Whether you’re managing up (your boss), managing across (your peers or cross-functional stakeholders), or managing your direct reports, influencing others is key to navigating complex organizational environments and a requirement in leveraging your value.

Yet, many experienced leaders feel flummoxed or flat when their efforts to move the ball forward are thwarted by others with different priorities. 

If this resonates for you, check yourself on the following three ways to fortify your influence.

1. Make and keep connection front & center.  

This can be difficult for high-achieving leaders, who love nothing more than to check the box.  Garrison Wynn said, “People buy from people they trust, and they trust people they like.” This doesn’t mean to be superficially friendly or manipulative. Connecting at a personal level builds trust and frankly makes working with others a lot more enjoyable.

If you’re able to make a personal connection, you’re likely able to understand what drives the other person, and what obstacles they are encountering. It’s the nexus of strong relationships and at the heart of emotional intelligence.  In hybrid work environments, making personal connections requires more time and intentionality.

2. Mutually assess the will AND the way.

The first step is to identify mutual goals and align on what constitutes a “win.” Stacking hands demonstrates the will to get ‘er done.

What happens, though, when the person you depend on to complete a task is overwhelmed with other commitments?  What tends to happen is a lot of hounding, ill will, and avoidance. Consistent check-ins go a long way to understanding the obstacles for that person. Does she have the ability and resources to deliver (the way)? If not, your role as a leader is to help that person remove the barriers.

3. Gain agreement on accountability norms. 

One of the most often overlooked tools in the leadership toolkit is setting norms on how to hold others to account for commitments.

What happens when a deadline is missed?  What happens when the work product is inaccurate or does not meet expectations? How will such occurrences be communicated and to whom? What will be escalated and to whom?

Setting norms sometimes feels too structured or formal for some leaders. If norms are not established at the get-go and reinforced throughout a project, however, you are left with a flimsy framework for influencing behavior.

Indeed, influencing others, even when you have inherent authority, requires time and intentionality. It’s a lifelong practice.

Not only is influence a precursor to and requirement for managing and leading others, but it’s also a super important ingredient to scaling your contribution and impact. Successfully wielding influence is a key differentiator and essential to maximizing your leadership value.

“Finish stronger than you start,” was a common parental refrain in my household growing up.  I didn’t appreciate it then, and I’m sure my parents didn’t appreciate my eye-rolling either. Now, however, I see how it reinforced the values of accountability, persistence, and tenacity.

If you find yourself more of a “starter,” and your energy and enthusiasm wane as the newness of a project drags on, consider the following quick tips for finishing strong:

1. Get clear on the specific steps necessary to get this initiative over the finish line.
2. Estimate how long each remaining step will take to complete.
3. Determine who, if anyone, can help complete the task. Ask for help and/or delegate.
4. If it’s you, you, and only you, block off the estimated time on your calendar.
5. Then, the most challenging for many leaders: honor that time and minimize distractions (close your door, turn off device notifications, etc.). It’s OK to let others know you are duly occupied and prefer not to be interrupted.
6. Complete the task as planned.
7. Rinse & repeat for the next project or task.

Sometimes when we slow down to check the status of a project, we realize that the finish line is well within reach – perhaps just two or three more steps remain — and we’re relieved. Other times, of course, it’s more than we anticipated, and it feels overwhelming. 

Either way, this approach brings clarity and keeps you grounded. It gives you a concrete way to see the finish line, snap you out of ennui, and break through the ribbon with fanfare (crowd cheering here!).

Some leaders have a sixth sense of what lies ahead for their organizations and markets. The leaders who do this well tend to be branded as visionary, or in some cases, “out there.”

Many leaders, however, need to develop their strategic skills, and could benefit from a framework to help broaden their perspective beyond the day-to-day.

If you have a difficult time carving out time, much less stepping back to consider future possibilities, the following “short-list” of questions should get you started.

The first set of questions are focused internally; the second set invite you to develop an external perspective. Build upon these, of course, as you see fit.

• What keeps your most valued customers (clients, donors, etc.) up at night?
• To what degree are employees across the organization engaged, satisfied, and operating consistent with cultural norms?
• Is your team delivering optimally on its objectives? Are there overlaps with other areas of the organization?
• What is the biggest headache for your boss’s boss?  
• Which operational processes are showing signs of strain?

