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

 Most of us have the tendency to rush in giving advice to other people but what is it that prevents most leaders to be ‘coach-like’ to their team?

In this post, Steve explains why by just being like a coach, great work can happen – to the person being coached, to the organization, to the leader himself and to the world.

It’s not a question of knowledge because there are tons of books and podcasts where we can learn and gain knowledge from, but if you really want to shift the way you show up to the world, you have to understand what it takes to change your behaviour and habits.

“A lot of people have gone further than they thought they could because someone else thought they could.” – Zig Ziglar

Learn Why You Might need Coaching

To answer the question above as to why leaders can’t or refuse to coach are that the word ‘coaching’ carries a lot of baggage for most people and they feel they don’t have time for this airy-fairy stuff.

But what they don’t realize is, being more coach-like doesn’t only help others but also themselves because it allows them to free up time to focus on big-picture and strategic issues.

There are 3 principles of coaching:

– be lazy,

– be curious, and

– be often.

Six questions

And to implement the coaching principals here are six questions that actually help others grow by enabling them to become more competent, more confident, have more impact and have more autonomy.

Read more about how to ask questions

1. What’s on your mind? – the kickstart question that lets the other person choose what he wants to talk about which helps to get into the real conversation right away

2. And what else? – this is the best coaching question in the world because it’s powerful. Usually, the first answer somebody gives you is never the only answer and it’s rarely the best answer. What it does is it deepens and adds more value from any other question and it also serves as a self-management tool for the leader to slow down the rush to action and advice-giving

3. What’s the real challenge here for you? – this is a focus question and the key here is that the first challenge that shows up is almost never the real challenge. This question digs deeper into what really needs to be figured out.

4. What do you want? – this is a foundation question. Interestingly, most people actually don’t know what they really want. If they get clear on that, so many things fall away as they get laser-focused on the things that matter.

5. How can I help? – the lazy question. It helps you calibrate how much you know and how much you don’t know. This question slows down people to rush into action and it’s a way to make sure that leaders understand them before jumping into action.

6. If you’re going to say ‘yes’ to this what must you say ‘no’ to? – this is a strategic question that makes the opportunity cost more obvious

Final Thoughts

When leaders act more coach-like it can actually make us more influential to other people and to the world. Having the answers is not the outcome that we want but it’s allowing others to find the answer.

Learn More About Using Steve As A Coach

When a new leader begins their role they often get a surprise.

They’re shocked at the time it takes to manage personal and professional relationships at work.

Their success can come down to seeing the warning signs and having the skills to deal with them.

Until you’ve actually been a leader, it’s tricky to develop the specific leadership skills and qualities you need to be effective. To help you get there faster, here are five signs your leadership skills could use some work—and what you can do about it. 

Surprise #1: You really can’t run everything.  

A leader doesn’t need to have a toe dipped in every single pool at work. Sure, you want to know what’s going on and be consulted when necessary. But trying to run everything single-handedly will ultimately lead to burnout, making mistakes, and ineffective leadership.

There are a few instances when micromanaging can be a useful tactic. Learn about them here.

Here are some warning signs you’re trying to run too many things as a leader:

• You are in too many meetings and involved in too many tactical discussions.
• There are too many days when you feel as though you have lost control over your time.

Surprise #2: You learn there’s a price to giving orders.

New leaders are often surprised to find they pay a price for being the one to give orders. Often, this is shown in how their relationships can change with coworkers. 

Here are some warning signs to look out for:

• You have become the bottleneck.
• Employees are overly inclined to consult you before they act.
• People start using your name to endorse things, as in, “Stephanie says…”

Surprise #3: You don’t know what’s going on.

Remember how we talked about being too involved in every project, decision, or discussion? There’s another side to that, and it involves being too distant from all of these things and missing important details and information.

Here are some warning signs you don’t know what’s going on at work:

• You keep hearing things that surprise you.
• You learn about events after the fact.
• You hear concerns and dissenting views through the grapevine rather than directly.

Surprise #4: You’re always on display.

As a leader, you’re bound to face the spotlight more often than you did in your previous roles. This feeling of “always being on display” is often a surprise to new leaders. 

Warning signs:

• Employees circulate stories about your behavior that magnify or distort reality.
• People around you act as if they’re trying to anticipate your likes and dislikes.

Surprise #5: You feel like you’re on shifting ground.

New leaders don’t always feel the stability and security they expected to in their new role. 

Be on the lookout for these warning signs:

• You don’t know where you stand with your boss or board.
• Roles and responsibilities between your boss or board are not clear.
• The discussions in board or executive meetings are limited mostly to reporting on results and decisions.

Implications on your leadership.

These ‘five surprises’ have tremendous implications on how a new leader should perform their role.

