Archive for category: Leadership

Life is full of examples that teach us lessons. That’s why stories and illustrations make learning so much more effective. When a story can be used to illustrate or demonstrate a valuable lesson, the story makes it much more understandable, relatable, and memorable. With that in mind, I want to take some time to do just that – share examples of circumstances and stories experienced in everyday life which illustrate leadership lessons that we can learn and apply. This is one of those examples, and it teaches us that doing the same thing doesn’t always guarantee the same result.

This lesson became obvious to me recently when I grew out my beard. It wasn’t the first time I had grown the hair on my face. I had grown facial hair in different forms at different times since I was 18 years old, including a mustache, a goatee, and various lengths of beard. But for the last 10 years, I had been clean-shaven. So, when I started growing a beard again, I expected it to look like it had before. It didn’t take long, however, before it became obvious that this time it would be different. This time . . . it was white. Not gray. Not salt-and-pepper white mixed with my hair color. It was completely white. The beard was the same, but the color was not.

It has been said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing and expecting a different result. You’ve probably seen this happen, and likely are guilty of it yourself. You did certain things or exhibited certain behaviors, and the result was a mess. But then, for some reason, you did the same thing again, and the result was the same mess. And it makes sense that this happens because the same actions tend to lead to the same results. But my beard was evidence that this is not always the case.

Sometimes doing the same thing does not guarantee the same result. That’s because life brings changes and differences. As time passes, there are lots of different factors that can shift or change, leading to a different outcome. It reminds me of the original Jurassic Park movie, where Jeff Goldblum‘s character is describing chaos theory by dropping a little drop of water on top of his knuckle, and explaining how tiny variations can change the outcome in unexpected ways. Similarly, that was the case with my beard. My face is the same, and the hair that grows on my face still grows the same way, but time and age caused the color to change. So even though I grew the same beard that I’ve grown in the past, it was not the same! It made me realize that differences in age, time, circumstances, and contexts can produce different results.

I experienced this in my leadership practice when I left a school where I had served for nearly 10 years as a teacher, guidance counselor, and assistant principal, to go to a new school in another state as the Head of School. I had, what were in my mind, brilliant ideas based on some things that had been a huge success in the school that I came from. But when I tried to implement them in the new school, I was met with resistance, and a definite lack of enthusiasm. I tried to do the same things, but in a different context, and I got a different result. I learned in that experience that the same thing doesn’t work the same way everywhere, and that I needed to do different things based on where I was.

That’s the lesson on leadership from this little thing in life, from growing my beard but finding that it was a different color. Doing the same thing doesn’t always lead to the same results. You need to be aware of the differences that can affect what the outcome might be, learn to take those into consideration, and adjust your actions based on the context and circumstances. While it is true that sometimes doing the same thing and expecting a different result is insanity, at other times it’s insanity to expect the same result. Because doing the same thing is not a guarantee of the same result.

Life is full of examples that teach us lessons. That’s why stories and illustrations make learning so much more effective. When a story can be used to illustrate or demonstrate a valuable lesson, the story makes it much more understandable, relatable, and memorable. With that in mind, I want to take some time to do just that – share examples of circumstances and stories experienced in everyday life which illustrate leadership lessons that we can learn and apply. This is one of those examples, and it’s about lessons on leadership I learned by losing 50 pounds.

For over twenty years, I had stayed in the same 20-pound weight range. I had tried a variety of diets and exercise regimens, but nothing ever moved me out of that range, nor had any of them ever become a long-term lifestyle. I convinced myself that I simply had a stocky build, and even had a sense of pride about my larger size. And I believed that I was much healthier than I actually was. But then I was confronted with the realization that I was very overweight, out of shape, and unhealthy. My doctor had to prescribe medications to treat the effects of my poor health, and a family member confronted me about my overeating. I realized that I was endangering not only my own life, but also the care and well-being of my family.

It was then that I embarked on a journey that (literally) changed me into a different person. I changed some of my eating behaviors, incorporated several tools to help me maintain a daily awareness, and gradually implemented moderate exercise. The results shocked me – I consistently lost several pounds a week, losing a total of 50 pounds in just under four months to reach my goal weight. My greatest moment of joy came when I was able to once again wear the leather bomber jacket that my wife had given me at our wedding 26 years ago. As I traveled along this journey, I began to identify reasons why I was succeeding this time, when I had tried so many times before without the same results. What I saw was that there were certain specific behaviors important to my success, behaviors that kept me going and produced consistent results. After I reached my goal and reflected back on those behaviors, I realized that not only did they help me accomplish that weight-loss goal, but they also represented some very valuable and practical lessons on leadership. So, here are five lessons on leadership I learned by losing 50 pounds:

