Leadership lessons from 2015

2015 was quite a year. Truth be told, it was the most challenging, most frustrating, and most energizing year of my career (so far). It was a year of significant change and immense personal growth for me as a leader.

In this post I’m going to share some of the things I’ve learned this year because I suspect some of you might be going through similar challenges in the coming year.

Leadership isn’t a popularity contest

“A man who is influenced by the polls or is afraid to make decisions which make him unpopular is not a man to represent the welfare of the country. – Harry S. Truman “

When I first took over the team I’ve led for the last few years, I made some quick positive changes. The team overwhelmingly supported these changes and the feedback I got was great. Then something else happened about a year ago. I realized we needed more significant change across all aspects of our business. It meant changing job descriptions and roles for a lot of people. It meant asking some people to leave the organization, and hiring new people with different skills and traits. It also meant restructuring much of the way we do our work so that we could deliver more value for our clients.

I was naïve because I thought that with early successes and support under my belt and a bold vision for a better future I could get everyone to easily buy into this change. I couldn’t have been more wrong! Bringing about complex, meaningful change in an organization can be a herculean task. And you quickly realize you can’t please everyone all of the time.

The response to this change – even though I thought I had done great work preparing the team – was considerably more negative than I anticipated. It resulted in angry calls. Angry emails. Gossip across the office. Some really good people decided to leave our organization. It even resulted in virulent anonymous online posts proclaiming that I was ruining our company, as well as former employees continually reaching out to current staff to tell them how terrible I was. This was a huge gut punch. A major blow to my ego that shook my confidence.

But something else happened. Clients began to call and email to tell me that the changes were working. They understood why we did what we did, and that they were pleased with the increased value they were experiencing. We still had (and have) a lot of things to improve. But this feedback confirmed that our vision and direction were correct.

What I learned from this is that leadership is about doing what is right, not what is popular. I’m human, so of course I hope that people like me. But going through this process helped me to realize that more important than being liked is doing what is right for our people, our clients, and our organization – even when the right things are unpopular in the moment.

Communicate early and often

The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place. – George Bernard Shaw

There were times throughout 2015 where I thought I had delivered an important message to my team, only to find out the words I had said – no matter how eloquent – hadn’t exactly landed. In some cases they hadn’t landed at all. Other times my initial message got through, and I was pleased with myself for effectively communicating. But I didn’t do enough to communicate that message on an ongoing basis to keep people focused. This led to confusion, frustration, and missed opportunities for people on my team.

If we as leaders aren’t communicating our vision and direction clearly and continually, we leave our people wondering if anything has changed or if they’re still on the right path to success. When that information gap exists, people begin to tell themselves stories – and the stories they tell themselves are almost always worse than the reality.

Be clear in your communication. Use words and phrases that are easy to understand – don’t try to impress people by showing them you know how to use big words – and communicate your message frequently. Just when you think you’ve communicated enough, do it again, because chances are you haven’t.

Authenticity is critical

Authenticity is the daily practice of letting go of who we think we’re supposed to be and embracing who we are. – Brene’ Brown

Throughout the change process I’ve been leading over the last year I’ve tried to keep a positive, upbeat perspective – a hope for the future, if you will. I’ve focused on our desired future reality, talked a lot about the benefit of where we’re going, and how great it will be once we get there.

Behind the scenes it was a bit of a different story. I’ve dealt with a lot throughout this process. I’ve spent weeks apart from my family (so much so that my oldest daughter called me one day and said, “Dad, when are you coming home? I forgot what your face looks like.”), and been stressed more than I have been in over a decade. My work schedule on many days spanned from 5am – 10pm (sometimes even longer). My eating and exercise habits suffered because of the brutal schedule that I kept. At times I’ve been completely overcome with fear – fear that I didn’t have what it takes to lead change like this. Fear that the decisions I was making – though I believe 100% in our direction – would somehow hurt the people I’m leading.

Through most of this process, I kept all of this to myself, confiding only in my spouse and a few other key leaders in my organization. I thought I was doing the right thing by exemplifying strength and determination for my team. What I didn’t realize is that during this time many of our people were also overwhelmed, overloaded, and hurting. One bold staff member finally summoned the courage to address this saying, “We’re over here killing ourselves, and you’re always smiling and talking about what a positive future we have to look forward to!”

That’s when I realized my attempt to shield my team from the true challenges I was facing as their leader in this process had created an authenticity gap that I needed to address immediately. By sharing my own personal struggles with my team it helped them understand that I was experiencing many of the same challenges they were – that we were truly in this together – and that in spite of the challenges, together we could still find a path forward to a more successful future.

