A New Source Code

In various wars during the Middle Ages, leaders would come to visit their troops and issue a rallying cry. Usually this was done immediately after the troops had sustained heavy losses. The leader wanted to keep morale high and encourage the troops.

After hearing their leader , the men would get a “second wind” and they would continue to fight. And they fought harder than before to glorify their king and be honored for their bravery.

But in the workplace, we don’t normally think of rallying the troops. That the team would just understand that they need to step up their output. Yet the need for rallying the troops remains ever present.

It’s one of those unheralded jobs of the leader. And this job is doubly important after your team has stumbled and erred. Because that is precisely the time when they are most likely to give up.

So…

How will you encourage your troops to give their all when they are down? What will you say to them that will “put the wind in their sails”?

What’s your rallying cry? 

 

What do you do when a teammate lies, cheats or steals from you? And after you’ve confronted the issue, how do you bring yourself to forgive them?

You always remember that:

They are human, too. 

Because you also slip up. You make mistakes and errors. You sometimes say the wrong thing just to save your neck. You’re human.

When you extend that forgiveness to others, you really end up forgiving yourself. You recognize your shared humanity, and in that moment, you become a true leader. And a magnanimous one at that.

It will be difficult. Especially when the act committed is on a large scale. But punishing the person with the stick, isn’t always the answer to the crime. Sometimes, your forgiveness allows the person to stop their ways and gives them permission. Permission to change. Permission to grow. Permission to become their best self.

Remember those days when you wished someone would have forgiven you when you made an error?

Now it’s your turn. Forgive them for what they did.

After all, they’re human too.

Imagine a nonstop day You started your day responding to emails In the emails you discovered that there were a number of fires that you needed to put out And ASAP You got caught in the rabbit hole and before you knew it you worked a full sixteen hours before you even took a break And that was to go to the bathroom for 2 minutes Talk about a long day And you know that you have to repeat it all tomorrow because you are lagging behind

Ouch. 

That is a normal scenario for most leaders. But wait, did you feel that something was different about the first paragraph? (Go ahead and re-read it again. I’ll wait.)

That’s right. It lacked full-stops. There were no pauses in the paragraph. Did you feel breathless?

We all can notice when a paragraph has no full-stops. It irritates us and speeds up our heart rate. Yet, we think nothing about working sixteen hours without taking a pause.

Why?

Why are you running so fast? Where do you have to go that requires you to work flat out for days on end? And why don’t you take a pause?

The world needs more of you at your full capacity. And the best way to consistently do great work, is to take more pauses and recharge. They don’t even have to be long; 5 minute breaks are enough to get you back in a great state.

Make a full stop. The world can wait.

 

 

Gloves have immense symbolism. When a boxer puts his gloves on and enters the ring, he is ready for battle. They become his weapons. They also become his shield. Putting on his gloves indicate that he is ready to fight to the death.

But once he leaves the ring, the gloves should come off. He’s no longer in warrior mode; he can be the peaceful husband, father, or lover that he normally is.

However, gloves become destructive when he believes they are part of his identity. He continues to “wear” them outside of the ring. He comes home from a long day and he picks a fight with his wife. Or he fights with his inner demons by turning to alcohol. Or he starts fighting with his colleagues during his day job and subsequently gets fired by his manager.

A better way to handle the situation is: leave the gloves at the door. You don’t have to carry your gloves with you everywhere you go. They are simply one tool that helps you accomplish the job. You are not your gloves.

Surprisingly, it’s not just boxer who wear gloves. We all bring our gloves in the workplace as well. In fact, much of our language around leadership draws on this warrior mentality. We will “hit our targets”, “beat the competition” and “challenge the status quo”. Everyday it seems that leaders are in a fight to the death to win. And if it’s a fight, then we better bring our gloves to stay alive.

But, why are we bringing our gloves to work with our team? Wouldn’t having the gloves at work increase your likelihood to start swinging at someone? Wouldn’t the gloves encourage you to attack instead of collaborating? Wouldn’t you want to show who’s boss instead of serving your team?

Gloves are powerful symbols. But they don’t belong at work with your team.

You can leave them at the door.

Here’s a scenario: There is a regulation placed on your team that you must follow if you play by the rules. Now you’re the leader of the team. There is tremendous pressure from the outside world on your team to make your targets. You know of the regulation and you believe that you find a way around it.

What would you do in this moment of truth?

Would you follow the law to the letter and suffer losses in the eyes of the public? Or would you try to find ways to game the system and then hope that you’re not caught?

The choice is obvious. You tell the truth. End of story. 

But take a minute to think of how regularly this scenario occurs.

Let’s say you’re the CEO of the Volkswagen group. Or you’re the vice-president of the United States deciding if to go to war. Or you’re the coach of the best team in the league. Every day there is some event which for you, could be called a moment of truth.

What will you do when those insidious voices keep pestering you to lie, cheat and steal? Will you have the backbone to tell your truth? Or will you listen to the fear and try to save yourself from trouble?

These moments of truth happen to every leader, no matter the size of the team. And the right answer in all of those situations is always the truth. No matter the consequence.

It’s not easy, but it’s always worth it.

When a turtle is threatened, it never tries to out run the foe. It doesn’t retaliate and attack. Instead, it retreats into its shell and waits for the threat to pass away. It’s a simple strategy but it’s highly effective in certain situations.

Alternatively, when a hare is threatened, it never stays still. It always tries to run away with its speed and quickness. Again, simple and effective.

The main difference between humans and animals is that we have the power to choose how to respond. We may decide that for today, it makes sense to listen to music. Or we could eat a piece of chocolate. Or we could cry. Or we could go to the gym.