• Everyone wants to know your secret. After it started becoming noticeable that I was losing weight, people would ask me what are doing to lose weight, typically for one of two reasons: 1) they were looking for a trick, something easy and simple that they could do to also lose weight but without a lot of effort; or 2) they wanted to know what I had done so that they could do exactly the same thing and get the same results. The same thing happens in leadership. People will read books or attend seminars so they can copy someone else’s pattern or uncover the secret. But there is no secret, and if you try to be someone else, you are not being authentic and genuine.
• There are only a few core behaviors. It should not be a surprise that my weight loss and fitness really boiled down to diet, exercise, and a handful of core behaviors. It started with making better food choices and exercising in moderation. I found and added a couple of other accountability behaviors that worked for me, and the result was consistent, noticeable weight loss. Again, the same is true for leadership. There are lots of principles, theories, and ideas on leadership; far too many for any one person to use. But there are certain core principles and behaviors that show up in leadership research over and over. You need to learn, understand, and apply those core behaviors, and to use them in a way that matches who you are.
• It requires discipline and effort. There was no simple trick to my weight loss and fitness change. It took hard work, and one of the most important things I did was to keep moving forward, exercising when I didn’t feel like it, and resisting the urge to eat what I shouldn’t. Likewise, leadership is not easy. It requires discipline and effort, and there are times when you want to quit, but you must steel yourself to keep going, to not give in to those pressures. Keep doing what needs to be done. Keep leading, and keep leading in the right way.
• Moderation is essential. I knew that if I had jumped right into an intensive workout routine, it wouldn’t last. So I started with a little bit and made incremental increases. By the time I reached my goal weight, I had very gradually worked up to a moderate but consistent level. It worked because I didn’t overcommit at the beginning, and I made incremental, manageable improvements. Effective leadership understands that moderation is a key to success. If you overcommit your energy and resources before you’ve built up stamina and strength, you will run out of gas. Be balanced in your approach.
• It needs to be enjoyable. I eliminated unhealthy and artificial products, but I also ate food that tasted good and treated myself with some things that I thoroughly enjoy, but I ate them in moderation (see point 4, above). While eating healthy and natural, I also ate food that I could enjoy eating, and allowed myself rewards and treats because I knew that denying them completely would likely result in overindulgence if, or when, I gave in. In the same way, the work of leadership needs to be enjoyable. That doesn’t mean that it will easy, but you should be getting a sense of satisfaction from the work you are doing. So you need to find enjoyment in it, and you need to provide rewards along the way.

There’s one other lesson I learned, a bonus lesson, but it’s not actually a separate lesson; rather, it is a lesson that is woven through the other five. The bonus lesson is this: It has to be sustainable. All the work I had done would have been fruitless if, six months later, it was not something I could have maintained. Your leadership style and practice need to match who you are while focusing on core behaviors with incremental improvement, and it needs to bring you joy. Therefore, these five lessons, and the ideas they represent, have to be applied in a way that makes them sustainable. Don’t try to do things in a way that you can’t keep up, because you won’t.

I am in a much healthier place in my life now. In the process of getting there, but along the way, I also found some principles that transfer to a healthy approach to leadership. Ultimately, this change in my life that made me better also made me a better leader. There is no secret. Start with key core behaviors of good leadership, work hard, be balanced, and find joy. Do these things, and you will cultivate healthy and sustainable leadership.

Life is full of examples that teach us lessons. That’s why stories and illustrations make learning so much more effective. When a story can be used to illustrate or demonstrate a valuable lesson, the story makes it much more understandable, relatable, and memorable. With that in mind, I want to take some time to do just that – share examples of circumstances and stories experienced in everyday life which illustrate leadership lessons that we can learn and apply. This is one of those examples, and it teaches us a lesson about the complete picture of leadership.

My wife and I were reminiscing about some of our experiences together over the years, and because it was our anniversary, that included (like it does every anniversary!) remembering when and where we first met. We first met on an international school trip when we were seniors in high school. I was from Michigan and she was from Florida, so it is unlikely we ever would have met if this had not happened. The schools that we traveled with were two Christian schools that partnered together to travel to Europe for a senior trip. The first time I ever saw my wife was when we got on the tour bus in Brussels, Belgium, to start the trip. Although this was more than 40 years ago, I can still clearly see in my mind‘s eye the moment she got on the bus, and I was awestruck and thought that she was the most beautiful girl that I had ever seen in my life. By God‘s grace and providence, we learned that we would be attending the same college, where we became close friends and eventually dated and got married.

