Twice a month, Lead Change Group authors write a blog post on the SmartBlog on Leadership site. Today it’s my turn with a post called How to Get Your Team to Speak Up. It’s based on my observation that many team leaders create a culture where saying “no” is unacceptable, thereby causing their team members to use the truth recklessly when they say “yes”. Go on over, check it out and leave a comment. Would love to hear from you!

It’s six days out from last week’s TEDx Grand Rapids event and I’m still processing.

TED events are well-known for their brief, powerful speaker presentations proffering Big Ideas (see my list of quotes from the 2012 TEDx Grand Rapids speakers).  Frankly, A TEDx event can be daunting—such BIG ideas, presented by people with amazing stories and credentials. The crowd is daunting—700 people who had to apply to attend.

It could be easy to feel small in such a sweeping context. Happily, it’s not at all that way . What’s great about a TEDx event is that if you pay attention, you’ll see unlimited opportunities to make a difference. My take-away from this year’s TEDx experience is that making a difference doesn’t always need to be the grand gesture. It can be a simple, yet meangingful one-to-one interaction.

For example, the event organizers showed a TED video clip of Laura Trice who talked about giving praise . . . and how, even though people crave praise, we think it’s not acceptable to ask for it. Laura reminds us, that it is ok to ask for praise. And it’s also super-easy (and FREE!) to give praise. One person can make a huge impact on the life of a fellow human being.

Following this idea of “making a difference” in small ways, I made an extra effort to create meaningful connections at each scheduled break and with all the people seated around me at the Civic Theatre. Here’s a quick run-down of some of my interactions, which shows the diversity of the people one can meet at a TEDx event:

•  Jake – a Kendall College student studying furniture design, who asked me for career advice.
• Jason – a recent WMU graduate, who’s looking to make a difference by going into fundraising.
• Molly – a food truck owner  – The Silver Spork – I gave her tips on how to use Twitter to help promote her business.
• Rick – we met in line waiting for coffee. I read his nametag and said, “I’ve hired you to work for me!” but we had never met in person. He peered at my name badge and said, “You’re right! Nice to meet you!” Three years ago, Rick designed graphics for my blog; up until last Thursday we had conducted business strictly by phone and email. This was our first face-to-face (and completely unexpected!) meeting.

By opening your vision about what it means to “make a difference”—be it simple career advice for a college student or dispensing social media tips to an entrepreneur, you can feel solid in the fact that you are making a difference each day.

You have the power to create connections every day. How will you make those connections meaningful?

You can hear more about my thoughts on creating meaningful connections at TEDx Grand Rapids in this brief interview conducted by Josh Leng on his Live at Five segment for WJRW Talk Radio last Friday.

photo credit: istockphoto.com

I attended my second TEDx Grand Rapids event last Thursday.  The theme this year was “What Now?” and it came alive in such unexpected ways. From innovations in technology and materials, to finding peace in an act of terrorism, each speaker was able to knit “what now?” into his or her presentation. It’s a very thought-provoking question. Every presentation made me ponder “what now?” in a new way.

By the end of the conference, this is where I landed: the presenters were encouraging us to make a difference—in whatever way matters to us. Every day, we should be asking, “What now?” as a way to move forward in an ever-progressing series of small acts to make our world a better place.

Here are some thought-provoking quotes from the TEDx Grand Rapids presenters for you to consider as you ponder your own personal “What now?”

 
Dr. Kristin Tolle, a researcher who works with “the most brilliant minds in the world” to connect them to the most pressing issues around the globe:

“Language is a living thing . . .it changes over time.”

Bill Sabram, professional game designer, on the importance of being able to fail in a safe environment:

“Games let us lose without feeling like a loser. And they let us fail without feeling like a failure.”

Linda Ragsdale, artist and Peace Master, on people who say with resignation, “That’s just the way it is.”:

“No, that’s the way we’ve allowed it to be.”

LZ Granderson, sports columnist, on the injustice of labeling people:

“Why is what people are so much more significant than who they are?”

And finally, from Linda Chorney, Grammy-nominated singer-songwriter who says of TEDx events:

“Its’ not a ‘cha-ching!’ thing, it’s an ‘aha!’ thing.”

Couldn’t have said it better myself, Linda! Those are my “aha’s”.

Questions for you:

If you’ve been to a TED event, what moments of clarity have you experienced?

Have you considered “What now?” If so, what have you concluded?

