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Podcast, Season 2, Episode 23: Be a Better Leader: The Be-Attitudes of Better Leadership (Part 7, Be A Talker)

In this “Be A Better Leader” series of website articles and podcasts, I am talking about a variety of attributes, characteristics, and skills that are essential to effective leadership, and discussing how they are reflected in practice. I have grouped these things into five categories of what a leader ought to be, which is why I am labeling them as the “Be-attitudes of Better Leadership.” These five categories are: “Be Genuine,” “Be Relational,” “Be Trustworthy,” Be Knowledgeable,” and “Be Excellent.” Today in part 7, I am continuing to explore the second category, “Be Relational,” and more specifically, I am talking about the importance of being a talker.

Here is the link to the podcast.

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Podcast, Season 2, Episode 22: Be a Better Leader: The Be-Attitudes of Better Leadership (Part 6, Be A Listener)

In this “Be A Better Leader” series of website articles and podcasts, I am talking about a variety of attributes, characteristics, and skills that are essential to effective leadership, and discussing how they are reflected in practice. I have grouped these things into five categories of what a leader ought to be, which is why I am labeling them as the “Be-attitudes of Better Leadership.” These five categories are: “Be Genuine,” “Be Relational,” “Be Trustworthy,” Be Knowledgeable,” and “Be Excellent.” Today in part 6, I am beginning to explore the second category, “Be Relational,” and more specifically, I am talking about the importance of being a listener.

Here is the link to the podcast.

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Be A Better Leader: The Five Be-attitudes of Better Leadership (part 7, Be Relational . . . by Being a Talker)

In this “Be A Better Leader” series of website articles and podcasts, I am talking about a variety of attributes, characteristics, and skills that are essential to effective leadership, and discussing how they are reflected in practice. I have grouped these things into five categories of what a leader ought to be, which is why I am labeling them as the “Be-attitudes of Better Leadership.” These five categories are: “Be Genuine,” “Be Relational,” “Be Trustworthy,” Be Knowledgeable,” and “Be Excellent.” Today in part 7, I am continuing to explore the second category, “Be Relational,” and more specifically, I am talking about the importance of being a talker.

I have shared before that “most people understand communication is two-way street, involving both talking and listening, but I would also guess that most people do far more talking than listening. . . . One of the skills, then, that is necessary for effective leadership (and for healthy relationships) is the ability to listen well. In short, we need to be good listeners.” However, and while this is definitely true, it does not mean that we can neglect the other side of that street – we also need to be good talkers. Good communication involves both talking and listening, and so even though we tend to do one (talking) to the neglect of the other (listening), we can’t ignore either one. We need to do them both well.

I am by nature a reflective thinker, so I generally process my thoughts for a while before responding to people. What that looks like inside my head is, “Hmmm, let me think about that so that I can give you a very good answer,” but what it looks like to other people is, “Did he even hear a word that I said?” My wife humorously describes this thought process in my head as a train that is circling the tracks and eventually comes back around to the train station. So when my children ask me a question, and I haven’t answered yet, she will say, “Be patient children, the train is on its way back to the station.”

Although we joke about my train, recognizing this has helped me to understand that I have to verbally tell people that I am processing their questions, input, or ideas. I have learned that I need to tell people, out loud, that I have heard them and that I am thinking through what they said. They need to hear me speak. Why is that so? I think the answer comes from something else that I have often heard my wife say – if you give people a blank page, they will write in their own perceptions and ideas. If you don’t give people information that they need to know, or let them know that they have been heard, they will form their own conclusions which may or may not be true, and which will likely have to be addressed and/or corrected, which in turn makes your job of communicating that much more difficult.

Therefore, even though listening is a critical skill that we must develop, we also must learn to speak. I am not talking about the skill of public speaking (although that is something that also ought to be developed in our leadership), but about the simple act of communicating our thoughts, ideas, vision, and responses. We have to talk to people, and we must do it in a way that lets them feel heard, gives them understanding, enlists their support, and provides information that they need. In order to do this well, there are three needs that must be met by our words.

