Over the past three months I have been non-stop learning!  From reading books and I’ve taken much of my readings from the past three months and compiled what I have found to be the four characteristics great leaders demonstrate daily:

1. Leaders have strong opinions but weak defenses

Bob Sutton author of No Assholes Rule, gives a great example of how leaders opinions can set organizational culture.  In a post he describes how Andy Grove’s approach to leadership pushes three points that can be summed up with the following phrase, “Leaders have strong opinions but weak defenses.”  He says leaders explore and doubt in private, espouse self-fulfilling confidence in public and always seek to understand and adapt.

2. Leaders seek understanding

Are we able to express our ideas clearly and most importantly can we actively listen? Leaders seek understanding through civil dialogue. In Donald Miller’s post on civil dialogue, he lists his five principles of civil dialogue that take leaders conversations to the next level:

1. Truth is not My Truth, it’s Just Truth
2. Methodology is Part of the Message
3. Without a Loving Heart, I am Like a Clanging Cymbal
4. The Other Person has Sovereignty
5. I Could be Wrong

3. Leaders consider business in their current state, not in its ideal state.

Seth Levine calls it “Your reality filter,” but it is just calling a spade a spade.  Ambitions, passion and excitement tend to cloud sound judgments on today’s decisions.  Put those feelings aside to make decisions based on data.  This practice of relying on data that describes the current state evidence based management.  Its the theory where we commit , “to finding and using the best theory and data available at the time to make decisions.”  Note it does not say feelings, or goal state.  When my feelings over run my logical ability to make a decision, I run into issues.  True leaders focus on the current reality and not the idealistic view of their business.

4. Leaders understand enough of each part of the whole so their ideas can have sex.

British author, Matt Ridley calls this “the mating of ideas.”  Ridley’s recent TED talk explained how ideas over the centuries have built upon traded with to enable an explosion over the past 100 years of standard of living.  He explains that people take their ideas or products and combine with or trade for other products creating new ideas or products.  His point is that not a single human knows how to make a mouse – drilling for oil to make the plastic, growing coffee for the rigger making the oil.  What is valuable here is that leaders can dive into details in a cross-functional way yet zoom out to make those details have sex and create value.

Leadership is an infinite resource, but finite in execution.  There are plenty of folks who know about these leadership characteristics, but very few who are able to implement them.  At the end of the day, we all ask ourselves the same question, am I implementing leadership characteristics in my life?

Post from: Joe Budde Jr. More about social media and Joe can be found at his blog.

Four Characteristics of Great Leaders

We all clamor for professional development at some point in our careers, asking for trips, conferences, extra projects, but here are six of the most valuable minutes we will ever spend on our professional careers.  The video’s below teach us how to iron a shirt and shine shoes in less than three minutes each!

How to Iron a Shirt

How to Shine Shoes

Via the always stylish and entertaining men’s fashion writer Kenyatte.

Post from: Joe Budde Jr. More about social media and Joe can be found at his blog.

Business Dress 101: How to Shine Shoes and Iron Shirts

Netflix spends considerable effort to maintain a culture of values congruence.  By aligning employees actions with their values, Netflix can build what I think is the most effective competitive advantage, a culture of trust.   Its values are action oriented and drive performance management and talent management across the company.

This Netflix slide deck explains how they maintain their culture.  After reading it several months ago, I have recommended it to several friends and colleagues. I didn’t want my faithful readers to miss the benefits, so I have embedded the slides below.

How different would the world be if all employers/managers were this focused on driving results from its teams?

Post from: Joe Budde Jr. More about social media and Joe can be found at his blog.

Netflix Continues a Culture of Values Congruence

I love where I work.  Daily, the conversations are challenging, broadening and focused on achieving impressive goals.  As a non-profit, my organization is always looking to take its operations to the next level, especially in terms of engagement with our constituents.  The mission and vision are what drive the passion for so many of my colleagues and volunteers.  Difficult part about it is driving engagement via conversation.  Just yesterday my co-worker sent an email to a few of us at the office helping us tilt our mission and vision toward the conversation and our collective ability to drive it. Check out his amazing thoughts:

Guest Post adapted from an email by Kye Hittle

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You might remember that we threw out the idea of having the entire staff and talented volunteers become “compelling content producers” by way of blog, wiki, etc. That sounds very pie-in-the-sky, but it isn’t and it could offer a part of the solution to one of the immediate problems that we face in the comm arena (content creation). So, I thought maybe a tangible example that hits close to home for you might help.