Externally focused questions:
Scan the horizon

• What are the current macro trends affecting your market and segment or industry?  Google “macro trends” and you’ll get pages worth of data and reports. Scan one or two.
• While scrolling through your newsfeed, think about what could possibly affect your market sector?
• How might these shifts affect your organization’s ability to thrive (or not)?
• Which technologies and innovations are apt to drive change for your business or industry? Certainly AI, but what about 5G, blockchain, bitcoin, 3D printing …?
• Are there potential learning opportunities from sectors related (or unrelated) to your own?  From your competitors?

Once you’ve identified the top challenges (or opportunities) most likely to affect your organization, you can begin to qualify the likelihood and timeframe. From there, you can socialize internally and shift into solution mode, if needed.

The ability to anticipate challenges and opportunities is a key leadership differentiator. While developing the skill takes time, it’s not as difficult as you might think. It’s more about applying a fresh perspective to your day-to-day – one that reminds you to look up and out to contextualize your situation with a broader, more strategic lens. 

Here’s to the power of questions in helping you anticipate what lies ahead!

Leading cross-functional initiatives through a highly matrixed organization can be confounding — on a good day. 

Leaders who have learned to navigate the complexities are a special breed. Those who thrive in such an environment lean into two “A” game leadership attributes: Alignment and Accountability. They take nothing for granted throughout the process.

Alignment means that those involved and affected are in line, or in agreement, with you. It includes norms for how a team works together and who owns what and provides clarity on deliverables and what constitutes success.

Let’s face it, most of us have found ourselves in a situation that sounded like a good idea at the time — only to realize later that it wasn’t. So, it’s not enough to gain agreement at the get-go of an initiative; rather, it must be checked each step of the way.

Alignment requires a project management mindset, in which each milestone is an opportunity to check in on commitments and concerns. All too often, the train is too far down the track before a leader realizes that one of the cars has derailed. Re-affirming alignment requires time, patience, and an open mind. 

Accountability means holding each other responsible for commitments and deliverables.

To be effective, accountability requires a process for keeping track of who is on the hook for what by when. This can happen via email, text, Slack, meeting minutes, performance objectives, etc. Without a “formal” system, it is all too easy for stakeholders to leave a meeting or Zoom session with different impressions. 

While there are plenty of other factors that contribute to whether a cross-functional initiative is successful (i.e. politics, etc.), alignment and accountability stand out as two key skills within a leader’s control.

For those who love the murky world of leading through complexity, these skills become second nature and make the difference between a poorly executed initiative and one that works superbly.

Decisions come in all shapes and sizes across an organization: from the simple to complex, to immediate vs. long-term.  No matter the variety, the first and most important factor across all types of decisions is determining (and gaining agreement around) the decision maker. Or, as one of my esteemed colleagues says, “Who owns the ‘D’?”

“Who owns the D?” is often informed by the stakes of the decision. Two key factors that determine the stakes are the time needed to make the decision, and the importance of the decision to the organization.

In general, low to medium stakes decisions involve fewer people, happen faster and are less important to the broader organization. In those decisions, the decision maker is often defined by a person’s role and scope of responsibilities. If you lead a sales team, for instance, it’s usually your decision on how accounts are realigned after a team member leaves.

High stakes decisions, often strategic, tend to require input from a cross section of contributors. They are often vital to the organization’s long-term success and take more time and deliberation.

In those cases, identifying the decision maker can be less clear and might even be up for debate. Deciding which customer input gets prioritized and fed back into product roadmaps, for instance, crosses several organizational functions (e.g. sales, product marketing, product management, product development and engineering).

When the decision maker is unclear, decisions tend to take an inordinate amount of time and can result in a lot of teeth-gnashing and strained relationships. What’s worse, when there’s no clear decision maker, accountability languishes.

Clarity on the decision maker is the starting point not only for making better decisions. It’s also on the critical path to leading effectively and getting anything done.

Nearly as critical to identifying the decision maker is getting clear about who else is involved, their roles and the decision-making process. That’s a topic for another blog, perhaps.

For now, here’s to living decisively.

The final months of the year are often fraught with apprehension and stress. Then, before you know it, it’s a clean slate and we’re kicking off another year with new, more ambitious goals. We’re off to the races again! Is it any wonder that even the most centered leaders get a little out of sorts at times? 