First: Learn to manage strategically rather than focusing on daily operations. Strategic, effective leadership, not diving into the details, can be a jarring transition.

One client, a CEO, said that he initially felt like the company’s “most useless executive,” despite holding all the power.

He needed to learn how to act in indirect ways by:

• setting and communicating strategy,
• putting sound processes in place,
• selecting and mentoring key people who create conditions to help others make the right choices.

At the same time, he needed to learn how to set the tone and define the organization’s culture and values through his words and actions—in other words, demonstrate how employees should behave. To do this, he needed to learn the right leadership skills.

Second: Leaders must recognize that a position does not automatically give the right to lead, nor does it guarantee loyalty.

Leaders must perpetually earn and maintain the moral authority to lead. CEOs can quickly lose their legitimacy if:

• their vision is unconvincing,
• if their actions are inconsistent with the values they espouse, or
• if their self-interest appears to trump the welfare of the organization.

They must realize that success ultimately depends on the ability to enlist voluntary commitment rather than forced obedience—and yes, it takes certain leadership skills and leadership qualities to do so.

By the way, you won’t want to miss these 3 important things to remember on your first day as a new leader. 

Mastering the conventional tools of effective leadership and management may lead to the promotion or appointment of a leader, but these tools alone will not keep you there.

Before you commence your leadership role, ask yourself WHY you want to be a leader in the first place. 

Finally, it’s essential that the leader maintains humility, and must not get absorbed in the role.

Even if others think you are omnipotent, you are only human.

Failing to recognize this will lead to arrogance, exhaustion, and a shortened tenure.

By maintaining a personal balance and staying grounded, an effective leader can achieve the perspective required to make decisions in the interest of the organization and its long-term prosperity.

If you’re interested in going deeper or moving your career to the next level, you’ll also want to have a look at my 1-on-1 coaching services.

If you enjoyed this article, be sure to check these out, too:

How One Word Can Damage Workplace Culture

9 Stupid Management Practices (and what to do instead)

The 6T’s To Know What To Delegate

This article was originally published on November 25, 2018, and has been updated.

They say “sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” But words do hurt—and all too often, what they hurt is workplace culture. 

I have come to realize how important words are not only in everyday life, but in our workplace interactions as well.

And I don’t just mean poetry and prose. Simple one or two-word phrases can stop a conversation dead in its tracks. This can lead to mistrust and a toxic work environment.

I wouldn’t call myself a word nerd. But I understand words are significant so I try my best to use them as precisely as I can. 

Before I get to examples of words and phrases that can damage workplace culture, let’s look at some common terms that are often used incorrectly or made up entirely.  

Words that are commonly used incorrectly.

• Adverse and averse
• Affect and effect
• Led and lead
• I.e. and e.g.

Made up words and phrases:

• “All intents and purposes,” not “all intensive purposes”
• Enunciate, not annunciate
• Espresso, not expresso
• Cabinet, not cabnit
• Nuclear, not nucular

If the words or behaviour used at work lead to a culture of harassment, here are some ways to stop it dead in its tracks. 

Words that lead to an unhealthy workplace culture.

Now that we know some of the words and phrases that are often misused or made up, let’s get more specific. 

If you’ve noticed a dip in morale or in overall performance at work, it might be time to ask yourself about the words you use or the words you hear your team use with one another.

Here are some other questions you can ask to check up on your team. 

The following are some words and phrases that can kill trust and lead to a toxic work environment: 

• “Yeah, but.” This tells the listener that you don’t care about what they’re saying.
• “You don’t understand.” This causes the listener to feel like they are being disdained.
• “With a bit more experience…” This dismisses youth and enthusiasm. 
• “I appreciate your comments.” This tells the listener thanks, but you think he is an idiot.
• “It’s not in the budget,” or “That’s not according to policy.” This means you’re blowing the person off because you haven’t even thought about what they’re proposing.
• “Five-year strategic plan.” Usually, this just means blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

While we’re on the topic, here are 2 phrases a boss must learn to demonstrate their trust in their team. 

Words cut to the core faster than a knife. They can cause wounds that take forever to heal.

As a leader, our people are watching and listening to everything we say, ergo (and I use that word correctly), leaders must be very precise with the words we choose. Words must be applied judiciously and thoughtfully—or we risk contributing to or creating a toxic work environment.

In World War II they said ‘loose lips sink ships.’ In today’s world, loose lips can sink workplace culture.

If you’re interested in going deeper on improving the culture at work or moving your career to the next level, you’ll also want to have a look at my 1-on-1 coaching services.

Leaders are traditionally the ones who provide answers, not ask questions.

Good leaders are into questioning.

They know it’s important.

But often,  they do not act on the information they gather by questioning, nor are they spreading it throughout the organization.

