Category Leading With Courage

Innovation is the lifeblood of success.

Organizations that can adapt, embrace change, and foster creativity are poised to thrive. Yet, amidst the demands of day-to-day operations, many organizations are stuck in a routine cycle, clinging to familiar practices and struggling to break free from the shackles of repetition.

So, why do some leaders, despite voicing support for innovation, shy away from it in practice?

This is not limited to the entry-level or the boardroom, but it often strikes hardest in mid-level management. These managers are the bridge between the strategic vision of top leadership and the execution of plans on the front lines. They are entrusted with maintaining the status quo and driving innovation and improvement.

Let’s take Maya.

She’s a mid-level manager who repeatedly expressed her desire to see “out-of-the-box” thinking from her team to get faster, higher-quality service. She and the team’s schedules are filled with weekly back-to-back meetings, leaving no time to nurture or evaluate creative ideas. The one brainstorming session she organized last month was a rushed 30-minute virtual call on a Friday amidst an already hectic day interspersed with urgent emails and calls.

The result?

You guessed it: ideas were safe, familiar, and anything but innovative.

The Battle Against Repetition

Leaders like Maya, often unknowingly, lead teams that become world champions of acting like we did yesterday.

In the realm of work, this means adhering to practices because “that’s how it’s always been done.” It means churning out reports in the same format, holding meetings without clear agendas, and avoiding any method or idea that deviates from the norm. There’s an implicit safety in repetition; it’s familiar, predictable, and rarely questioned.

But here lies the paradox: by seeking refuge in the known, we shut out the innovative and the new, stunting potential growth.

Understanding Reluctance Towards Creativity

So, why do some leaders, despite voicing support for innovation, shy away from it in practice?

• Risk-Aversion: Creative ideas are, by nature, untested, which makes them risky. Many leaders fear the repercussions of a novel idea failing, especially in front of senior leaders or the team.
• Time Constraints: True creativity isn’t instant. It requires time for thought, discussion, and even disagreement. The daily hustle, especially for mid-level managers who must manage multiple tasks and do their work, makes it challenging to carve out this space, particularly when the pressures of your day-to-day life tell you that “you don’t have time for this.”
• Look For Base Hits Instead of Home Runs: Some might believe creativity is only about ‘big ideas’ and grand innovations. They overlook the more minor, incremental changes (sometimes called ‘little c’ creativity) that can lead to substantial long-term benefits.
• Resisting Change: It’s human nature to resist change, especially when current systems seem to be working “good enough.

 Read about Resisting Change

Questions to Guide Creative Thought

For managers looking to harness the power of creativity within their teams, reflecting on these guiding questions can be transformative:

• Re-Visit Assumptions: “Why do we do it this way?” Challenge the status quo. Reassess ingrained practices to see if they still serve your team’s goals.
• Establish the End Goal: “What are we ultimately trying to accomplish?” Clarify the endgame. Understand the core objectives to ensure that innovation aligns with the bigger picture. You can use a tactic like the “5 Whys” to get at the source of the issue and ensure you’re solving the right problem.

Read about the ‘5 Whys’

• Brainstorm: “What do we think can solve this?” This is not the time for negativity (that comes later). Encourage an open platform for ideas where No’s, But’s, or “We already tried that” are momentarily set aside.
• Combine Ideas: Once ideas are on the table, look for intersections where combining them could lead to more effective outcomes. This is sometimes known as looking for the “1+1=3” ideas.
• Prevent Overthinking: “What if we only had 30 days? What if this were easy?” Imposing constraints can often lead to more ingenious solutions.
• Identify Hurdles: “What would prevent this from happening? What could go wrong?” Recognizing challenges upfront, potentially through Red Team exercises and frame changes, allows for better planning and resource allocation.
• Strategizing Solutions: “How can we overcome these barriers? What resources are needed?” Convert challenges into actionable steps.
• Action and Commitment: “Who is doing what, and by when? How will we know we’ve succeeded?” Define responsibilities and success metrics to track progress through written action plans.

Embracing creativity isn’t about discarding everything you know. It’s about allowing space for new possibilities.

For mid-level managers like Maya, the challenges are twofold: finding time amid the chaos and having the courage to venture into the unknown.

To all such leaders: Take a step today. Dedicate just an hour this week, free from distractions, to brainstorm with your team. Utilize the guiding questions above.

Listen, truly listen to their ideas.

You may find the seed of the following significant innovation for your organization in that hour.

