Tag Archives: Oprah Winfrey

If No One is Following You Aren’t Leading

Personal Development • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

images (8)Whether you are in a management position or play a leadership role in your organization, the challenges remain the same. New leadership skills are required for the workplace of today and the next decade. Not everyone chooses to lead – but everyone gets to choose who they want to follow. What do you look for in the leaders you follow?

Worth Remembering … “One of the most important things about being a good leader is to lead with a heart. You have to know the business, but you also have to know what’s at the heart of business and that’s people.” – Oprah Winfrey

Daniel Goleman, in his groundbreaking book Working with Emotional Intelligence, might have said it best: “We are being judged by a new yardstick: not just how smart we are, or by our training and expertise, but also by how well we handle ourselves and each other.” Soft-skills, your ability to communicate and interact more effectively with others, now plays a more pivotal role in your success and the overall success of your organization. You stand little chance of winning the hearts, minds and hands of those you lead without the ability to connect with them.

Worth Remembering … “Communication is the breakfast of Champions.” – Ken Blanchard

All the great leaders: Churchill, Lincoln, Roosevelt, Thatcher, Trudeau and Clinton, they all had one thing in common – they had the ability to communicate. They had the ability to communicate in such a way that you could see a future that you wanted to be part of.  The power of the spoken and unspoken word can’t be overlooked. The words you choose and how you go about saying them can be a catalyst for action or in-action. You can build people up or tear them down simply by the tone of your voice and the non-verbal message your body language sends. Regardless of your political beliefs, President Barack Obama’s ability to communicate and connect with others inspired a Nation – and changed our World forever. Agreed, leaders also need to be patient, understanding, flexible and great listeners. But, if you can’t communicate in a way that others will want to follow – then you aren’t leading.

I believe you aren’t born a great communicator but, I believe you can learn to become one. Here are a few suggestions on ways to communicate and interact more effectively with others.

  • Provide regular opportunities for informal, casual discussions. This is a great exercise for building collaborative teams.
  • Check for points of disagreement or misunderstanding by being more intuitive to the non-verbal signals being sent. Ask closed questions for clarity. Ask open-ended questions to promote dialogue.
  • Listen more than you talk.
  • When giving instructions use direct, to-the-point communication without a lot of social chatter. Too much information muddies the water and tends to confuse rather than inform.
  • Use two-way dialogue, responding to a person’s feelings is just as important as what is being said.

Give them a try. After all – the worse thing that could happen is you’ll draw a crowd. And for today’s leaders, that’s not such a bad thing.

Copyright (C) 2013. Brian Smith – Reformed Control Freak. Brian is available for speaking engagements and seminars on a variety of topics including: communication, dealing with difficult people and challenging situations and leadership development. To find out more visit http://briansmithpld.com

Soft Skills for a Hard Place

Personal Development • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

millennials-200x192Daniel Goleman in his groundbreaking book “Working with Emotional Intelligence” might have said it best: “We are being judged by a new yardstick; not just how smart we are, or by our training and expertise, but also by how we handle ourselves and each other”.  Times have certainly changed. I think there has been a dramatic shift in people’s attitudes. Their wants and needs are changing. For the first time in our lifetime we have the potential of working with 4 different generations in the same workplace at the same time. Each generation communicates and interacts differently and want to be managed and manage differently. Each generation have a different set of values and career aspirations. For the newest generation – the Millennials – life outside of work is just as important,  if not more important,  then life inside work. Each generation is motivated by different things. What you need to decide now is – will the management style that got you here – be the same style that will sustain you or get you to where you need to go? Is one style of managing and leading others good enough?

Worth Remembering … “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing – expecting a different result” – Albert Einstein

Productivity is still the name of the game and that will never change. One of your roles as a manager or leader has always been to minimize the input and maximize the output. In today’s ever-changing, competitive global marketplace you need to produce more with less. Your survival and your company’s survival demands it. To accomplish both – managers and leaders must change from being task-focused to being people-focused. People like to work with people they like. People like to feel wanted. People like to feel that they are appreciated and respected.

Worth Remembering … “One of the most important things about being a good manager is to rule with a heart. You have to know the business, but you also have to know what’s at the heart of every business and that’s people”. – Oprah Winfrey

Technical skills are important but, for the most part, you can get that out of a book or Google it. What is needed to be successful managing and leading others in the 21st Century are soft-skills, sometimes referred to as people skills. Successful managers and leaders will be those who have developed great soft-skills for a hard place. Successful managers and business leaders are F.O.C.U.S.E.D. (C) on their most important asset – their people.

Friendly: Someone who can smile and say hello. Someone who can make the other person feel important.

