Tag: relationships

Add or subtract

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What if the next Democratic candidate at the White House would start their campaign speech by saying: “I do appreciate the work the Trump administration has done so far, particularly for what concerns the boost to the economy, the renovated focus on national security and the efforts put into establishing a negotiating table with North Korea. And to further bring America towards the future, here is how my administration is going to build up and expand on the these and other themes.”

There is really no effective benefit in going one against the other, a part from reinforcing each others’ views and widening the gap that separate us. In politics, as well as in business, interpersonal relationships and society in general, you can either add or subtract to the work of others who came before you.

Adding is the path towards unity, forward motion, long-term and prosperity. It is about building bridges and building them together, trying to go somewhere nobody has been before. Consider this the next time you are asked to take on a new assignment.

I still go “ouch!”

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When things go bad, I still go “ouch!”.

When my daughter (rarely) or my son (more often) throw a tantrum, I still go “ouch!”. When my work gets rejected, the neighbour does not say “hi!”, a stranger cuts my way, the weather is not the way I had planned it to be, a bee flies a little too close to me, the canteen has nothing decent to offer, or somebody close tells me something that hurts, I still go “ouch!”. And sometimes, I go a little beyond “ouch!”.

What meditation is gently teaching me, though, is to stop there. To understand that disappointment, anger, anxiety, frustration, fear, loneliness are feelings that can be identified, appreciated and let go. That it is ok to complain (a little bit) when the grand scheme of things is not in line with your desires, and that you can still continue living and doing just as you were a moment earlier. And that no, nobody is plotting against my happiness or success.

Meditation is a great gift, and if you are as inclined as I am to see the dark side of things, it is going to help you appreciate that as well as the brightness that is just few steps ahead.

Developing

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Before you start implementing career development plans for your employees, or ask one of your team members to embark in a personal development plans, you have to sit with yourself (and your managers, and the board), and be honest about a very simple fact.

Are you ready to commit to helping your people to potentially change role, job and company?

This is a major scare for most leaders. They struggle to accept the fact that somebody might one day move onto biggest thing, a more interesting role, or even a more successful organisation.

But even if you are among those who fear people leaving, there are very good reasons why you should go ahead and be serious about helping them develop their careers.

First of all, whether you are or not involved, they are going to take care of it, and it might turn out to be a whole lot worst if your company is just a passive spectator. In a particularly unclear time for my development, I had asked my bosses to help me navigate the next steps. They were not responsive, hiding behind a “you can be whatever you want to be”, and eventually I took the lead. First by making a decision that should have been made more carefully, and then by leaving the company.

Then, the idea that people will stay in the job for more than a bunch of years is nowadays highly unrealistic. In the US, the median number of years a worker stays with a company is 4.3, and the pace at which people change job in certain sectors and companies (even the most successful ones) is quite amazing. How to motivate them to stay just a bit longer than your competitors’? Well, certainly not by feeding them shallow performance reviews and promises of promotions into jobs they’ll later find out they do not care about.

Finally, you might easily end up realising that by actually developing your people, you will give them a reason to stay with you longer. There are not so many companies out there that do that seriously, and yours could be a quite big competitive advantage in the search for talents, for a pretty long time.

How to start trusting others

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Three ways to start the good habit of trusting others, particularly if you are in a leadership role.

  1. Praise others’ strengths. This is not about saying “good job” or “keep up the great work”, but actually about taking time to identify things people do well and break those down with them. Why are they good? Why do they matter (to the organisation, to the purpose)? What is it that makes them special? How can we make sure you can re-do this next time?
  2. Listen without distraction. I wrote about listening yesterday. Making sure you are 100% present during a conversation (that is to say, at least listening to understand) means you are trusting others with your time. No, you don’t need to check your phone every five minutes. No, you do not have to quickly answer an e-mail as somebody is talking to you. And probably no, the phone call you are getting is not important and you do not have to take it.
  3. Delegate responsibilities. Delegating, in general, is difficult. In part, we don’t want to bother others; in part, we do not believe others can do as good a job as we can. Furthermore, when we delegate we usually delegate tasks: “can you work on this report?”; “can you take next week’s presentation?”; “can you update this process?”. I believe we can do a better job by delegating responsibilities, that generally feature more freedom and exposure: “We have been tasked with achieving this type of growth, can you take ownership?”; “I have been in charge of updating the management, how about you do it from now on?”; “So far, managers from the headquarters have done most of the touch bases with remote offices, how do you feel about taking that?”.

What type of listener?

Fabrizio7 Comments

One of the things we most seek is a good listener. Somebody who can just shut up and intensely, passionately, attentively listen to what we have to say.

But are we any good at that?

During a coaching course I took, professor Bob Thomson taught me the five different types of listening.

The first one is not listening. It happens when you are in presence of somebody else speaking, yet you are not really paying any attention to what is being said. A great example is when somebody is in a meeting and continuously checks the phone. They are not really listening, they are just physically present.

The second type is listening, waiting to speak. This is when we pay just enough attention to the what is being said to be able to say something as soon as there’s a pause. It happens quite a lot early in a relationship, as we want to make a good impression, and we can’t wait to follow up with something smart. Most of what is said is missed.

The third type is listening to disagree. It happens very muhc in arguments and heated discussions, it’s essentially taking some of the things the other person is saying to make a point. Words are often misunderstood in this scenario, as the real meaning is not at all important. What matters is finding ways to support and strengthen our own view.

The fourth type is listening to understand. While the first three types are very common, this is incredibly difficult to practice and meet. This is sitting in a conversation saying “I want to see the World from your point of view”. We put ourselves aside for a moment, and try to the best of our possibilities to listen and empathize with the other person.

The fifth one is listening to help the other understand. I know the fourth type seemed magical, and as it is so rare, we might be satisfied with it. Yet, it still demands some kind of negotiation: for me to understand your perspective, I need to take my worldview, your worldview, and somehow make sense of them both. And this often means I “distort” your worldview to try to make it fit mine.

The fifth type of listening, on the other hand, says “It does not matter if I understand you or not, what matters is that you understand yourself”. It is pure service. I am here, I am present, I am listening, and I want to help you understand what you are feeling, living, experiencing.

Listening to help the other understand means “I” am out of the equation. Not momentarily, but completely. What you are saying does not have an impact on my assumption, I am not defending anything or trying to understand anything, as I am strong in my own awareness. I want to make yourself strong as well, hence I listen.

Good listeners are no less rare or important than good communicators. Here, too, an unusual degree of confidence is the key — a capacity not to be thrown off course by, or buckle under the weight of, information that may deeply challenge certain settled assumptions. Good listeners are unfussy about the chaos which others may for a time create in their minds; they’ve been there before and know that everything can eventually be set back in its place.

Alain de Botton

Before you demand a certain type of listening, be aware of what you can offer. Most likely, the two will go hand in hand.