Most of the onboarding of new leaders and managers is common sense. Still, different people latch on to different nuggets that help their chances of success in a world where 40% of new leaders fail in their first 18 months.

These tips all nest under the importance of getting a head start, managing the message, setting direction, building the team and delivering results.

1. Failure to deliver is the #2 cause of failure. Get done what they need you to get done.

2. Adjusting to the culture. Keep your eyes open and adjust to changes as they arise.

3. No one cares about you. They care about what you can do for them.

4. Avoid the 100-Day Plan for Interviews trap. If asked to prepare a 100-day Plan for a final interview, position your plan in the context of the company’s objectives and 12-month goals.

5. Plan your meetings. Live meetings can have flexible agendas. Virtual meetings need deliberate and detailed content, meeting flow, and technology planning, preparation, and rehearsals.

6. Answer three due diligence questions:

• • • What is the organization’s sustainable competitive advantage? (Organizational risk.)
    • Did anyone have concerns about this role; and, if so, what was done to mitigate them? (Role risk)
    • What, specifically, about me, led the organization to offer me the job? (Personal risk.)

7. Dig into the culture. Make sure you understand:

• • • Behaviours: Flexible vs. stable discipline | Interdependent vs. independent | Enjoyment vs. order
    • Relationships: Purpose vs. authority | Informal vs. formal communications | Diffused vs. hierarchical decisions
    • Attitudes: Innovation vs. minimum viable strategy | Proactive vs. responsive | Learning vs. safety
    • Values: Purpose as intended vs as written | Open/shared vs. directed learning | Caring vs. results focus

8. Assess the onboarding risk. 

• • • If it’s low, do nothing out of the ordinary. 
    • If it’s manageable, manage it in the normal course of events.
    • If it’s mission-crippling, resolve or mitigate before accepting the role.
    • If the barriers are insurmountable, walk away.

9. Identify the contributors, watchers, and detractors. Contributors share your agenda. Detractors want to stop you. Watchers haven’t decided yet. Turn the contributors into champions, the watchers into contributors, and get the detractors out of the way.

10. No one will believe what you say. They will believe what you do.

11. MAP your communication efforts across Messages.

• • • Switching the “we” immediately, never talking about your old company again,
    • Stand on the shoulders of those who built the organization as you go forward,
    • leverage new change models to turn the old guard into partners.

12. Do not talk about yourself. No one cares about you. Their only question is “What does this mean for me?” 

13. Clarify your organizing concept. Get the strategy behind your communication points right.

14. Make your communication emotional, rational, and inspirational– in that order. Emotionally connect with people, then be honest about the truth and facts of the situation. Then provide an inspired solution with a specific call to action to inspire.

15. Create an imperative.

• • • If you tell people to do something, the best you can hope for is compliance.
    • If you want people to contribute, sell, test, or consult.
    • If you want their commitment, you need to co-create.

16. Put in place milestones. Strategies are practically useless until turned into actions with clarity. Make sure someone owns the process and follows through on milestone tracking regularly.

17. Get the right people in the right roles early on. The #1 regret leaders have when reflecting on their careers is not moving fast enough on people.

• • • Invest in under-performing people in the right role.
    • Support effective people in the right role.
    • Move out under-performing people in the wrong role.
    • Move up outstanding people who are in the wrong role.

18. Systematize a management cadence. Manage core talent, strategic, capability and operating processes annually/quarterly.

• • • Track programs monthly.
    • Track projects weekly.
    • Track tasks daily – perhaps with huddles.

19. Observe. Assess. Plan. Act.

• • • Downplay minor and temporary changes. Control and stay focused on priorities.
    • Evolve through minor and enduring changes, factoring into ongoing team evolution.
    • Manage major and temporary changes. Deploy your incident management response plan.
    • Restart following a major and enduring change. Jump-shifting your strategy, organization, and operations to lead through the point of inflection.

20. Keep going. Keep growing, conducting a self-assessment, and getting stakeholder feedback to inform course corrections in culture, priorities, and leadership approach.

I am often asked about my thoughts about Remembrance Day.

I don’t often share because everyone has a story, and many have gone through more than I could imagine.

This year I thought I would share a story: after returning to Canada from a tour, a unit had arranged for families to be united with their soldiers at the terminal on the Trenton airbase.

There were emotional and tear-filled reunions going on everywhere, and a friend had arranged to meet his wife and 5-year-old daughter on the grass outside the building.

When his daughter sighted her dad, she broke away from her Mom and ran across the grass to her Dad.

As soon as this happened, the Dad started screaming and swearing at the little girl to stop and get back.