Imagine you read this article (that came to me via twitter btw) which was just published today. You don’t have to actually read it, the exec summary is that charities often inflate their gifts-in-kind number to get a better rating on charity watchdog websites because it pushes down their cost of fundraising percentage.

The first thing you think is “wow, this reminds me why we are so conservative in our policies and, ya know, there really are some shadeballs out there.” And then “gosh, I hope our donors don’t think WE are like that.”

But, WAIT, how DO they know that we are any different? None of those policies are posted online. We don’t publish them in the annual report. (And even if we did who would ever read boring crap like that anyway?) We kill ourselves adhering to these policies and I betcha that, if surveyed, a bunch of our constituents just assume we are like the rest!  Ugh, we might as well play the game and get the better rating – sure would make our job a lot easier!

That’s not how our organization does things, however. So, you write a blog entry on the website blog linking to the article and going down how our policy handles each point Kathy Kristof levels against us nonprofits. Then you click Post and its done – 15 minutes. Now there’s no magic here – that doesn’t mean every potential donor automatically knows that we are above such shenanigans, but it does IMMEDIATELY put our position out there for the entire world (not just people we have contact info for, mind you, but anyone searching or stumbling across this topic). On top of that, the blog model invites a conversation, so people can say how much they appreciate our approach (sing our praises to the rest of the world for us) or ask further questions (allowing additional education we didn’t even anticipate was needed) or throw out a stupid and incorrect statement (that we can then correct in a public forum cuz you know if one thinks it, there’s a ton more that do too).

Try doing that with a magazine article, annual report or letter – or even a one-on-one phone call with someone that does care enough to call in and get the skinny. The reach would be far less and its a lot harder to refer to in the future when the question comes up again. Plus, when you need content for Foundation Flash or the Foundation e-newsletter, just throw in a blurb and link to your blog post for those that have interest (or didn’t but do now that you’ve brought it up for them). I could go on-and-on about the potential impact of that one simple post, but hopefully that begins to paint a picture.

That’s how it should work. You can probably imagine how this would play out for pretty much any staffer or key volunteer (there would be a ton of different scenarios). I really like thinking of the online content of an organization as its “resume.” Right now ours looks pretty thin and short of hiring someone(s) to beef it up, we’ll remain that way, unless we consider what new media offers.

This is one of the only tech-powered strategies that I would even consider at this early stage if I was in your shoes. Of course start small. What’s the cost? Staff/volunteer training, blog software (free, but there’s some setup), a shared strategy for what messages need to be advanced, strategy on one blog vs multiple. Are we ready for all that now? Probably not, but I’d say it should be in the consideration hopper. It just occurred that we can talk tools or theory, but a story would most likely be the best educator – hope it helped. Come hang out with Joe and I for an hour in that world and we’ll really blow your mind!

-Kye

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Now, the theme of this post is the response from YOU and the ensuing conversation, so both Kye and I would love to see your thoughts on this.  Please leave a comment and let us know what you think of this example and the start of a new more conversational and listening focused strategy.

Post from: Joe Budde Jr. More about social media and Joe can be found at his blog.

Yet Another Futile Attempt to Explain Social Media for Non Profits

via dklimke on flickr

Whether your community is your co-workers, employees, or the group of people you interact with online, success is directly correlated to the strategy in place to achieve engagement.

At school teachers give you a syllabus.  They provide the “what to do” to learn what you need to.  In the real world, we must create our own syllabuses to drive results.  Here is the syllabus I follow to get results with my communities:

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1. Have a Plan – Put the Who, What, Where, When, Why and How on paper.  Make the Why answer drive the other answers.  The Why is the keystone for the entire plan.  Crafting a great How based on a community focused why is what makes marketing authentic.
2. Execute/Engage – Don’t just talk about it!  Go do it!
3. Listen – Put your ear to the router.  Put yourself in the feedback loop so you can actually hear the positive and negative conversations about your engagement. And don’t forget to ask for feedback as well!  People want you to improve!
4. Adjust – Take the feedback seriously.  Go back to your plan and make changes to ensure your plan aligns to your goals and the feedback you received.  Communicate this feedback loop to the community.  Create a conversation about the feedback and start the changes to the plan, accept your shortcomings publicly: truth and understanding is the foundation of healthy relationships.
5. Execute/Engage – When we adjust our actions, it is easy to feel like efforts to engage the community have failed.  Feelings of failure often lead to quitting.  DON’T DO IT! If we listen and care about our new relationships, we can care enough to improve.

Post from: Joe Budde Jr. More about social media and Joe can be found at his blog.