First, people need to feel informed. No one likes to be surprised with information, especially if they will be impacted by the circumstances or the information. It is therefore important that they know what is happening around them. As you lead your organization or your team, there will be changes that you need to implement, strategies that you need to develop, and obstacles that you need to navigate. During those experiences, you need to communicate what is happening and what you are doing. And it is especially important that you communicate information to someone if you are obligating his or her participation. If they have to contribute or participate and they have not been properly informed, they will resist. So the bottom line is, you must be sure to communicate often, communicate well, and communicate much.

Second, people need an active, accurate data stream of information. They will generally believe what they hear most repeated, and so if you do not make sure that the information they receive is accurate and frequent, people will begin to believe things that are not true, or will form perceptions that can be detrimental to your direction. And once perceptions are formed, they can be hard to change. The information that people will be exposed to will often come from other sources besides you – the gossip of coworkers, the opinions of friends and relatives, the advertising of competitors – so you will need to make sure that they are repeatedly hearing true information.

Third, people need to hear stories. Stories make cold facts become relatable, memorable, and more believable. They provide handles for information so that they can remember what is important, and can share it with others. As Steve Gruenert and Todd Whitaker say in School Culture Rewired (2015), “Stories are the currency of a culture – they are the most effective means of transferring information from one person to another” (p. 38). It follows, then, that leaders should become good storytellers, able to put information in the context of a story that they tell. When you do that, people are more likely to listen and understand, and will have a better grasp of the information that you share.

So, the conclusion should be that we need to talk as well as we listen. In order to do that, we must be intentional about what and how we communicate, to ensure that our words are meeting the needs of our listeners. Make sure that we are communicating information that our followers need to hear, that we are doing it often and accurately, and that we using stories for the context. Then, when that happens, our words will fill in the page in front of them with the information that will be best for their growth and their performance. When that happens well, we build more effective relationships, which in turn helps us to be better leaders.

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Quote Your Dad

“He who answers a matter before he hears it, it is folly and shame to him.” Proverbs 18:13

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Be A Better Leader: The Five Be-attitudes of Better Leadership (part 6, Be Relational . . . by Being a Listener)

In this “Be A Better Leader” series of website articles and podcasts, I am talking about a variety of attributes, characteristics, and skills that are essential to effective leadership, and discussing how they are reflected in practice. I have grouped these things into five categories of what a leader ought to be, which is why I am labeling them as the “Be-attitudes of Better Leadership.” These five categories are: “Be Genuine,” “Be Relational,” “Be Trustworthy,” Be Knowledgeable,” and “Be Excellent.” Today in part 6, I am beginning to explore the second category, “Be Relational,” and more specifically, I am talking about the importance of being a listener.

In the New York Times Best Seller The Art of Racing in the Rain (2008), author Garth Stein tells a fictional story of the life of a race car driver, Denny, as seen through the eyes of his dog, Enzo. At one particular point in the story, when Denny is experiencing great difficulty, Enzo shares this thought: “I listen. I cannot speak, so I listen very well. I never interrupt. I never deflect the course of the conversation with a comment of my own. People, if you pay attention to them, change the direction of one another’s conversations constantly. It’s like having a passenger in your car who suddenly grabs the steering wheel and turns you down a side street.” (p. 101). Remarkable insight from a dog, but so often it is true.

I would guess that most people understand communication is two-way street, involving both talking and listening, but I would also guess that most people do far more talking than listening. Unlike Enzo, we don’t do such a good job of listening, and at those times when we do appear to be listening, we are probably guiltier of thinking about what we are going to say next than thinking about what the other person is saying. The unfortunate result is that we do not communicate well, our relationships suffer, and we are not as effective as leaders.