My mother has always been woman of action. As an 18-year-old newlywed, she walked into a furniture store with $300 dollars of wedding gift money. She walked out with a three-piece bedroom set, mattress, box springs, dinette table/chairs and a pair of end tables.

As she tells it: “Your father and I started out with absolutely nothing, so my mind was made up:  I had to get the most that I could for that $300. I just kept asking that salesman ‘Is that the best you can do?’ So you see, it can be done, you just need to set your mind to it.” Setting one’s mind to “get it done” has been one of my mother’s many life lessons to me. She believes that willpower (and a good dose of “people skills”) will take a person a long way in life.

Like many women, lessons from my mother have occurred in many ways an in many places.  Oddly enough, the furniture from her newlywed days has come along for the ride as well.  Like the “traveling pants” of the sisterhood, that 3-piece bedroom set that she negotiated with “Frantic Frank” all those years ago has been a backdrop against which my most memorable lessons have been drawn.

Those hard woods have witnessed many a mother-daughter conversation about life’s aspirations. When I was a teen the bedroom set stood sentinel to my fretful pleas: “I’m scared. Should I take the leap?” Mom unerringly supported me with, “What’s the worst they could say? They’ll say ‘no’. Would that be so bad?” Her attitude helped me see that daring to step out of my comfort zone wasn’t a huge deal. It was part of life.

My mother also supported my dreams. Whenever I would share a new opportunity that I’d been presented, her first reaction was always “Oh honey, how exciting; that sounds wonderful!!” Never was this more apparent than when I took my first job in Milwaukee after college. There were no tears from her, no unspoken recriminations for moving six hours away. She put my dream—to be a career woman—first. She and my dad helped me pack and sent me on my way . . . with their bedroom set. It had resided in my parents’ room for nearly twenty years and now it was bequeathed to me, on the move, ready to provide rest for a young woman starting out on her own.

And now, I’m a mother.  The end tables and dinette from the 1960’s are long gone, but the bedroom set remains, steadfast in its support of the joys and sorrows of life. It lives on in my daughter’s room, now refurbished in child-friendly maple laminate counter tops and darling bun feet. It sits, as it has in the past, witnessing the dreams of an upcoming generation. I pass by my daughter’s bedroom and hear my mother, who is visiting from out-of-town: “Who cares how you dress?” It’s who you are in the inside that counts, honey. You can be anything you want to be.  . .” And so it continues . . . the next chapter of the motherhood story  . . . passing on encouragement, daring young girls to dream and most of all to do.

Mother’s Day is this weekend. I’ll visit with my mom, who lives a few hours away. As we often do these days, we’ll reminisce. Who knows, maybe the “traveling bedroom set” will show up in an anecdote or two. No matter what, I’ll be sure to give thanks to the woman who dared to me be bold and to do what it takes to make dreams come true.

This post was inspired by the book Dare, Dream Do, by Whitney Johnson.

Discussion: If you enjoyed this post and want to share stories of your aspirations and achievements, please leave a comment: how did a significant woman in your life dare you to dream?

Do you live in West Michigan? I invite you to a Dare, Dream Do meet-up in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Click here for details.

Dan McCarthy, founder of the blog Great Leadership and host of the monthly Leadership Development Carnival keeps it simple this month and offers us a straight-forward carnival. No theme– just 27 excellent essays on leadership. Speaking of keeping it simple, you can see my carnival entry titled The KISS Model of Leadership Development. Other interesting titles include The Cruel, Bitter and Crushing Taste of Dumptruck Feedback (go, Art Petty!) and Tanmay Vora’s Lessons from a Cab Driver.

Check out the latest Leadership Development Carnival here.

Has developing future leaders at your company become a complex web of activities?

With formal processes like talent reviews, individual development plans, and high-potential candidate reviews, it’s no wonder that you feel swamped and put leadership development on the back burner.

There is another way to develop leaders. I suggest that when you are overwhelmed with the formal “to do’s” of developing your team’s leadership skills, go back to the basics: keep it simple.

Using the “Keep It Sweet and Simple” model (KISS), any leader, no matter the size of their organization or the availability of formal development practices, can create simple, effective leadership development opportunities for their team members.

Here’s your four-step plan:

Keep it real. Don’t fabricate a development opportunity. Look for real tasks and projects that people can lead. When people feel they’re making difference on a “real” project, they’ll really step up.