Observant: Someone who can recognize those that need help and those that don’t. Someone who will get out of their way and let them do the job.

Consistent: Some who is consistent in the way that they apply policies and procedures. Consistent in the way they treat people and deal with situations.

Understanding: Someone who tries to see things from the other person’s point of view. Empathy is a valuable 21st Century skill to have.

Sincere: Someone who truly wants their people to be successful at what they do. Managing and leading others is a team sport – create win-wins.

Energized: Someone who is enthusiastic. Someone who looks and acts like they want to be there.

Dependable: Someone whose word they can depend on. Someone they can trust. If they can’t trust your word they won’t trust you.

Are you F.O.C.U.S.E.D.?  🙂

Copyright (c) 2013. Brian Smith-PLD. Brian is the author of “Confessions of a Reformed Control Freak – The Top Ten Sins Most Managers Make & How to Avoid Them”. Looking for a speaker? Planning a lunch-n-learn or organizing a workshop? Contact Brian. briansmithpld@gmail.com

 

You Couldn’t Pay Me Enough to Work Here 3

Leadership Development, Personal Development • Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

bxp59950Staff engagement – it’s rarely about the money. They stay because of the people they work with. They stay because it’s a fun place to work. They stay because they see an opportunity for advancement. According to a recent survey conducted by Aon Hewitt, employee engagement in North America is at an all time low – down to 63% of the workforce. If those numbers are accurate that means 37% of your employees are not engaged, they are just going through the motions, or worse yet, they are actively disengaged, and our bent on trying to undermine what you and your engaged employees are trying to accomplish. That means 37 % of your staff have turned off or have tuned out.

Worth Remembering … “Get to know your people, what they do well, what they enjoy doing, what their weaknesses and strengths are, and what they want and need from their job” – Robert Townsend

What are you doing to retain the talent you have? Every organization has an identity – a culture that is best described as the values, beliefs and attitudes that are shared by everyone in the company. It starts at the top and trickles down. It never starts from the bottom and trickles up. Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos believes that if you get the culture right, then a lot of really amazing things happen on their own. What are you doing to engage the hearts and minds of everyone in the company? Answers to exit interviews conducted by the Saratoga Institute and outlined in Leigh Branham’s book “The Seven Hidden Reasons Employee’s Leave” may hold a few clues. According to those surveyed “Workers felt devalued and unrecognized, workers suffered from stress due to overwork and work-life balance and there was a loss of trust and confidence in senior management”

  • You’ve got to give people a reason to stay.
  • You’ve got to make them feel part of the process by soliciting their input.
  • You’ve got to communicate often by letting them know how well they are doing
  • You’ve got to let them in on your plans for the future, where they fit in and where the organization is going.

Worth Remembering … “One of the most important things about being a good manager is to rule with a heart. You have to know the business, but you also have to know what’s at the heart of business and that’s people.” – Oprah Winfrey

What are you doing to attract new talent? Everyone is competing for the same recruit. Why would someone want to work for your company instead of your competitors? And remember it’s not about the money. You just can’t sit back and throw money at them. At some point you won’t be able to pay them enough money to stay. According to a 2012 Bersin survey, $720 million per year is spent on employee engagement without much of a return on that investment.  If you want to attract new talent then you need to understand what they are looking for in the companies they choose to work with and commit to changing the way you communicate and interact. Life outside of work has become just as important, if not more important, than life at work. Especially among Millennials who will make up 50 % of the workforce by 2020. What are you doing to promote a healthy balanced life-style?  Advancement should be based on merit not on seniority. What training dollars are you willing to invest in their future? If you aren’t willing to invest in them, then don’t expect them to invest in you. Do you have a mentorship program? Have you identified your next crop of managers and enrolled them in your management development program? Can they work at home or do you offer a flexible work schedule? Company mission statements, values and code of conduct should be more than just fancy platitudes. You and everyone in the organization need to “live” them.

  • You’ve got to give people a reason why they would want to work for you
  • You’ve got to make them feel part of the process by soliciting their input
  • You’ve got to communicate often by letting them know how well they are doing
  • You’ve got to let them in on your plans for the future, where they fit in and where the organization is going.

I hope you are starting to see a pattern here? People are people – it doesn’t matter what generation you are from – we all want the same thing. We want to be seen and treated as partners. We want to work for an organization that wants us to be successful and are willing to invest time, energy and resources in us. And we want to work for an organization that makes us feel valued and trusted. 

Copyright (C) 2013. Brian Smith – Reformed Control Freak. Looking for a speaker? Planning a lunch-n-learn or training session? Let’s talk. briansmithpld@gmail.com. To find out more about Brian and what he can do for you and your organization visit – http://briansmithpld.com