Certainly not the reunion anyone expected.

Both Dad & daughter were traumatized.

You need to understand that the father had spent months soldiering in a place full of IEDs, mines & booby traps. IEDs are hard to place on pavement & sidewalks, so the ‘bad guys’ would place them in grass and foliage.

So a grassy expanse was something to be feared.

The dad was reacting instinctively to saving his daughter’s instinctive reaction to seeing her Dad for the first time in over six months.

This I think about on Remembrance Day.

For many years, and as a young man, Remembrance Day was a day to remember all of those who died serving our country and being honest, it was dress uniforms, marching through the streets and drinking with new and old comrades in a legion somewhere.

During the last years, Remembrance Day has come to mean something different to me. I can’t help but think of the thousands of soldiers who returned from war with life-altering, debilitating wounds, both seen and unseen.

I think of those who came home in a box or came home irreparably changed, and I think of their friends and families.

I think of returning soldiers are suffering from some mental health issues, from depression to full-blown PTSD.

Diseases just as deadly as any sniper.

There are failed relationships, tangled finances and legal problems, all caused or exacerbated by the effects of war.

There are homeless veterans and young men & women in challenging domestic situations. Or those who are trying desperately to fit into a civilian workplace where the biggest crisis is the wrong flavour of the coffee.

So, on Remembrance Day, I think of the innocents. Those caught in a fight that isn’t of their making: women, elderly and children who become causalities and are often subject to the cruelty of the evilest acts perpetuated by the evilest bastards on earth.

I think of these soldiers not mentioned on memorials wall or honoured in any fashion, as they are most certainly casualties of war.

I am saddened to think of what those lost, ruined, and wasted lives might have had a chance to accomplish

I think of my friend and his daughter.

Based on a Harvard Business Review article

Last week I told you about my chance dog-walking encounter with a bright, intelligent HR Professional. We talked about dogs and podcasts and then leadership.

‘Why Are There So Many Bad Bosses?’ Freakonomics podcast

During our time together, she asked my opinion about choosing the best candidate for promotion to a leadership role from a pool of 4 candidates who seem to be more or less equally qualified.

I asked had her company had completed any psychometric testing (DISC, Meyers Briggs etc.)? If all things were equal between the candidates, they should consider empathy and compassion as the deciding factors.

Why Empathy and Compassion?

Empathy is an essential differentiator to good leadership.

The risk is that too much of it can weigh a leader down as they take the people’s difficulties onto themselves.

To manage the impact of the potential burden of empathy by balancing it with compassion. 

Empathy and Compassion: What’s the Difference?

Let’s start with some definitions. The words “empathy” and “compassion,” as well as “sympathy,” are often used interchangeably, and they all represent altruistic traits. But they don’t refer to the same experience.

It is helpful to consider that compassion is understanding what another is feeling and the willingness to alleviate suffering for another.

The following HBR graphic is an excellent representation of pity, sympathy, empathy and compassion:

When we experience pity, we have little willingness to act, and little understanding of another’s experience. We only feel sorry for someone.

When we experience sympathy, there is an increase in our willingness to help and our understanding of the other, and we begin to ‘feel’ for the other person.

When we feel empathy, we have an intimate, visceral understanding of the other person’s experience. We begin to feel with the person, but it does not necessarily help the other person, except for possibly making them feel less lonely in their experience.

Finally, when we have compassion, we understand what the other person is experiencing and are willing to act. Compassion occurs when we ask ourselves what we can do to support the suffering person.

Compassion is an intentional act, not simply an action based on emotion.

What about EQ? Click to read more.

Why Does This Matter?

Empathy often helps us do what’s right, but it sometimes motivates us to do what’s wrong.

As leaders, empathy may cloud our judgment, encourage bias, and make us less effective at making wise decisions. It should not be avoided entirely because a leader without empathy cannot make human connections.

The challenge for most leaders is that we tend to get trapped by our empathy, making us unable to shift to support the person who is suffering effectively.

Avoiding the Empathy Trap — and Leading with Compassion

Shifting away from empathy does not make you less human or less kind. Instead, it makes you better able to support people during difficult times.

Here are six key strategies for being empathetic while leading with compassion.

Take a mental and emotional step away.

To avoid getting caught in an empathetic trap, try to take a mental and emotional step away.

Step out of the emotional space to get a clearer perspective of the situation and the person. Often it is only perspective that you will be able to help.

You are not stepping away from the person; you are stepping away from the problem so you can help solve it.