Strategy to Engage a Community

Fred Wilson at Union Square Ventures has a way with explaining how he approaches business.   In his most recent presentation, he explains how he is intentional about how he uses the Internet to do what he calls “Social Recruiting.”

What is “Social Recruiting?”

Social Recruiting is the process of using “social” websites to obtain and research candidates for a job opening.  The use of the term social is optional.

Building teams based on trust is one of the most essential parts of running any business and this presentation on social recruiting is important for those searching for jobs and those with jobs to fill.  Both the recruiter and the recruited can use the Internet for finding your next coworker or next employer.  Fred provides this excellent presentation to prove that point.

Post from: Joe Budde Jr. More about social media and Joe can be found at his blog.

Fred Wilson on Social Recruiting: A Guide for the Recruiter and the Recruited

I’d like to think that most of you are people who pour their hearts into all that you do. If I could be so bold, I’d classify myself right there beside you. Its people like us who spend a majority of our day working to improve the world around us. My recent efforts have lead me to question just what part of my business would be the most effective competitive advantage.

My answer:  The ability for an organization to build and maintain trust.

It leads to effectiveness, it creates freedom for innovation, it enables relationships to flourish – it is the basis for building solid businesses.

Kotter and Cohen, authors of The Heart of Change, point to trust as a foundation for a team to see, feel and execute change.  Also, one of the Five Dysfunctions of a Team is the absence of trust. Even though many people see it as foundational, it seems as though trust slips away from us through the inevitabilities of business life:  layoffs, restructuring, lack of funding, poor investments, poor hires, there are too many to name.

At the Catalyst Conference, Andy Stanley presented about trust as a foundation of organizational culture.  He provided a functional way for how you and I can begin to establish trust in our organizations.  I reproduce them here so you won’t miss out on these great ways to lead others to establish trust:

“To develop a culture of trust, leaders must be trustworthy. Worthy of trust does not mean perfect. It means when I create a gap where your expectations don’t line up with the experience I give you, I talk to you about it.

5 Essential Commitments of Trust

1. I will believe the best.
2. When other people assume the worst about you, I will come to your defense.
3. If what I experience begins to erode my trust, I will come directly to you to talk about it.
4. When I am convinced I will not be able to deliver on a promise, I will come to you ahead of time.
5. When you confront me about the gaps I’ve created, I will tell you the truth.

The gaps are the opportunities… the gaps are the litmus test… for you to choose what culture you will have.

Questions to Ask

1. Are there people in your organization you have a hard time trusting.
2. Is it your issue or is it theirs? (if you have never chosen to trust it is still your issue)
3. What can you do about your part?
4. What do you need to address with them about their part?
5. Who do you sense having a difficult time trusting you?
6. Why?
7. What can you do about it?

If you choose to trust, you will create an organization that is more nimble and effective.”

Its not easy to create this trust, but it sure does challenge me and push me to the next level.  I’ll be asking  myself these questions to become more intentional about building trust.  What do you do to develop trust in your relationships?  Buy people coffee?  Take them to the doctor when they need their wisdom teeth pulled?

I’d love to hear how you intentionally build trust into your relationships, leave a comment and lets get the ideas flowing.

Post from: Joe Budde Jr. More about social media and Joe can be found at his blog.

The Most Effective Competitive Advantage

Recently, my wife and I have been having discussions about critical thinking and the ability to chose words and responses.  Our discussions started after a dinner at Chick-fil-A.  We noticed all employees at this fast food restaurant respond to a customer’s “thank you” in the same way by saying “My pleasure.”

“My pleasure” is a response that doesn’t elicit a feeling of favor from the receiver.  This makes all the difference in customer service and enables their employees to learn why it is so important to chose words carefully.  Now people who learn this may not understand immediately, but having the knowledge that it is possible and justified to spend time thinking about what words to chose provides the ground work for structuring the thinking of a person.

Then this morning, I woke up to find an email from a co-worker with the following quote from Martin Luther King, Jr.:

“The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically… Intelligence plus character – that is the goal of true education.”

The first time I heard the words “structure” and “thinking” in the same sentence was via a finance professor who provided two semesters worth of my education at Miami University.  Thus, with my collegiate experience and this quote, I couldnt agree more with the purpose Dr. King provides for education.

My experiences and discussions with friends and coworkers are continually challenging me to structure my thinking – because as I have learned, it is just as valuable to learn how others think as it is to learn what others think.

Post from: Joe Budde Jr. More about social media and Joe can be found at his blog.

