Lesson 5: The Ripple Effect

Like a stone hitting the water, the ripples of a leaders decision often impact more than the person making the choice. Our decisions in our personal and professional lives ripple into the lives of our colleagues, friends, family members, neighbors, and competitors. The impact can last hours, days, weeks, years, or even a lifetime.

How are you making decisions? In other words, what is guiding you? As the expression states, "if you don't stand for something, you'll fall for everything."

Having a mission, purpose, or compass is a good way to stand for something. Not only is this important to guide your decisions, but it can impact the lives of others. What can others count on making ripples in the waters of your leadership?

One of the best leaders I have ever had the privilege of working for didn't have a fancy degree, outrageous title, or was influenced by politics. This leader had one mission in life - "kids first." This attitude has served him well over the years and has also shaped my own philosophy as a leader.

What do you stand for? What ripples are you making? What ripples can others count on from your leadership? As I steer the waters of leadership, I'm starting to realize that every careless word, careful decision, selfish action, or act of humility has more of an impact on others than I have ever realized.

Lesson 4: Are You a Barrier?

I was recently sitting in a doctor's office waiting room and couldn't help but hear a conversation between two family members, where they were blaming everyone and everything for their troubles. Perhaps they were right, but perhaps they were wrong.

After listening to this conversation, I began to think about how I often play the blame game when things don't quite go my way.

The blame game is dangerous in leadership. Especially, when we blame everyone and everything for our troubles. Sometimes we may need to take an honest look in the mirror to see our world correctly. Here are some questions that I have been pondering in my leadership journey:

1. Do I pose unintentional or unnecessary barriers in my interactions, conversations, and body language to my colleagues?
2. Are my decisions based on my ego or on the needs of others?
3. Do I build others up or tear them down?
4. Do I listen with my ears or with my mouth? 
5. Do I make decisions based on how I feel at the moment? 

Case in point, leaders must have the courage to take on blame and give others the benefit of the doubt. 

Lesson 3: Everyone is Fighting a Battle

About a year ago, I had a very sour attitude about a particular individual. No matter what I tried, nothing worked with this person. It was during this time that I ran into the following quote, which changed my perspective and life:

I was reminded of this quote the other day after talking with a challenging individual, who is often standoffish and difficult to interact with. After a brief conversation with this person, I learned that they have experienced more difficult things in their life than I have ever known. Not to excuse their behavior, but their behavior now makes sense to me because I realized that I needed to approach this individual with a different attitude.

Sometimes leaders forget that everyone has parts of their life that we know nothing about. The seemingly perfect individual may not be so perfect. The rude person may have just receive terrible news. The mistrusting colleague may be experiencing the effects of a life of abuse. 

We may only see one or two dimensions of their life, but we may never truly know their story. The fact is that everyone has one and this story shapes our thoughts, habits, relationships, and motivations. 

Imagine if all leaders could keep this quote in mind. How many misunderstandings could you avoid? How many situations would you navigate differently? How many difficult situations would you not take personally?

Lesson 2: Putting for Empathy

Do you jump to conclusions? If I am honest, I find that I am often more likely to assume the worst in others than assuming the best. Unfortunately this has been a bad habit and shortcoming in my leadership journey for quite some time. It is a bad habit that I would like to change.

A few days ago, I was listening to a speaker talk about the topic of empathy or being able to see things from another's perspective. He used a powerful golf analogy to explain the concept. If you are a non-golfer, perhaps it would be helpful to think of mini-golf instead. 

When most amateur golfers are putting, they often look at the lie of the land from the ball to the hole. Professional golfers have learned to take a walk around the green and stand behind the hole. They want to see the ball from the hole's perspective before they take action. Often millions of dollars are hinging on their decision. 

 

Empathy works the same way. We need to force ourselves to take a walk around the green before we jump to conclusions, retaliate, and make or cast judgements. Before making assumptions and snap-judgements, it can be helpful to see things from another's perspective before we say or do something we will regret. Often our influence as a leader hinges on this decision. 

It takes practice and is a difficult character trait to develop; however, the dividends empathy pays are well worth the effort.

Incubator Lesson 1: Why Would Anyone Become a Leader?

I begin this blog in the midst of a challenging week and era in my life. It pains me to say that I am learning some very hard leadership lessons from my own failures, selfishness, and lack of experience. I find myself in a leadership incubator, sometimes patiently and many times impatiently, waiting for an opportunity to arrive.

Leadership has always been a passion of mine. I've attended conferences, read dozens of books, and tried to fill my resume with as many leadership experiences as possible. With all of the effort I have invested in my own personal leadership journey, I have been surprised to see how challenging leadership truly is. It makes me think of a conversation I had this week with a colleague. We were discussing the question, why would someone ever want to become a leader?  I have to admit, I couldn't think of many good reasons. Then she offered a great answer - we are wired to be leaders.

I dedicate this blog to answering this question in my own life and hopefully yours. I hope that we can learn from my successes and my many, many, many failures.

Matt