One of the skills, then, that is necessary for effective leadership (and for healthy relationships) is the ability to listen well. In short, we need to be good listeners. In an article published on LinkedIn on February 2, 2015, called “Best Advice: Listen More than You Talk,” Richard Branson, the founder of Virgin Group, echoed this truth when he wrote that one of the “best and most simple pieces of advice” he ever received came from his father: “listen more than you talk.”

Learning to listen well, though, requires effort, because it involves much more than simply hearing the words that the other person is saying. It involves understanding the idea and intent, the meaning, of what the other person is communicating. Usually, however, the problem we have is that our own tendency toward selfishness and our own perceptions and experiences interfere with our ability to hear what the other person is communicating, therefore we have to become intentional about learning to listen, and this means much more than just listening with our ears, but also with our eyes and with our mouths.

  1. Listen with your eyes – I realize this may sound a little odd, but one way in which listening happens is with your eyes. In reality, people do a lot of communicating with facial expressions, hand gestures, and body language, and so the implication is that much of what you hear people say comes from what you see. For that reason, you need to become very intentional about looking around and observing as part of your listening process. When you are face-to-face with someone, engaged in dialogue, you must consciously become aware of what they are saying with nonverbal cues, thereby more clearly hearing what they are trying to communicate; however, I would suggest you also need to do the same when you are observing from a distance, when you are not directly interacting, but instead are watching or noticing the behavior and actions of those around you. Your understanding will improve if you take time to look around and listen to what you see.A caution here, though: we tend to only see what we are looking for, those things that reinforce our predetermined perception, therefore confirming our belief that it is true, even if it is not, and we also tend to miss a lot of what is right in front of us, primarily because we are not looking for it, and therefore will not see important clues and information that we need to see. Therefore, we must intentionally set aside our perceptions and must put in conscious effort to see things that we are not looking for, in order to hear what is actually been communicated.
  2. Listen with your mouth – A second way in which listening happenings is with your mouth. This does not happen in the same way that you listen with your eyes, because your mouth does not generally take in information to enhance your understanding in the way that your eyes do (to state the obvious). What your mouth does, however, is provide feedback and response that reflects your listening. Your mouth is the vehicle through which you mirror what you hear, and so it communicates how you are listening. How, then, does this happen? Primarily in two ways: rephrasing, and asking questions. First, as you listen to someone speak (or as you observe activity, behavior, and responses), you need to give back a rephrasing of what you think you hear (and see). This communicates that you are trying to listen, but it also gives you the opportunity to validate and refine what you think you hear, by giving and then receiving additional feedback. Second, ask open-ended and clarifying questions that help you to have a deeper and more accurate understanding of what you hear – also known as active listening – which gives you a better grasp of what others (namely, your peers and your subordinates) are experiencing and feeling. This will better enable you to respond to what you hear (and see), which – again – will help you to be a more effective leader. One extremely important caveat, though, is this: when you ask questions, you must ensure that it is safe for people to answer; otherwise you will not get the kind of feedback you need.
  3. Listen with your ears – Finally, and most obviously, listening does happen with your ears. In the book Quiet (2012), Susan Cain discusses the implications of introverted personality tendencies for leadership, and applies it to a lesson on listening when she shares the experience of a salesperson who states, “In sales, there’s a truism that ‘we have two ears and one mouth and we should use them proportionately.’ I believe that’s what makes someone really good at selling or consulting – the number one thing is they’ve got to really listen well” (p. 240). What this means is that we need to close our mouths and let others say what they need to say, and we actually need to be attentive to what they are saying. We need to follow Enzo’s counsel of not interrupting, of not taking over or sidetracking the conversation, but rather consciously hearing the words, the meaning, and the heart of what others are saying.

In essence, an effective leader needs to be an effective listener, and that requires intentional effort and discipline. Learn to listen with your eyes by observing, learn to listen with your mouth by rephrasing and asking questions, and learn to listen with your ears by setting aside your own interests and hearing the meaning of others’ words. When you learn to be a better listener, you will build better relationships and in turn will be a better leader.