If you don’t care about people, you should quit

Life’s most urgent and persistent question is, ‘What are you doing for others?’ – Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Leading is about serving others. It’s about pouring into other people to help make them better. Better at work and better at home. As a leader, you can’t succeed at this if you don’t truly care about your people.

If your motivation is personal gain, more money, or being the top dog, it’s probably time for you to find another career.

Success as a leader comes from developing others, from helping them identify and unlock their strengths so that they can grow and add value to their peers, clients, family, and community. Your job isn’t to bark orders and micromanage their work. Your job is to build your people up and release them to do their best work.

Simply put, leadership is all about them, not about you.

Invest disproportionately in your top performers

Taking initiative pays off. It’s hard to visualize someone as a leader if she is always waiting to be told what to do. – Sheryl Sandberg

This is something I learned years ago as an athlete. The idea is that the most capable, highest performers on a team should get the most focus from the coach. It can often be misconstrued to be favoritism, but it isn’t (remember, as I tell my four year old, fair doesn’t mean equal). It’s the understanding that pouring leadership into your strongest players will deliver significantly greater returns than putting all of your efforts toward improving your weakest players. I’m not suggesting you should neglect poor performers. On the contrary, you should appropriately invest resources to help them improve. But 80% of your resources ought to be put to work to enhance the already strong performance of your best people.

Attitude is everything

A leader’s attitude is caught by his or her followers more quickly than his or her actions. – John C. Maxwell

There is huge truth in this. Show me a team or department with a negative reputation in your organization and I’ll show you a leader with a negative attitude and outlook.

As a leader, if others are coming to you and telling you that your people have bad attitudes, don’t immediately try to fix your team. Instead, take a long hard look in the mirror. Fix yourself first. Model the behavior you want to see in your people. Once you’ve credibly changed, coach them to change and communicate your expectation for their future behavior.

You can’t coach character

The truth of the matter is that you always know the right thing to do. The hard part is doing it. – General Norman Schwarzkopf

If you’ve hired someone of questionable character, you only have one option. You must help them leave your organization swiftly and with dignity. In matters of skill, invest the hours and effort to train and support your people. But don’t assume you can fix character flaws. If you have an employee who lies, cheats, steals, or is unwilling to accept critical feedback, it’s unlikely that any amount of training or coaching will fix the problem. You, your people, your clients, and your organization are much better off helping this employee depart your organization.

Move quickly. Every minute you delay communicates to the rest of your people that you condone the behaviors that come with character flaws.

Be honest. Even when it hurts.

Honesty is an expensive gift. Don’t expect it from cheap people. – Warren Buffett

As a leader there comes a time when you’ll have to give someone bad news. Sometimes it’ll happen more frequently than you’d like. It could be as simple as providing constructive feedback to someone who has been a close friend, or maybe you need to have a crucial conversation about someone’s inappropriate behavior.

What I’ve learned over the last year is that there is no substitute for quickly and honestly dealing with people. Your people deserve to know where they stand. They want to know how they’re doing, what success looks like, and what they need to do to improve. And you owe it to them not to sugar coat the information you share.

The true sign of a strong leader is the ability to deliver honest information in good times and bad, and to help your people chart a course to improvement through difficulty and challenge.

Take care of yourself

The core of true success is love. And that includes loving yourself enough to take care of yourself! – Zig Ziglar

You probably hear people all the time say that great leaders put their people before themselves. That’s really a bad leadership philosophy. In many respects it might be true – but a leader who continually puts his people before himself risks burnout, poor health, depression, and a lot of other consequences.

As a leader, if you aren’t taking care of yourself (i.e., eating right, exercising, learning, making time for reflection and relaxation), you won’t be able to care for your people at an optimal level. Over the last year, primarily because of my challenging workload, I’ve made some huge changes. I’ve walked over 400 miles. I’ve cut many processed foods and drinks out of my diet. I’ve made a commitment to reading and learning more regularly, and for the first time in years I took two weeks of vacation with my family. I mean real vacation. I didn’t look at work email, didn’t answer work calls. And you know what? The world didn’t crumble. I have highly capable people on my team, and they were able to lead our business while I was away. This time away helped to refresh and recharge me, to improve my relationship with my wife and daughters, and helped me come back to work with renewed vigor.

I know how hard it is to make time for these things. It’s a trade-off between doing something for yourself, or doing something for someone else – and choosing yourself feels selfish. It is. But not in a bad way. Because taking care of yourself first means you’ll have greater capacity to take care of those who depend on you.

I hope some of these things that I learned over the last 365 days help you as well. What leadership lessons did you learn in the last year?

Wishing you a Happy and Successful 2016!