Good Customer Service Enables Structured Thinking

Recently a popular tech blogger, Robert Scoble learned about owning the time between stimulus and response.  Owning that space in your life is relationship changing and life transforming.  That’s why its one of the main points and continuous goals I have coming off of the Stephen Covey training.  But as I have espoused here before, listing your goals out on paper is a great way to start on the path to achieving them.  Obviously one of my first goals with this blog I failed to achieve (post once a week) especially in the last month.   So in an effort to Sharpen the Saw Covey style, I’ll let you all in on a few of the goals I set for myself at the covey training.

At the end of the covey training, you set goals in four dimensions as a way to achieve Habit Seven, Sharpen the Saw.

• Physical
• Social/Emotional
• Mental
• Spiritual

I’ll take you through my Mental and Social/Emotional areas of my goals.

Mental

Mentally, Covey pushed us to renew ourselves mentally by encouraging writing, reading, collecting quotes, and developing a hobby.  My goal was to further purge my daily reading to expand/widen the scope of what I read online.   The first thing I did was to remove the standard social media and tech guard out of my feed reader.  I was sick of reading the same piece of news from 4 blogs.  I picked one and am going to stick to it.  I also subscribed to other blogs.  Oh and my wife and I started laughing our bottoms off while reading “Me Talk Pretty One Day” by David Sedaris.  Its outside of my comfort zone and its an absolute riot and well written book.

Social/Emotional

In this area I wanted to focus on three of the suggestions from the covey training in this area.

1. Widen your circle of friends.
2. Let go of the damaging competitive feelings you may have towards others.
   
3. Practice Empathic Listening regularly with the people who are important to you.

My execution plan on this goal was to invite folks over for dinner – simple yet revolutionary.  With just two of us, its easy to have leftovers – but investing those leftovers in relationships is a revolution.   Now that we are moving into a new neighborhood, my wife and I have started to plan a block party.  Its important that we spend time developing those friends and actively being interested in them and their stories.  I plan to work hard to make my home a open place where people feel free to be themselves and free to be loved.

Next week I will outline a few things that the Stephen Covey training walked us through so that by my listing them here, you might be propelled to think a new thought.  We all know it is a challenge to implement change as we learn new things.  I use this blog as a real way to mark my progress and hopefully we can implement together as we learn together.

Best Quote from this topic:  “Sharpening the Saw actually saves time.”

How have you saved time by reviewing your goals and implementing change in your life?

Post from: Joe Budde Jr. More about social media and Joe can be found at his blog.

Sharpen the Saw – A Challenge to Implement Change

There are so many people out there who think Gen-Y is the best thing since sliced bread.  I am a Gen-Y’er and I believe it most days, but today I am here to say that Gen Y is the most irresponsible generation.  Bold, I know.  At my session of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People Signature Course, there were three things that stood out to me as issues where Gen-Y is irresponsible.

For Reasons Gen-Y is Irresponsible

1. Gen-Y (or their parents on their behalf) talks its way out of bad behavior.

The 7 Habits course had a great quote that was a great explanation of one of the top struggles of us Gen-Y’ers:

“You can’t talk yourself out of problems you behave your self into.”

How many times have you seen Gen Y’ers get themselves in a pickle only to talk themselves right out of a consequence?  Granted there are good ways to talk your way out of bad news.  But owning our actions and the associated consequences enable us to deepen and build lasting relationships.

2. Gen-Y spends time only on what they enjoy, not what is important.

One of the videos we watched in the Covey class said something to the effect that unsuccessful people only spend time on what they enjoy, not what is important.  Gen-Y, the generation full of passion and the ability to choose to work on or for something they are passionate about sometimes confuses passion with enjoyment.  Passion leads you to work towards something.  And sometimes the work on the path towards that goal is not enjoyable.  Most Gen-Y’ers find themselves in the struggle define their personal boundary between enjoyment and passion.

3. Gen-Y was taught to treat others as you want to be treated.

This is great advice if we lived alone on our own individual Walden Ponds.  Too bad we dont.  How I want to be treated doesn’t mean that someone else wants to be treated that same way.  If I enjoy direct feedback no matter what(my friends and I call it (No Grace Period), that doesn’t mean your coworker wants to be told that he comes to work in dress that is only appropriate for a picnic.  We really should be saying treat others as they want to be treated since relationships are about empathizing.

So, these are three areas where Gen-Y fails the responsible generation test as defined by the 7 habits of highly effective people.  Gen-Y has an awesome chance to act on our ideals and achieve supreme success, but not without tackling these responsiblity issues first.

Post from: Joe Budde Jr. More about social media and Joe can be found at his blog.

Gen Y is Irresponsible