As we were reminiscing on this anniversary and talking about our memories from the trip, my wife was looking at her album that had her pictures from the trip, and asked me to get out mine. The reason she wanted to look at both was that she wanted to relive all the memories with me, and I had taken pictures of all the beautiful sites and places, while she had taken pictures of all the people and activities. Because of our different personalities and natures, we had focused on different things when we took pictures on that trip. When combined, however, the result was a full picture, which included the beautiful sites we saw, the people we spent time with, and the activities we did.

This reminded me of one of my favorite marriage quotes, from the Sylvester Stallone movie, “Rocky.” At some point in the movie, Paulie (Rocky’s best friend) is having a conversation with Rocky in a meat locker.  Paulie is asking Rocky what he sees in Adrian (Paulie’s sister), and gives a straightforward question when he asks, “What’s the attraction?” Here’s the line I love, which I think is incredibly profound:  Rocky replies by saying, “I don’t know, she fills gaps, I guess. . . She’s got gaps, I got gaps, together we fill gaps.” This is true for my wife and me in our marriage, but the same principle can also be applied to leadership. No one person fills all the gaps in a leadership role. A good leader will know this and will use their strengths to maximize their leadership style, but will tap into the strengths of others to fill the gaps.

That’s the lesson on leadership from this little thing in life, from two photo albums of the same trip, with two completely different kinds of pictures. You do some things well, and other things not so well. Therefore, it is important to know your gifts and strengths, and to use those well. But also know the gaps caused by the things that are not your strength, and allow others to fill in those gaps. If you will be both wise enough and humble enough to do this, the result will be a more complete picture of leadership.

Life is full of examples that teach us lessons. That’s why stories and illustrations make learning so much more effective. When a story can be used to illustrate or demonstrate a valuable lesson, the story makes it much more understandable, relatable, and memorable. With that in mind, I want to take some time to do just that – share examples of circumstances and stories experienced in everyday life which illustrate leadership lessons that we can learn and apply. This is one of those examples, and it teaches us a lesson about potential outcomes.

There is a gas station near where my son lives that he likes to use, called TXB. He likes it because it’s clean and modern with excellent service and good quality products, including the options of food and beverages. So, when I was driving with my son in my car and saw that it looked like a new gas station was being built near my house, I said to him, “I hope it’s a TXB!” My son commented, “Dad, it’s Schrödinger’s gas station. It’s a TXB for you until it’s not!” (then he told me that was the first time that the Schrödinger’s cat paradox made sense to him).

As another example of this lesson, my daughter, who is a sixth-grade teacher, called me when she arrived at work to say that something metal seemed to be hanging down under her car. I described what my daughter said to ChatGPT, and asked what it sounded like it might be, so that I could be prepared when I got there. Based on the information from ChatGPT, I drove to her school with an idea in mind of what I thought I was going to have to do, which included using tie straps to hold up her muffler pipe so that I could take it to a mechanic in have it reattached, because that seemed to be the most likely option. When I got there, what I saw was a flat piece of metal sticking down behind her tire, so I laid down on the ground and slid under her car to take a look. What I discovered was that, while driving to school in the dark, she had driven over a metal construction tie-down strap, which had caught under her car. I was able to get it out from underneath the car and checked thoroughly to make sure nothing underneath had been damaged. The problem was resolved, but until I saw it, I thought it was something else. I had to crawl underneath and see it before I knew what it actually was, and could then address the issue and check for damages that might have needed attention (thankfully, there were none!).

Both of these illustrations are examples of what often happens in our leadership responsibilities. We face circumstances or have decisions to make, but we don’t always know what the outcome will be. In that moment, there are different potential outcomes. Our responsibility is to prepare for the possibilities, but allow for something unexpected. There are two very important things that we can do when this happens.

1. We need to recognize that the potential outcome is often connected to current behavior. While I may not be able to ensure the outcome I want, I can choose actions and behaviors that may have an influence on which outcome takes place, or that can affect the impact of that outcome.
2. We are responsible for how we respond to the outcome. Whether that outcome was something planned for, hoped for, feared, or unexpected, we get to choose what we do next. We choose what we think, we choose our attitude, and we choose the actions we take.

That’s the lesson on leadership from this little thing in life, from a Schrödinger’s dilemma about a gas station that was one brand until it wasn’t. When you have circumstances to manage and decisions to make, there are often variables and factors that can cause something unexpected to happen. You may not know what those things are until they happen, but what you can do is to be intentional about what you do in the process, and choose how you respond after it’s over.