Before you go too far asking questions of others, start with yourself and then your leadership team.

Use the following discussion guide based on the work of Jeff Grimshaw, Tanya Mann, Lynne Viscio, and Jennifer Landis to prompt thought and conversation on why you are a leader.

What you can do with this

You can print it, read it, share it, and discuss it.

How to use this material

Introduce. Discuss. Remind. Encourage.

That’s my recommended approach to helping people commit and develop.

And once you’ve done the introduction piece (e.g., introduce ideas or concepts), those last three points should be an ongoing thing as long as someone is on your team or in your department … and maybe for those special few, even when they go somewhere else (be a mentor).

I recommend reading and discussing each of the categories with your team each week.

Each can be read in less than 3 minutes and discussed in 10 – 15 minutes.

How to prepare

Share one with your team and schedule a time for discussion.

Or, share the guide with your department leaders and have them facilitate smaller discussions.

Ask everyone to read and consider each of the questions.

Ask them to make notes on anything they find valuable or disagree with.

On your own, make your notes, and answer the questions you intend to ask or give.

Give some quick thought to any likely objections or challenges to the material you can anticipate from your group. (Who might ask what and how do you want to respond?)

Here is one idea to introduce your upcoming discussions in person or by email – edit to fit your style:           

“I came across a few thought-inspiring questions that had a big impact on me. I thought we all might benefit from talking about them over the next few weeks – one a week.

Each question can be dealt with within a matter of minutes. Please read each one and give some advance thought to it. Make notes on anything that connects or resonates with you.

Let’s kick off next week and meet in the conference room on Monday morning at 8:00 for 30 minutes, at most.

I believe the effort will be good for our work, but it might be helpful to each of us personally.”

Discussion tips

• Smile and be enthusiastic.
• Avoid interrupting or finishing someone’s answer to them. Add a small gap of silence to an answer – just a beat or two – allowing someone to expand on something or minimizing someone’s feeling that they need to rush through their answer.
• When you feel someone might have more value to add, encourage them with a “How do you mean, Nancy?” or “Can you expand on that?” or “What happened next?”
• Invite different people to contribute to the discussion and have different people lead the talks each week.
• Be ready to help the discussion move on if someone takes too much control of it. (“Good point, Bob. If we have time in the end, let’s come back to this.”)

The Discussion Guide:

How do I make decisions and actions

1. What are some ways you or other leaders effectively “role model what you want to see more of”?
2. Some people argue that “if it costs you nothing, it’s not a ‘value.’” What are some values you want to stand for, even if it costs you something or is inconvenient?

What you reward and recognize

3. How consistently do you reward what you want to see more of? In your culture, what are some ways that you “reward A while hoping for B”? What are the consequences?
4. How can you more effectively leverage your greatest source of power? (The power to change the way people feel?)

What you tolerate (or don’t)

5. Leaders are defined by what they tolerate, what have you tolerated that you shouldn’t?
6. What excuses have you used to rationalize your leadership choices? What’s the long-term cost?
7. How can you be smarter about what you do tolerate? In the long-run, how is that likely to pay off?

How you show up informally

8. What are some examples in your culture of leaders effectively “showing up”?
9. In your culture, do you operate more from a creative mindset or a reactive mindset? What, if anything, does being reactive cost you and your culture?
10. In your culture, does fear and egos get in the way of having real conversations, confronting problems, exchanging feedback, and innovating? How can you “change the conversation”?

Formal communication

11. How effectively do you use official communication to boost your messages?
12. What are some ways that the signals transmitted as formal communication are inconsistent with your other communication efforts?

Turning culture into a competitive advantage

13. Is your current culture more of an asset or a liability? Is it boosting performance—or “eating your strategy for breakfast”? How do you know?
14. In your culture, do leaders broadcast consistent formal communication? What is an example of signals getting crossed?
15. What do you believe to be the gaps between the culture you have and the culture you need? (What’s your evidence?)
16. If you move the needle on culture, how will you know it?

If you Google the term ‘first day as a manager,’ you’ll get almost three billion results.

What does that tell us? 

That a lot of people are looking for ways to succeed as a new leader, boss, or manager. 

It also tells us there are a lot of people offering advice on how to do so. 

But what if I told you there are only three things you need to remember to succeed on your first day as a manager? 

I’ve been the new boss many times. 

Each time, I found myself with more responsibility and in charge of more people. 

And each time, there was a nagging voice in my head telling me the same thing: I was in over my head.

When self-doubt creeps in, it doesn’t just affect the impression our employees, peers, and bosses have of us—or how we see ourselves. It can also have lasting negative effects on our performance and success at work. 

Here are three things you should know to quiet self-doubt and be the best boss possible:

1. Your boss has confidence in you.

You’re in a leadership position for a reason.