Each of them is a perfectly valid response to stress. And each one can be effective for alleviating the stress.

But the challenge that we face, is that like animals, we develop a preferred stress response over time. As much as we can change, we stick with what we know will work. Even if it doesn’t help us achieve our goals in the long-term. We might procrastinate on Instagram instead of doing the project that we need to do. Or we might complain about our colleague and then do nothing to improve the relationship.

The key to solving this challenge is to choose your response carefully. What do you currently do when work is stressing you? And then, what can you do instead that is a better response?

Knowing your stress response helps you win the battle in the short term. But choosing the right response allows you to win the war.

Always remember that you have the power to choose.

 

Navy Seals are some of the most fearless people on the planet. They rush headlong into shootouts with enemies in the tiniest spaces. They swim deep underwater in total darkness to achieve their mission. They even parachute out of planes to get to where they need to go.

But there’s one thing that strikes fear into the hearts of all Navy Seals. It’s hearing the following words:

Blue on Blue. 

To a Navy Seal, this might as well mean the end of the organization. That everyone, from the top to the bottom of the organization, has failed in their mission.

Now, you’re probably thinking: “What could be so serious about those words?”

I’ll tell you. They mean that one Navy Seal team has attacked another Seal team. By accident.  

You can see why this would the single worst thing that can happen. And yet, it can happen at anytime. It happens when a teammate withholds some crucial information from the leader. Or when the leader doesn’t make his points crystal clear to the team. Or when the teammates don’t put the mission above their personal conflicts.

In short, it happens because people don’t communicate honestly and don’t own their responsibility to the team.

The Navy Seals are excellent as a team precisely because they are terrified of the negative consequences. Any communication and leadership mistakes mean that their friends, their brothers in arms, will be killed. By their hands.

What if you thought about your team in the same way? What if you communicated to your team, like their lives depended on it? What would you do in that situation?

Use the fear of Blue on Blue to create your best team possible. Communicate like your life depended on it. Communicate like a Seal.

 

Assumptions are like icebergs. The biggest problem with them is that they are typically unseen. And what you can’t see, can destroy you.

For example:  You’re hoping to land a new client to secure a future round of funding from your VCs. In this situation there are a ton of hidden assumptions:

1. That there’s a reasonable chance of you winning the new client.
2. That the client is interested in you and willing to commit to the deal, instead of just shopping around
3. That getting the client is what will convince VCs to put money into your business
4. That the VCs are willing to invest in your company
5. That the VCs still have money to invest.
6. That the deal will go through quickly and without problems.

I could go on and on but you get the point. All of these assumptions can torpedo your plans quickly if you’re not careful. But how do you surface these assumptions?

By talking about them out loud.

You would think that this is standard practice for anyone making a decision. And yet, you remember what happened to the Titanic? Yea, it went down just 4 days into the journey.  And the key assumptions that those engineers missed?

They assumed that the lookout would know the size of the icebergs from the top of the ship. And that he would tell the captain in time to make a course correction.

Really? Really??

Think you’re immune? Sorry to say this, but you’re not as smart as you think. You regularly  gloss over the hidden assumptions. And that could be fatal to your business and your team.

Make it a habit to surface those assumptions. You can’t afford not to. 

You see your team about to make a costly mistake. They should have come to you earlier to ask for help. But they didn’t. Now, what do you do?

A) Allow them to make the mistake. Then use that mistake to teach them a lesson.

B) Offer them your help before they make the mistake.

C) Fix it on your own without your team knowing that you fixed it.

(If these options sound like different parenting styles, that’s because parenting is a fantastic model of leadership. In many respects, it can be the ultimate form of leadership, if done correctly.)

But back to the question. Which would you choose?

It’s easy to see that Options B and C create a cycle of dependency. And Option A is used by many parents as a form of “tough love”. Not every team learns the right lessons from this kind of treatment. Honestly, it’s a tough call in this situation. Maybe you decide to take the mistake on the chin and hope that it never reoccurs.

Regardless of which option you choose, in this situation, it’s your fault. They should have come to you for help and you’ve allowed the mistake to happen. Your culture is one where the team feels threatened and they avoid asking for help.

Instead, what if you created the conditions that didn’t stifle people asking for help? What if you made it safe for them to make a mistake? What if you shared your mistakes with them openly as well?

You would create a positive environment that encourages growth and risk-taking. Your team would be enabled to dare, dream and innovate. And isn’t that what you really want, anyway?

The secret combination involves a mixture of psychological safety, vulnerability and some good old fashioned love. It’s that simple.

“Go where the fish are”

If you’re a fisherman, this is the most obvious thing that you can do. You would never search for fish where there are none.

But if you had the entire ocean to search for fish, where would you go? You’d probably ask your fisherman friends for some help. And they would point you to their tried and true zones. The ones where they are “guaranteed” to find fish.

At first, you catch a ton of fish. You start getting plaudits from other fishermen. “Hey how are catching so many fish? What’s your secret?”

You think that they’ll never find out how you did it. But then one day, you show up in your favorite zone, thinking it’s all yours. And then you see that all of your competitors are there, taking “your” fish.

Now what do you do?

You go search for a new zone.

In the instance when you discover a new zone, you have the rewards all to yourself. There’s an abundance of fish for you to catch and then profit from.

Which means that you need to find the balance fishing in guaranteed areas and searching for new ones. Always. You can’t rely on your safe methods to carry you through until the end.

Maybe you spend 80% of your time doing the tried and true methods. And the remaining 20%, you get wild and search the entire ocean for fish. Because if you’re not pursuing the new, then you’re going to be out of a job. And fast.

Always remember:

What got you here, won’t take you there…