Tag: entrepreneurship

Hear the noes

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It is up to you to set expectations with those around you.

If you are a leader, this means setting expectations first and foremost with those you report to (upper management, executives, board). Expectations on what can be achieved, in which time frame, at what cost. Saying yes at all cost, whatever the reason for it, will just put you in a situation where all you can accept from those who report to you is a resounding and enthusiastic “yes!”. And a “yes” – perhaps not resounding, perhaps not enthusiastic – is all you are going to get. Ever.

It is the perfect recipe for failure.

Seeking attention

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Pure advertising is still something many companies invest heavily into, often along with the complementary public relations. I am sure they are important and they matter to some brands, but before putting resources behind it, particularly startups and small business should consider one simple fact.

People hate advertising so much that when given the choice many prefer to pay to skip it.

Netflix (vs cable TV), Spotify, YouTube are the most popular examples. And if that’s the case, what kind of attention will your ads get the next time they air?

Defuse

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Caught in the heat of an argument, the challenge is to find the lucidity to defuse. Do that while you are in a position of power, and you will have made real progress.

Going head against head, second guessing, paying back, raising your voice, smashing and controlling. Those are short-lived strategies that will just feed into the next argument.

What is strength?

Sparkles and glitter

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As long as you keep running from boring, repetitive, uninteresting, unrewarding, uneventful, average, your chances of actually mastering something are going to be very limited. There’s a wrong perception that success is equivalent to sparkles and glitter, but that only comes after (if at all), and it does not usually lasts for very long.

Find ways to get accustomed to the 99% of your life and suddenly you’ll be a much better human being, parent, partner, leader, or anything else you aim to be.

Natural born managers

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People are promoted into managerial and leadership positions, and then it is expected they learn how to do that on their own. That rarely happens.

The skills you need to manage or lead a team are very different from the skills you need to successfully execute a project or design a flawless service or build a company from scratch. If managers and leaders are not put in front of this very basic fact, they will fall back to what got them promoted in the first place (in most cases, execution and some sort of compliance) and their teams will fail.

A new survey by the Boston Consulting Group about the challenges of managers stresses two facts that is worth considering before you put the autopilot on and promote the next best performer.

First, not everyone wants to be a manager. We often assume that is the natural career path everybody aims for, yet the survey points at only 9% of non managers actually wanting to become one (in Western countries). If you have a great performer, it is more likely they want to either stay in their current position or become a subject matter expert. Of course, this means you’ll have to ask them, and then find ways to reward them other than the title. There are many.

Second, just one-third of managers receive career coaching. It’s a very delicate transition, one that often creates challenges even out of the office. If supporting the manager through it is not a priority for the company, it won’t be one for the manager either.