Pink Balloons

Driving out of my subdivision yesterday morning I noticed a pair of garage sale signs flanking an intersection. What really caught my eye was the happy pink balloons floating above each of the signs, waving in the breeze. Pink balloons. My mind instantly pictured a garage sale selling lots of baby stuff. In particular, little girl baby stuff. Lace, ruffles, pastel colors.

Stop! Where is that coming from?

All my years in the advertising business (where you learn the power that colors have in our culture and the meanings attached to them) and the diversity training I've had kicked in and I realized what a cultural assumption I was making. Perhaps the pink balloons were simply left over from something else and in reality the garage sale featured lots of used yard equipment and men's work clothes. Based on my cultural conditioning about the color pink I had immediately assumed to be aware of something that I had no way of knowing.

How many times do we assume we know someone by the car they drive? The clothes they wear? The schools they attended? The color of their skin? The way they speak? The job they have?

We create "stories" for people and situations all the time and that's fine because stories are what make us human. But, it's also important to recognize that its only a story in our mind and may have nothing to do with the reality or story that the other person is living. It's just our pink balloons.

Now every time I meet someone and imagine that I know something about them I'll remember those pink balloons, waving in the morning breeze.

Sharing the Credit & Assuming the Responsibility

All the most effective leaders I know share an important skill, or perhaps more accurately, a willingness to shine the light on everyone around them when there are accolades to accept. They will make a real effort to include everyone on the team, even those who didn't participate at the level the leader expected. Not only is this willingness to share the spotlight a generous thing to do, it's a very smart thing to do as well. Have you ever participated in a team effort but for could not contribute at a high level for some reason? If the end result is successful and the leader take all the credit you, along with your teammates, will probably wonder if your efforts were really worth your time and if yours were subpar you might feel justified for slacking off.

But, when the leader generously and lavishly praises all involved, no matter their participation because, after all, it was a "team" effort, won't you feel a twinge of guilt for not giving a full-out effort and resolve to do better the next time? Most people will and that smart leader knows exactly that. They may also expect that you'll be coming in to talk about how you can perform at a higher level the next time and that conversation will lead to a better understanding of your role and responsibilities.

And when team results don't end up so well.... what should we expect of the smart leader? That's when they take on the responsibility for the overall performance of the team, knowing that, once again, the team members will look at their role and how their contributions could have been different. Those one-on-one conversations are then most certainly called for in this circumstance.

This is the kind of leader that attracts the best talent, the hardest workers, and the happiest people. All of us that know one or have one in our lives can be very grateful. Credit for all, blame for one.

Conquering Fears and Doubts

Aspiring to or being in a leadership role can bring you squarely up against every fear and doubt you thought you'd been able to handle. Suddenly that hesistation you have about speaking in front of a group or telling somebody "no" is keeping you awake at night and making your palms sweaty. Do you really have what it takes? Do you match up to the impressive resume? Were all those previous awards and accolades just a hoax or out of pity? Are you all fluff and no stuff?

Whenever I get into that place of doubt, seeing my worst fears around every corner, I try to get focused on the here and now. I remember that everyone is human. We all have dark corners we're afraid others can see into. We're all ashamed of something we've done or said. Nobody's perfect, nobody's immune from doubt.

I find that love and compassion are the best treatment for fear and doubt. And that tender-loving-care attitude needs to start with ourselves. Then, reach out and give the person next to you a sincere compliment or a smile. Remember that they might be carrying a heavy load or fear today in their heart.

Here's a favorite quote of mine from the "Four Agreements" by Don Miguel Ruiz that is applicable when fear takes over:

"Always do your best. Your best is going to change from moment to moment; it will be different when you are healthy as opposed to sick. Under any circumstance, simply do your best, and you will avoid self-judgement, self-abuse and regret."

Words to live by.

A Graceful Exit

Knowing when to step aside and let someone else lead is a tough skill to master. Look no further than politicians and professional athletes for proof. But, truth is, we all face these times in our daily lives. Sometimes its important to allow someone else to lead because you know they need to build confidence in their skills. So, you get to grow through the experience of allowing them the opportunity without interference or taking over. That's a tough one.

Or maybe you recognize you've taken an organization as far as you can and that new leadership, with the new ideas that come along with it, is the answer. Its can be hard to reach this conclusion. Your identity could be wrapped up in the role, in the organization. This calls for some soul searching and for doing the "inner work" of leadership.

Perhaps your exit from a leadership role is preordained by an established schedule of organizational change. So you've known from the beginning that the role was temporary, but that doesn't always make it easy to open your hand and pass the torch to the next leader. We might find ourselves criticizing their decisions or no longer supporting the organization. Much harder to continue to cheer on your successors and support them when needed, yet by doing this we allow ourselves to grow more and be open to the next leadership opportunity that calls.

What Makes You Tick?

Do you know what makes you tick? Do you know why you do the things you do and say the things you say? How self-aware are you?

Self-awareness can be a real key to leadership, especially to ethical leadership. If you are shut off from what your motivations are how do you know you are using your talents in the best way? If you haven't taken a good look at your beliefs, and why you have them, then how do you know you are behaving in an ethical manner? If you cannot be honest with yourself about how you will benefit from something then how can you expect others to be honest about their motivations?