Integrate into daily activities. Leadership ability is developed when people are nudged out of their comfort zone. Opportunities to strengthen someone’s leadership muscles are everywhere. Look around you— where can you delegate tasks that will build your team members’ skills in leading others?

Show them how it’s done. The best way a leader can develop others is by setting a good example. If you are modeling solid leadership practices, you are showing your team “this is what good leadership looks like.” Are you a positive leadership role model?

Start with small wins. “Big win” challenges don’t come along that often and when they do, you want to be sure your team members are ready for them. To prepare your team, start with low-risk leadership tasks.  Be on the look-out for ways your direct reports can achieve small successes that will accumulate into a portfolio of “wins”, which builds their confidence.

Specific suggestions:

• Delegate the leading of department meetings to your team members. Rotate responsibility.
• Send one of your team members as a “proxy” to a cross-functional team you belong to. (Note: run this by the team’s leader first.)
• Help your team members see leadership opportunities. “John, I noticed you didn’t speak up at the XYZ meeting. Why was that? It would have been a great opportunity to showcase your expertise on _____ and to demonstrate your leadership abilities.”
• Have a super-star performer? Train him or her to be a coach/mentor to others on the team.
• When you see leadership, recognize it. Be sure to praise any leadership activity you see. When you say, “Susan, I appreciate the leadership you showed when you offered to help Tom out with that tough customer situation”, it helps Susan envision herself as a leader.   

Developing the next generation of leaders doesn’t need to be complex. But it does need to happen consistently. Use the KISS template and you’ll never lack ideas for ways to grow your team’s leadership skills.

Additional resources: I’ve researched and compiled a list of free leadership development resources. Check them out here and here.

photo credit: istockphoto.com

Today I’m excited to be a guest on the popular blog talk radio show, Drive Thru HR, hosted by William Tincup and Bryan Wempen. Things are pretty free-flowing on their show, so it’s anybody’s guess where our conversation will take us. We’ll start talking HR and the “people equation”‘ but who knows where we’ll end up!

The show is today, May 3rd, 2012 from 1:00 – 1:30 pm eastern. You can join us by clicking here.

 A guest post by Chris Wallace

It’s a tough lesson to grasp when you’re 8-years-old, but sometime during the road to adulthood I finally understood my grandmother’s favorite maxim — “You kill more flies with honey than with vinegar.”

This wise saying couldn’t be more true than in an office environment. Even if you’re a generally rosy person, there’s likely something or someone that bothers you at work. Maybe it’s the graphic designer whose headphones aren’t exactly ‘noise cancelling,’ or a partner on a project who spends more time complaining than contributing productively.

Anger and frustration are natural responses in situations that slow down our workflow or distract our train of thought. When they continue unabated or grow into persistent habits, it’s easy to let ourselves boil over. But however silently we stew, the negative energy we build in response will only serve to exacerbate the situation.

Consider these potential situations at work:

Your Coworker in the Adjoining Cubicle is Unbearably Loud on the Phone

If you’re like me, productivity requires peace and quiet. I struggle to work with constant distractions, so when a new employee with the voice of a play-by-play football announcer moved in next door, it forced me to wear headphones, cranking up the classical music in feeble attempts to drown him out.

After two weeks of gritting my teeth and complaining to my wife, she reminded me to ‘be nice’ and solve the problem. After work, I invited my new coworker out for happy hour. We broke the ice and I learned that he’s a great guy with lots of shared interests. With the situation relaxed, it was easy to bring up my gripe. He was immediately apologetic (I honestly believe he hadn’t even realized) and ever since, I’ve ditched the headphones and we’re fast friends.

A Colleague is Arrogant and Demeaning

There’s almost nothing harder to deal with than stubborn self-assurance, especially in a coworker who belittles people around them. It’s a character trait that feeds off of reactions. When someone talks down to a coworker performing a task for them, they expect subservience.

Don’t egg this tendency on. Even if someone is your superior at work, you’re still there with a common goal in mind. It’s tough, but treat these people with respect and kindness. Be a mirror of positivity, and your good attitude will reflect back onto the person trying to bring you down.