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Quote Your Dad

“Do you know what I like best about you? Everything?”

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Podcast, Season 2, Episode 21: Be a Better Leader: The Be-Attitudes of Better Leadership (Part 5, Be Yourself)

In this “Be A Better Leader” series of website articles and podcasts, I am talking about a variety of attributes, characteristics, and skills that are essential to effective leadership, and discussing how they are reflected in practice. I have grouped these things into five categories of what a leader ought to be, which is why I am labeling them as the “Be-attitudes of Better Leadership.” These five categories are: “Be Genuine,” “Be Relational,” “Be Trustworthy,” Be Knowledgeable,” and “Be Excellent.” Today in part 5, I am exploring the first category, “Be Genuine,” and more specifically, I am talking about the importance of being yourself.

Here is the link to the podcast.

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Be A Better Leader: The Five Be-attitudes of Better Leadership (part 5, Be Genuine . . . by Being Yourself)

In this “Be A Better Leader” series of website articles and podcasts, I am talking about a variety of attributes, characteristics, and skills that are essential to effective leadership, and discussing how they are reflected in practice. I have grouped these things into five categories of what a leader ought to be, which is why I am labeling them as the “Be-attitudes of Better Leadership.” These five categories are: “Be Genuine,” “Be Relational,” “Be Trustworthy,” Be Knowledgeable,” and “Be Excellent.” Today in part 5, I am exploring the first category, “Be Genuine,” and more specifically, I am talking about the importance of being yourself.

When I first became a teacher, I soon identified another teacher that I thought represented everything I wanted to be as a teacher. He was a master teacher, and had a tremendous influence on students, and I thought that if I could be just like him, I could also be a great teacher. The problem was, his personality and strengths were very different than mine, so try as I might, I couldn’t be a teacher like him. What I found, though, was that I had different strengths and attributes that worked well with a different style of teaching, and when I allowed myself to be myself and not him, I became an effective teacher as well, just in a different way.

People often take the same approach to leadership. They will read books or attend seminars so they can copy someone else’s pattern in every detail, or so that they can uncover the secret that no one else knows about. But there is no secret. Leadership is not a hidden, secret society that you are trying to uncover and imitate. Rather, you are a unique individual, so your leadership practice should reflect you, your personality, and your strengths. The truth is, if you try to be someone else, you are not being authentic and genuine. So – and this may sound like a statement of the obvious – you will be most effective in your leadership if you operate out of who you are. In order to do that, there are four steps you must follow.

Step 1 – Know yourself. Before you can lead in the way that works best for you, you first have to know who you are, which means identifying your predominant characteristics. Knowing yourself begins with identifying your “type,” the kind of personality or attributes that most represent you. There are a variety of ways to classify this – Type A or Type B; temperament types of choleric, sanguine, melancholy, and phlegmatic; thought processes of random-abstract or concrete-sequential; the range of introversion to extroversion; the DISC personality profile; StrengthsQuest team characteristics; and numerous others. Regardless of which format you use, you need to figure out what your personality type and characteristics are. (If you haven’t done this before, I would suggest starting with one of the most common personality assessments used in the business world, the Meyers-Briggs Typology Inventory (MBTI), which you can take for free here.) With an understanding of your type, you can then get an understanding of your particular strengths and weaknesses, so that you can more clearly identify what you do well and where you struggle.