Ask what they need.

When you ask the simple question “What do you need?” you give the person an opportunity to reflect on what may be needed.

This will better inform you about how you can help and allow the person to feel heard and step toward being helped.

Remember the power of non-action.

Leaders are good at getting stuff done. But when it comes to people, it is essential to remember that people do not need your solutions. They need your ear and your presence.

Read why silence is a HUGE power differential.

Coach the person so they can find their solution.

Leadership is not about solving problems; it is about growing and developing people, so they are empowered to solve their problems.

Coach them, mentor them and show them a pathway to finding their answers.

Practice self-care.

Show self-compassion by practicing authentic self-care.

There is a cost to managing our feelings to manage others better. So we must practice self-care: take breaks, sleep, eat well, cultivate meaningful relationships, and practice mindfulness.

As Leaders, we need to find ways of staying resilient, grounded, and in tune with ourselves.

When we show up in the workplace with empathy and compassion, people can trust us, lean on us and find comfort in our leadership.

“A company is stronger if bound by love than by fear,” the late Herb Kelleher, co-founder, CEO and Chairman of Southwest Airlines, once said.

I remember very clearly the first time I heard the word “love” uttered in a leadership context. I was about to teach a workshop on leadership to a group of up-and-coming junior officers. Before being introduced, the unit leader told the room full of mostly men they needed to love the people they were responsible for leading.

You could have heard a pin drop. Coming from this soldier’s soldier, the L-word was utterly unexpected.

Is it okay to use the word “love” in the workplace?

The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines love as “a strong affection for another arising out of kinship or personal ties.” As leaders, we need to understand that we may be the most important person in the lives of the individuals we lead.

I don’t recall ever being told that a Boss loved me, but I can remember, as if it happened yesterday, the times when a boss called me by my first name, told me they were proud of me, protected me from someone who was blaming me for something I didn’t do.

Read about Recognition 

All demonstrations of love. All demonstrations of belonging to something bigger than myself.

This isn’t just my opinion. A considerable amount of evidence suggests that social disconnection is widespread today. CIGNA first reported data in 2018 that chronic loneliness in the US has reached epidemic levels based on its research findings.

Beyond helping people feel safe and belonging, there are several compelling reasons outstanding leaders see the difference love can make in the workplace.

Love inspires performance excellence and resilience. Serving others is a reflection of love. Research shows that love has improved performance and protected people from stress and burnout. Call center staff raising money saw their revenue quintuple after meeting a recipient of that aid in person. Radiologists increased their diagnostic accuracy by 46-percent when the CT scans included facial photos of the patients. The most effective leaders inspire people by connecting them with the people they serve to show them how their work is helping others.

‍Love pulls together. Taking time to get to know and care for the people you lead brings about greater unity, especially as your team faces adversity. When love exists among the team members, they are more likely to pull together than tear one apart. They feel the bond of connection helps them overcome the inevitable obstacles every organization encounters.

Love overlooks minor offences. When love is present in a team, department or organization, people are more likely to assume the best in others and give them the benefit of the doubt. Absent love, potentially offending words or deeds are more likely to bring about retaliation and sprout rivalries that undermine performance.

‍How healthy is Your Organization? Take the test

Relationship Excellence Enhances Task Excellence

Critics say that love makes a work culture too soft. They are concerned that promoting the positive relational side of work will negatively impact productivity or make it harder to hold people to a high standard.

This is quickly addressed by having leaders communicate that being intentional about achieving excellence and results is expected so people don’t lose sight of their importance. And when standards are not met, take action to close the performance gap. This reinforces that, along with love, task excellence and results are essential to serving people well.

What critics miss is that relationship excellence enhances how tasks are performed. People who work in an organization love the people they work with and serve through their occupation. They work harder to please them. They care about the quality of the product or service they provide, and they offer it in a way that reflects love.

Employees of a business that reflects love also interact in loving ways. They are supportive, encouraging, patient, kind, empathetic and caring. 

Gallup Research has shown that the people we work with and how we interact with them are more important to job satisfaction than we do. Engaged workers give more effort in their work, align their behaviour with their company’s goals, communicate and cooperate more, and actively think of ways to innovate. 

Read more about appreciation. 

So, what’s love got to do with it?

Few leaders use the L-word.

So the next time you hear a leader speaking about “love” in terms of how colleagues treat one another and work together, pay close attention.

As it turns out, love is a powerful source of competitive advantage.

In the words of the great philosopher, Tina Turner, what’s love got to do with it?

Everything