I’m guessing that most of us have said something to someone that was not received as intended. In turn, it’s likely that we’ve also been on the other end of a comment that we interpreted as unkind or even hostile. Setting the right tone and getting a message across clearly is difficult when the clock is ticking against ambitious deadlines.  And there it is … why it can be difficult to “get along” in the workplace (or, neighborhood, family, community, nation, world, and otherwise).

So, in this “Season of Giving,” I offer the following six tips for a more peaceful approach to the end of the year … and beyond.

1. Assume positive intent (AKA “suspend judgment”) – Before reacting to a comment, email or text that rubs you the wrong way, take a pause. During that time, ask yourself.

• “What triggered such a strong response? “ 
• “Was that person intentionally operating with malice?” 
• “What might have been an alternative intent behind the message?” 

Often, by stepping back, we gain perspective and remember that everyone is doing the best they can. Once you’ve paused and reassessed, you’re better equipped to respond with your best intent.

2. Pace yourself – Several years ago, I recognized that when I didn’t leave enough time to get out the door to go to a meeting, I would inevitably forget something. Sometimes, in my rush to leave, carrying too many things to the car, I’d hurt myself by tripping over the threshold or hitting my arm against the door jam. When I started to allow an additional 10 minutes to pack up and walk carefully to the car, the difference in my disposition was dramatic. (And I had fewer bruises, too.)

3. Breathe – Many of us hold our breath when feeling stress. Taking a full breath periodically can be grounding and helps us moderate our pace.  It’s also an opportunity to savor the present and give homage to the moments that we may otherwise take for granted throughout the day

4. Behave kindly – Consciously choose your words and tone when communicating with others. Reread that email before sending. I’m not talking about sugar-coating or being disingenuous. But, in our hurry to check boxes, we sometimes forget there is a well-intentioned human at the other end. We don’t know what the receiver has on their plate or what they’re going through – loss of job, health issues, or worse, a personal tragedy. Ask yourself, “Is this something I would say to a loving family member or best friend?” Yes, this approach takes more time, but usually not as much time (or angst) as it would to recover from unintended consequences.

5. Reach out – The end of the year often leaves little time for networking and superfluous check-ins that fall outside our “to do” lists.  Reaching out to others, however, can make a huge difference in a person’s day (as well as your own). If finding time to schedule an official touch base feels insurmountable, send a quick message to let the person know you’re thinking of them, and schedule another time to catch-up later.

6. Take care of yourself – One of the most undervalued leadership skills is keeping your physical and mental health front and center. This is especially difficult if you work in an environment in which work-life balance is merely a suggestion. If you’re not taking time to recharge your batteries, you will have little energy to exercise the tips above, much less serve as a role model for your team members.

Here’s to a strong and mindful finish to the year and the year ahead – during which the “how” is just as important as the “what” you accomplished.

Of all the leadership skills my clients choose to work on, the most under-valued is reflection. It’s not that anyone is incapable of reflection, it’s more about prioritizing it and carving out time to make it happen. Let’s face it, it feels so much more productive to, well, produce something.

You crank out emails, respond to Slack messages, send texts, interview people, conduct staff meetings, solve problems, brainstorm ideas, create and present plans, onboard new employees, and that’s all before noon!  Lots of checked boxes and endorphins are pumping.

Even if you believe in reflection, deciding when, where and how to do so – not to mention on what exactly – can stop you in your tracks.  To that end, I invite you to consider the following to build your reflection muscle:

When: While the timing is highly individualistic, most people find it easiest to carve out reflection time at the beginning or end of the day (or both), and at the beginning or end of the week (or both).

I have clients, however, who prefer a break from all the doing during the day or middle of the week. Truth be told, it doesn’t matter when, as much as scheduling the time in your calendar and protecting it, as if your success depends on it.Where: Move away from your desk! If you’re in the office, find an unoccupied space, a  conference room on another floor, or better yet, get outside. If you’re working away from the office, find a location where you won’t be interrupted, or again, head outdoors for some fresh air.How: Set your alarm for 20-30 minutes and respond to the following questions. Be curious about what pops into your head as you answer questions. Don’t rush; if you finish early, cycle back and ponder the questions. Challenge yourself to go more deeply and broadly until the timer goes off. If you’re deep in the zone when it does, take a few more minutes to capture your thoughts.

Next, make a quick list of which leadership strategies and skills you would like to “Start,” “Stop,” and “Continue” moving forward. If you’re feeling particularly courageous, share these with your team or a trusted colleague who can help hold you accountable.

Taking that step back is often illuminating, even if a primary take-away is to stay the course. 