I once told my boss that I didn’t think I was ready for my pending promotion. 

It didn’t take long to get sent out of his office with the words, “I’ll be the judge of when you’re ready,” still ringing in my ears. 

Fear of leadership failure is a real thing. Remember, your boss believes you’re ready to lead or you wouldn’t be there. So run with it!

If you want to explore this topic further, don’t miss this post. 

2. Don’t rush.

I remember seeing a brash young captain standing in front of his new command. 

The first words out of his mouth were: “there’s a new sheriff in town and there’s going to be changes…” He looked like an idiot.

In that moment, he completely lost all credibility. 

What could he have done differently?

He should have entered calmly and slowly, asking people for their names and stories, instead of assuming everything needed fixing and stomping on toes. 

On your first day as a new manager, come in with the knowledge that it’s going to take time to get to know the staff and the way things work. From there, you can determine which adjustments need to be made. 

It might feel like there are a million things you want to hurry to get done on your first day, each more important than the last. That’s why I’ve written this post for dealing with competing priorities. 

3. Spend time with your boss and your peers.

This is advice not only for your first day as a manager, but on every day after that: Spend as much time with your boss as you can. 

Ask them what their performance objectives are and how you can contribute to their success. This demonstrates your value and establishes your place as a great asset to the company. 

Want to learn more about partnering with your boss? Be sure to visit this post. 

You should also invest in getting to know your team whenever you can. 

These people can help you navigate your new environment. And quite frankly, if you’re offside with them, they can contribute to your failure.

Almost all advice to a new leader is to invest in their employees during the early days of their new position. Your employees are important. But if you don’t understand what your boss wants or your peer team needs, you’re in for a rough ride.

Your first day as a new leader is just that—one day. Don’t expect to overhaul a company or predict your own failure before you’ve even had a chance to start. Remember: you were chosen to lead for a reason. 

Come in with a good attitude, an open mind, and a willingness to connect with your boss, peers, and employees. It will go a long way. 

Keeping these things in mind will help you succeed not only on your first day as a new manager, but throughout the rest of your career. 

If you’re interested in going deeper or moving your career to the next level, you’ll also want to have a look at my 1-on-1 coaching services.

If you enjoyed this article, be sure to check these out, too:

Micromanaging is a Good Thing
9 Stupid Management Practices (and what to do instead)
The 6T’s To Know What To Delegate

This article was originally published on March 14, 2016, and has been updated.

As a young leader in the Army, I used to ask my soldiers: ‘How are you doing?’

Guess what the answers were. Fine. Good. Okay.

What did I gain from those conversations? Nothing useful.

A mentor suggested that I start asking:

• What are you doing?
• Do you understand why you are doing this?
• When did you eat last?
• What do you need to help you do your job?

Read more about how to use silence to ask questions

I started getting information that was much more valuable in helping to understand what was going on.

Great questions can reveal tremendous information.

The questions you ask as a leader can reveal the values you hold, your priorities, and reinforce behaviours which you may or may not like. 

But too often, leaders reveal the gaps that exist between what they say and what they want and do.

Here are four questions leaders should be asking themselves.

1. What would a great leader do at this moment?

Imagine framing your perspective with the lens of what great leaders would do in the situation in which you find yourself.

The standard is raised immediately for the options available, the best actions to pursue, and the right words to use.

Great leaders ask this question to push themselves beyond their limitations, biases and planning assumptions.

2. What did I do today to enable my team to be better, or did I do something that held my team back?

Leaders touch everyone with their actions and in their conversations.  Often, there are unintended consequences from what they do and say.

Read about the 6 Essential Questions You Can Ask Children & Employees

Great leaders constantly review, assess and learn from what they do and say making adjustments along the way, revealing their value of continual learning.

3. If I could do one thing in the next 10 minutes, what would be the best thing to do?

Time management is critical as a leader.

When a meeting ends early, great leaders seize upon the found sliver of time to invest in getting things done, which usually involves building a relationship with an employee.

Your behaviour during these slivers of found time reveals your priorities.

4. Who’s hiding from me?  Who haven’t I met with recently?

While it’s easy to rationalize that an employee is working well on their own, is independent and self-motivated, great leaders know that relationships with all employees need tending.

Sustaining and growing inter-personal relationships with employees earn the leader the right to lead.

Growing your leadership impact requires you to reach beyond the limits of your personality and style.  And it’s in those moments of stretch that you begin to build your leadership muscles.

Read about the 3 questions that would have stopped me from wasting $20,000

Coaching Thoughts

1. Think back over the last several conversations you’ve had with employees and consider what values do you think you revealed?
2. In each meeting you have over the next 48 hours, write/type ‘What Would a Great Leader Do’ at the top of your notes. Then grab a coffee and reflect on the experiment.