Going through life on auto-pilot, not taking the time to really know ourselves and learning how to control our thoughts and attitudes isn't usually a recipe for true success. Before you can make a difference in the world you have to know what makes you different.

Moving the Process Forward

All of life is a process, from the day we are born to the day we die. And some might say that this life we live is just part of a bigger, eternal process, but that is a subject for another kind of blog. I'm thinking today about the larger process of my life and then the other processes within it and how my thoughts and actions affect how it unfolds.

We're all involved with more processes than we can count and usually in community (group action) with others whether that be at work, in our families, an organization, or a larger group (city, state, country, humanity). We each have a part to play, a part of the rope to hold on to and lift up.

There are important questions we can ask ourselves about the evolution of our process:

1) What IS my part in this process and how can I honor and enhance it?
2) Am I feeding useful information into the process or is it just noise?
3) When I notice a "problem" coming into the process do I offer this problem along with a possible solution?
4) Am I honoring the part others play in the process, even when I don't agree with them?
5) Am I taking steps, however small, to move the process forward, to help it evolve?
6) Can I be honest about wanting to stop my participation without making others bad or wrong?
7) Can I take part and stay engaged without knowing what the outcome will be?
8) Can I relax into the process and not fight against it?
9) Will I have gratitude for what I learned in the unfoldment of the process even if the "end" result is not to my immediate satisfaction or liking?
10) Can I look honestly at my motivations for involvement, honor the motivations of others, and know that everyone hopes to gain something different?

Involvement with other humans is many times a messy, chaotic, jumbled up, funny, heartbreaking, exasperating, complicated, loving and unavoidable journey. Its so easy to look at how the actions of others are impacting us, but how often do we look inside and make a correction in the way we're contributing to the process?

"Head" vs. "Heart" Decisions in Choosing a Leader

I was talking recently with someone I have a huge amount of admiration for because of the good work he's done in our community for many years. He's also just one of the "good guys". Part of our conversation was about how different organizations choose leadership, what seems to work and what doesn't. I've been mulling over this conversation for several days now and also using it as a template to compare some recent experiences and observations of my own. The essence came down to "head" (logical) decisions versus "heart" (emotional) decisions.

Both logic and emotion are valid, give us important information, and lead us in particular directions. Neither of these approaches to life is right or wrong. It comes down to what we value most and whether we recognize the validity of both ways and try to integrate and balance them. Our western world model comes down heavily on the sole validity of logic, facts and process. We learn from a young age that facts, knowledge and education are the most important things in life. Emotions are usually those things you keep to yourself and push down. Properly channeled and used, however, emotions can be the engine that moves mountains and I would propose that no creative endeavor can be successful without it.

If we can agree that there is a validity in honoring a balanced approached to decision making utilizing both logic and emotion, then perhaps we need to look at how we select leadership in the organizations we are part of. Can we find a leader that has enough of the hard skills to master the nuts and bolts of the position yet possesses the soft skills required to really connect with people? Are those involved in the selection a diverse group in their use and propensity toward logic and emotion so that the process isn't heavily biased toward one side? Are we honest with ourselves in acknowledging that we've chosen someone who is stronger in one area than another and what the consequences of that may be? Without recognition of the area of "weakness" we cannot truly assist that person in being successful.

Interesting questions that will be leading me to look at the ways I make decisions and whether I am listening to both my head and my heart.

Considering the Seventh Generation

I attended a chamber luncheon today and our speaker was the head of our county government, Judge Ed Emmett. He has a background in transportation and is so extremely knowledgable about regional transportation issues and that is a big, big thing here in Houston. Home of 4 million ++ distracted drivers! He speaks in layman's language about what our challenges are in our county, the third most populous in the country. He spoke today about the financial challenges facing Harris County, to a lesser degree than many places, and what that means for the future. One of the members of the audience asked how elected officials can communicate to and educate the public about the need for additional funding to support the needed changes over the next decades. All of this conversation got me thinking about how leadership isn't just a "here and now" endeavor. Leadership should take in to account the long term:

"In every deliberation, we must consider the impact on the seventh generation... even if it requires having skin as thick as the bark of a pine."
—Great Law of the Iroquois

Aren't we in the pickle we're in now because we've become focused on the immediate at the expense of that seventh generation? Enron being an extreme example of focusing on short term gain and the ever increasing share price, seems to me to be a symptom of a much larger sickness.

The health care/insurance reform debate would be another example: so much fear of change in the short term and little consideration of long-term ramifications. So goes Social Security, Medicare, environmental issues and so on. You can see it in our local communities where development is created without true consideration of long-term impacts, without a master plan or community discussion of what people really want.

I'm not just pointing the finger at everyone else. The finger is also pointed squarely in my own face. In my life I've been just as guilty of not considering how my actions have long term consequences. I like to think I've grown in my ability to discern: we only use organic products on our yard, we compost, we recycle, we drive cars that get relatively high mileage, we use CFL bulbs. We try to think before we buy, but we truly don't know the footprint we create. We also don't hold our government accountable for considering that seventh generation, because truth be told we're not thinking about them either.