Here’s to leading confidently…and ever-curiously!

When your team is stuck or at odds with one another, it’s not unlike the weight we feel when the atmospheric pressure has dropped. We often feel drained, and we move more slowly. Some of us get a headache.

Cultivating healthy engagement across the team is one way to raise the barometric pressure and make room for clear and inviting skies.

Healthy engagement happens when your team and stakeholders feel valued and have a sense of belonging. When team members feel respected and “psychologically safe,” you will optimize idea generation, participation and decision making.

Fostering healthy engagement is not necessarily a heavy lift (so to speak). It does, however, require that you invest time to:

1. Reflect on the communication and style nuances of individual team members 
2. Identify the biggest differences with your own 
3. Flex your approach, or help your team members develop new skills

While investing in style, communication and 360-degree assessments for your team encourages self-awareness and transparency, the following considerations are a good starting point when reflecting on the preferences of your team members:

• Speaking up – Some people are perfectly comfortable speaking up in a larger group setting; others simply choose not to speak unless what they have to say is substantive.

• How we communicate – Not everyone is able to express themselves directly and clearly. Some prefer to take a more circuitous path to get to the point.

• Communication medium – Organizations also have their own preferences for Slack, text, email, or (wait for it) phone – in-person or virtual meeting place brings additional considerations to the mix.

• Recognizing a job well done – Some people savor public praise, while others favor a personal “thank you” away from the limelight. Then, there are those who prefer no praise at all and believe a job well done speaks for itself.

• What we listen for – There are the “Just the facts” listeners and those who focus on the impact to people and relationships. Others simply cannot hear the details if the big idea or overarching strategy is unclear.

• Cadence and pace – Project variety and working in short bursts are key motivators for some individuals, contrary to people who thrive with contextual, deep work requiring longer periods of uninterrupted time.

• How quickly we make decisions – There are those who are completely comfortable deciding on the spot (come what may the consequences) and others who need deliberation time and love a good decision tree.

• How we generate ideas – Out-of-the-box thinkers are in heaven when invited to a brainstorming session. Let the spit-balling begin!  Yet, an empty white board is intimidating and a recipe for shutting some people down.

It’s remarkable, really, that anything gets done when you consider the wide array of individual communication and style nuances.

Understanding your personal preferences and those of the individuals on your team, however, is a critical path to recognizing differences and building a culture of respect, inclusion, and healthy engagement.

Here’s to the bright and sunny skies ahead!

The end of one year and the beginning of the next gives most of us cause for pause. “Out with the old, in with the new!” sounds so festive when the bells are chiming at midnight. Yet, it’s difficult to embrace new habits and approaches when the old ones have served us reasonably well. That is, until they don’t.

If, for instance, you find that driving meaningful change for yourself, your teams or organization has remained elusive, it’s likely an opportunity to experiment with ways to carve out space (time & energy) for all that goes into delivering high value outcomes.

Driving change that matters requires deep thinking, idea generation, problem solving, collaboration and project management — an imposing set of requirements for most mere mortals, and a likely reason for abandoning our quests or holding on to familiar (but ill-suited) approaches.

Indeed, creating space for impactful change requires a shift in how we prioritize and organize ourselves. The following steps are designed to help you do just that.

Let’s take it from the top.

Step 1:  Begin with the end in mind. Get clear.

Identify the top three things you want to deliver to make a significant impact on your life and/or the lives of others this year. At the end of this year, what would you like to have accomplished or changed for yourself, your team or organization?

The more specific the goal, the easier it is to measure and course-correct periodically. For instance:

At the end of this year, I will have…

• Established a sustainable and flexible hybrid workplace model for optimal health, well-being, and productivity of our team.
• Bolstered the engagement level of my team in our hybrid workplace model.
• Fortified the bench strength of my team (leaving me more time for strategic initiatives).
• Strengthened my network, surrounding myself with energizing (vs. draining) colleagues and friends.
• Disengaged from work after 6PM during the week and on the weekends.

Step 2:  Design your framework.

• Carve out your vacation time, personal days off and holidays now. Of course, some dates may shift, but you will be more apt to work around those dates, vs. trying to find vacation time later.
• Set aside time for health & wellness. How many times a week, which days and where do you want to exercise, do yoga and/or meditate? If a walk around the block at lunchtime is your goal, block the time on your calendar. “Decline” meeting invites that encroach on this time. Decide now on your exceptions (i.e. your manager’s hair is on fire). Yes, this feels incredibly awkward, especially at first, but over time, you and others will adjust.
• Be intentional about the degree to which you’re okay allowing work to intrude into your weekends and evenings.