Step 2 – Be yourself. Once you know yourself, with a clear understanding of your strengths and weaknesses, you can begin to operate as a leader out of your strengths. With your particular strengths in mind, you can capitalize on what you do well, matching it to your style in order to maximize the effectiveness of your leadership. Leadership styles vary according to three different factors – the leader, the followers, and the situation – and so, armed with the knowledge of who you are and how you best function, you can fit your style to your followers and to your situation. I know that on the introvert-extrovert scale, I am more introverted; on the MBTI scale, I am an INTJ; my temperament is more melancholy/choleric; in my thought process, I am more analytical and logical. Knowing myself and my strengths, then, I use my strengths to lead in a way that works well for me. Therefore, I don’t try to the charismatic leader; instead I connect with individuals on a more personal level, and in the process build trust. I take the time to listen and gather information before responding, processing my thoughts before giving my input, and I communicate that tendency to people when we meet, so that they know that I am thinking (and not ignoring) when I don’t answer immediately. My organizational thought process helps me to be effective at connecting the dots to see the big picture for planning and vision purposes, so I make that one of the tasks that I am directly involved in, but I delegate the repetitive details to others to manage because it is difficult for me to stay focused in those details. I have learned to use my strengths to lead, using the style that reflects what I do well.

Step 3 – Help yourself. Now that you have determined and established your style of leadership, one that best matches who you are and uses your strengths, the next step is to identify the growth areas and weaknesses with which you need help. You need to compensate for your gaps, deficiencies and shortcomings, both personally and organizationally. That means you need to address your personal deficiencies by employing tools to help yourself, and minimize your leadership weaknesses by delegating the responsibilities that require those attributes to others for whom they are strengths, and by surrounding yourself with people whose strengths offset your weaknesses. I know that I am a more reserved personality, so I always include as part of my team someone who is more extroverted and communicative, so that we as a team are more complete than I am as an individual. If you are a detail-person, you need to include someone who is a “big-picture, idea” person; or if you are an organized analytical person, you need to include someone who is more relationship focused; and so on. You will help your leadership to be better if you involve other people and resources to offset those things that are not your strengths.

Step 4 – Make yourself. Even though you are operating in the way that best matches you, there will always be things that you need to do that fall outside your comfort zone, and you will have to learn to make yourself do them anyway. It may be something that makes you uncomfortable or something that is difficult for you to do, but they are still tasks and responsibilities that you have to be able to handle, especially because you are the leader. For example, because my personality type is more introverted and reflective, I do not enjoy conflict. Once, when a supervisor asked me in a performance review what I felt I were areas of improvement in myself, I mentioned that I didn’t like conflict and confrontation. He then noted in my review that I needed to learn how to be more confrontational, but I responded by saying that the problem wasn’t that I couldn’t do it and didn’t do it, but rather that I didn’t like it. Because I didn’t like it, I had learned to do it in a very tactful way and in the process had become very good it – but I still didn’t like it. It was one of those skills that is necessary for leadership, and I had had to learn to make myself do it, and to do it well. The point is, no matter your personality type, there will be some things that you don’t like but will have to do anyway, and therefore you must be able to make yourself do it.

Four basic steps: first know yourself (figure out your personality, characteristics, strengths, and weaknesses); then be yourself (lead from your strengths); next, help yourself (compensate for your weaknesses); and finally, make yourself (discipline yourself to do those things that you don’t like to do, but have to do as the leader). Following these four steps will help you to become the most effective leader you can be, because your leadership will match you and reflect you. So be the leader you are, not the leader that someone else is.

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Podcast, Season 2, Episode 20: Be a Better Leader: The Be-Attitudes of Better Leadership (Part 4, Be Humble)

In this “Be A Better Leader” series of website articles and podcasts, I am talking about a variety of attributes, characteristics, and skills that are essential to effective leadership, and discussing how they are reflected in practice. I have grouped these things into five categories of what a leader ought to be, which is why I am labeling them as the “Be-attitudes of Better Leadership.” These five categories are: “Be Genuine,” “Be Relational,” “Be Trustworthy,” Be Knowledgeable,” and “Be Excellent.” Today in part 4, I am exploring the first category, “Be Genuine,” and more specifically, I am talking about the importance of being humble.

Here is the link to the podcast.

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Quote Your Dad

“If you’re good, you don’t have to tell people, they’ll tell you.”

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