2015 Leadership Tip

If feedback shows lack of trust is an issue, look to your accountability measures. You will discover excuses and blaming will diminish desired results. Where does human performance lack commitment, competence, and follow-through? Fill those gaps with affirmative visions and steps for success.

A Rare Sight

This week I am watching my college business communications class prepare for the semester final. The final exam is customized, individualized, and personalized, so there is no way to cheat. The test defies proving what each student does not know, as most tests are designed to do. Instead, each student records learnings that are applicable to one's own career choices from the array of concepts covered in 16 chapters and 8 weeks of discussions and activities. I am observing the epitome of teamwork: each individual feels supported by the team and contributes to the team's (the class's) success. The commitment to work together to ensure that everyone passes with a C or better is demonstrating peer teaching, taking inititive, asking for and receiving help and clarification, accepting and rejecting information accumulated, making affirmations, and showing empathy under the stress. Their continuing homework after the course ends is to influence all work groups in their futures to achieve this willing and trusting collaboration and cross-training in the name of excellence!

Change: New, Now, and Next

Change is blowing through the economic fabric of our country as we air dirty laundry in the credit and banking industries. External change billows and engulfs us like exploding airbags through the steering wheel. I remember a former student who walked into class with half of her face and neck bloodied and bruised in an auto accident in which her tires hit the curb at 25 miles per hour. She could have starred in a horror film and the make-up artists would have been nominated for an Academy Award. Change can smack us in the face and shock us into examining our own contributing behavior that can lead to internal change for individuals and organizations. As we each deal with what we could have done and steel ourselves for the future, we can pause to consider the characteristics of change--and our grief over losing the way of the past--to anticipate what's new, what's now, and what's next.

In studying the ultimate life change, Elizabeth Kubler-Ross wrote On Death and Dying decades ago. In it, she describes the stages of grief: (1) shock and denial, (2) anger, (3) depression and detachment, (4) dialogue and bargaining, and (5) acceptance of the inevitable. Since then, researchers have superimposed this list of stages into other life-changing events besides death and dying. Loss of job and divorce are two such events. Many people are experiencing these situations now. Usually these are changes people did not ask for and they feel pretty battered, blindsided, and betrayed. Getting on with one's life and healing can take a while, a long while.

Some changes may be more welcome, however. What about making a change to lift ourselves out of a rut, or making a change to avoid ditching our entire operation? In Donald L. Kirkpatrick's How to Manage Change Effectively, he identifies the steps for establishing change: (1) Assess the need or desire for change; (2) Make a tentative plan; (3) Consider alternatives and likely consequences; (4) Decide on a plan of action; (5) Set a timetable; (6) Communicate the change; (7) Implement and evaluate the change. The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) recommends this change model. In most circumstances, I would suggest that leaders begin communicating the change and their commitment to it before gossip and rumors fly.

Trust in leaders is damaged severely when employees hear about change on the nightly news, through a social Internet site, or in the local newspaper. This is the same in families, too. The parents should communicate buying and living changes to the children who are old enough to ask for items during a shopping trip. Changes make the rules shift, so making sure everyone understands--even if they do not agree--is essential for successfully surviving the change together. To know how difficult it is to achieve change individually, just think about the New Year's resolutions that met with disappointment and excuse last month.

I remember a useful bit of advice regarding positive change. In July 2004, I read an article by Rhonda Abrams entitled "Successful Business Strategies" in The Costco Connection. She says to contemplate the situation first,then reframe it into a positive outcome, and plan realistic action steps. Then commit by expecting and visualizing a successful result. Next, follow through with the plan, and recommit when needed and as many times as needed. Finally, habituate the change by integrating new behaviors. These seven steps reflect my experience when I choose to embrace successful change.

When a external change hits you in the face, I invite you to reflect on how these steps can help you survive a successful internal change in your life, lifestyle, family, or career. Bottom line: change will happen, so determine what you will learn from living through it. Take a deep breath and begin blowing--and moving forward through now, to what's new and what's next.