Step 3:  Remove the clutter. 

Pinpoint the pesky distractions that infiltrate your high value time. Ask yourself: 

• From which newsletters & blogs can I unsubscribe? While newsletters and blogs are easy to “delete” or comb through, they have a way of growing our inboxes and stress levels. 
• Which meetings can I stop attending? If the objective of the meeting (or your role) is unclear, consider whether it would be time well-spent, or you could send a delegate in your place.
• Which meetings can I stop hosting? Is there someone else suitable who can drive the agenda, determine objectives, and follow up on outcomes?
• Do I need to be copied on every email that involves my department? Is it time to give team members some latitude in making decisions or determine which topics warrant a “cc:?”
• Do I need to respond to every email, text, or Slack message immediately? The simple answer is “no.” This is hard if you value responsiveness, of course, but less so when you end up with more time to focus.
• Does every meeting require a full hour?  If you have four meetings a day that can be shortened by 10 minutes, you’ve found 40 minutes. Or, how about a “no meeting” day?
• Resist completing the customer satisfaction surveys and product reviews. Yes, they only take a few minutes, but again, they add up.

Step 4: Minimize the friction.

By friction, I mean…stress on the system. What is draining your energy?

• Which decision making processes are confusing, taking too much time and in need of improvement?  Is the decision maker clearly defined on each initiative? Are there too many people involved in a particular initiative?
• Are all responsible parties on-board and showing up with agency? Most of the time, big initiatives involve too many people and we are not often blessed to work with an “all-in” group. What can you do to restructure who’s involved when and for what?

Step 5:  Dedicate and honor time for your “make a difference” goals.

• At last, it’s time to carve out dedicated space to focus on the significant changes you identified in Step 1.

If building bench strength is a priority, it’s important to understand what each team member needs to advance their leadership skills. So, carving out time for individual development meetings is on the critical path. It may include introducing one or two of them to others in your network or adding a leadership coach to the mix (shameless plug).  Either way, now that you’ve cleared space for this initiative, you’re able to take the steps that have escaped you for so long.

Yes, changing it up can be uncomfortable, but let’s face it, so is another year of rinse & repeat. Here’s to your newfound space and time for what matters most this year.

The magnitude and frequency of change over the past year has been daunting, testing even the most competent leaders. While many were able to right the ship (especially in those organizations amenable to eCommerce and Zoom), few leaders would qualify the last year as one in which their teams and organizations thrived.

As organizations have shifted their attention to a post-pandemic life, there is a unique opportunity to invite fresh thinking, and to transform — or at least, challenge — the status quo.

As you work through what the new world order looks like for your organization, consider the following seven questions:

1. What is our primary goal? In other words, what are we solving for?  A goal of driving top line revenue will likely require a different approach than one designed to retain employees or enhance the customer experience. 

2. What is our decision-making process?  Exercising transparency and identifying roles, responsibilities and key milestones will go a long way to ensuring trust and, ultimately, buy-in to policies and practices. 

3. How will we evolve our process and decisions along the way, based on what we learn?  This is the epitome of change management: Don’t get too wedded to a solution. Put criteria and guardrails in place, then monitor outcomes and adjust accordingly.

4. Who needs to be included, and how?  When people lack a voice in the process, they feel powerless and can contribute to retention issues. Ensure all stakeholders have an opportunity to weigh in.

5. How can I invite “clean slate” thinking? If you were starting from scratch, how might your organization look or behave differently? Consider what kind of organization you want to be next year, three years out, etc.  Does the current structure accommodate that vision and move you closer? Get out of the weeds and zoom out.

6. What personal assumptions do I need to check and challenge? Just because your team has always worked well under one roof, or because you love the ad hoc nature of face-to-face, may not mean that’s the best way to accomplish your goals moving forward

7. What is my tolerance for a mix of solutions? One size does not fit all. Personality and life stage matter. What may have worked fine for someone early in their career may be a less attractive option when in the thick of raising children. Some people are highly effective in a work from home setting, others not so much.

Above all else, bring your energy and best self to effect and drive change. This is a unique time to reevaluate the status quo, and perhaps shake things up a bit. Leaders adept at change management will thrive.