involving their team. Like Mandela, great team leaders not only achieve success, but actually get most of the recognition and attention, which as hard as they try to share with the rest of the team; the world continues to give them the accolades.
If you are struggling with success in your team at work, perhaps you should start asking; how much of a team player or team leader you really are? There are four clear reasons why many of us fail to leverage the full potential of our teams and by extension limit our success potential. Some of us are caught up in our ego. I once heard a CEO say to his management team that I am always right, I have all the ideas, all the solutions, and with or without you, I will be fine". It's no surprise that his team is not very creative, does not challenge his thinking, and that the company's potential is limited. There are other leaders who are just naïve about the limitations of their capabilities, and never tap into the potential and prospects of their teams. In their naivety, they find out way too late, that indeed the world does not revolve around them.
The worst case of this problem is with leaders who are insecure. Their greatest fear is that one of their team members will surpass their abilities. Leaders who are insecure are really lazy and incompetent, and are not willing to take up new challenges, or break new barriers. Even if your staffs tries to catch up with you because of what you have invested in them, you will always be on the lead yourself, because as you let go of smaller things, you will rise to greater ones.
Sometimes our natural temperament and disposition, do not allow us to get the best of our working with others in a team. A great example of someone who must have over-come this, is Mr Bill Gates himself, who is reputed to have Asperger syndrome, which is a condition that naturally limits social skills in people. Despite Asperger, Mr Gates has gone on to build perhaps the most potent team in the world by gathering people of diverse skills, and interests, buying out young innovators and integrating them into the Microsoft team.
Personally, I have had situations in my former place of work, where my temperament had not allowed me to connect with my team. Yes, I had it all within me, but found it quite difficult to relate ideas with my team because I always felt they were insignificant to the work in question, only to find out when it was too late that, just that 'little' could have made a great impact.
Dear Manager, struggling to achieve success all by yourself, even those with naturally mitigating factors like Bill Gates have conquered their temperament, and built great teams. I think it's time to link up and subdue your ego, rise above your naivety, and set aside your insecurity, to build your team, achieve the success that seems to elude you, and get the recognition that you desire.
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