Defusing the Micromanager

Here’s where I’m guilty of being the annoying one — I’m a do-it-yourself kind of guy, and I tend to oversee projects to the point of frustrating people working with me on them. Over the years, I’ve learned that trusting people works far better than staring over their shoulder. If you assign a task, rely on employees to do it well. If you are that employee, your job is to really knock it out of the park. After the project is complete and you’ve proven yourself, don’t hesitate to point out to your colleague that their constant checking up on you wasn’t really necessary. They’ll recognize the good work you’ve just done and establish new trust in you, in part because you were willing to speak up.

The frustrating situations that can arise with coworkers in an office environment are endless (if they weren’t, we’d have far less content for TV sitcoms). Whatever the case may be, address it with a smile. Being positive is not always easy, but it’s contagious when it catches on. And wouldn’t we all rather be happy at work?

Christopher Wallace is Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Amsterdam Printing, a leading provider of personalized pens and other promotional products such as imprinted apparel, mugs and customized calendars. He regularly contributes to Promo & Marketing Wall blog.

Are you a person of your word?

As a leader, when you lay out a vision, you are creating a promise— that the future state will be better than the current one. People buy in to that vision based on their trust in you to get them there.   It’s up to you to deliver. Making the vision a reality means you kept your word.

The way you get from “vision” to “reality” is through execution—by getting things done.

Execution is important because it fulfills the promise of the vision.

It’s about planning, analyzing and creating momentum. But before you rush off and “go do”—think about adding another piece to the execution puzzle. What role will feedback play in your action plan?

People need to know how they’re measuring up to expectations. I’ve often said, “In the absence of feedback, people make things up.” When there’s an information void, people can be real creative on the meanings they make. Unproductive speculation threatens the vision. Help your team put their creativity elsewhere by providing feedback.

When giving feedback, you must balance two aspects: addressing problems and offering praise. Don’t be stingy with either. Failing to address problems immediately leads to people getting off track. Not bothering to praise people leads to lower morale.

Is the landscape of your workplace littered with broken promises? If so, you have a real opportunity to be different from other leaders . . . and to make a difference by delivering on the vision you created. Providing feedback to your team will help them keep you true to your word.

photo credit: istockphoto.com

Disclosure: the concept of Execution through Analyzing, Momentum and Feedback come from the newly-released Work of Leaders™ assessment from Inscape Publishing. My consulting company SkillSource is an authorized distributor of Inscape Products.

Would you like to see how you can use these concepts to help lead your project team or work team? I’ll send you a sample report.

Send an email to info [at] people-equation [dot] com with “Work of Leaders Report” in the subject line.

This past weekend, my daughter and I spent some time in her room sorting through books she no longer reads. We had three piles: Keep, Donate and Memories. The “Memories” books would be put into storage—they no longer were age-appropriate, but they held sentimental value. As we sorted books, our conversation went like this:

Me: “What category?”

Kid: “Donate.”

Me: <aghast> “What?! But honey, you used to love this book.”

Kid: <disdainfully> “Yeah, Mom, when I was like, THREE.”

My second grader was ready to move on. I was not.

It can be hard to know when to let go. Memories – and the emotions they evoke – are powerful forces for keeping us where we are.

Sometimes, it’s (relatively) easy to make the move – the eight-year-old no longer needs books designed for a preschooler. It was fun while it lasted, but she’s moved on. Now it’s time for her mother to do the same.

Other times, it’s a lot harder.

Are you thinking it it’s time to move on, but aren’t completely sure? Here are ten signs that may be time for you to put your current situation into a Memories box:

1. It’s not fun anymore.
2. You can’t find anything positive to say about the experience.
3. The people you used to enjoy now annoy you.
4. You’re starting to do subversive things like “forgetting” tasks, just to make it interesting and see who notices.
5. The work drains you.
6. You just don’t care, even though you should.
7. The financial benefit of staying doesn’t justify doing so.
8. You’re self-medicating.
9. You’re staying because the thought of leaving makes you feel guilty.
10. Everyone that you care about has already moved on.

There are probably a whole bunch of reasons you can use to convince yourself to stay, but keep this in mind: if you aren’t showing up with your best work, how is that a good thing? Nobody benefits from you hanging on to “what used to be”.  If you know that it’s time for you to make a move, do yourself and everybody around you a favor: make a plan for your exit.  There’s no need to jump ship tomorrow, but making that choice to move to a better place will give you courage to take the next step.

In making this plan, you will be a person of integrity who has set a course for new adventures. Moving on doesn’t mean you forget where you’ve been; it means you’ve given the past its rightful place in your life’s journey.

photo credit: istockphoto.com