Tag: team work

No solution

FabrizioLeave a comment

Caring about others, about a situation, about an outcome it’s not finding an immediate solution.

It is more about persistence.

Asking how someone is, inquiring about the status of a project, ensuring people who come to you with issues, fears, troubles, complaints feel heard and respected, coming up with ways to help and continuing doing that when help is rejected, truly listening and deeply caring. Doing this over a period of time, regularly, without waiting for others to ask, without missing an opportunity to show that it matters to you, without assuming that having nothing new to say is having nothing to say at all.

We are all very good at offering our support. We are also equally good at finding any possible way to escape from having to actually give it.

Connection

Fabrizio3 Comments

We underestimate the importance of talking with somebody when things are bad.

We tend to close, fantasize, make assumptions, build on our own emotions, point fingers, second guess, and in general spiral down in a hole we can’t get ourselves out of.

There is always somebody to talk to. Sometimes that is your partner, a friend, your boss, the quiet colleague who barely talks in meetings, a mentor, a person you think highly of.

When things are bad, we need connection much more than a solution. And connection is all around us, we just need to be brave enough to reach out and start building it.

Would you take it?

FabrizioLeave a comment

Are you into leadership because of the power, the role, the status, or because of the challenges, the responsibility, the people that allow you to lead?

It seems like a trivial question, and the answer is probably, for most, somewhat in the middle.

But I can’t count the leaders who stop at the prestige and forgo the difficult part.

What if we would start presenting promotions into leadership roles in a different way? And so, instead of saying.

You did well so far, here is a promotion, a new title, and a salary raise.

We would say.

You did well so far. Here is a chance to take this team and make it awesome, to listen to their ideas and ensure the ones that make sense get developed and the others are put on hold (perhaps forever), to raise their engagement with the company and their role even in the face of bad news – especially in the face of bad news. Do you take it?

Managers do really need to start thinking at leadership in a different way, otherwise it will continue to be the professional graveyard of people with monetary and status ambitions.

Silence

Fabrizio1 Comment

Silence makes us uncomfortable. Yet without silence there is no listening.

We spend entire conversations just waiting for out turn to speak, trying to cut the others short because our idea, our understanding, our experience is better, talking over each other, filling reflective pauses with jokes or irrelevant thoughts, getting annoyed because everyone is taking too long to get to the point. While indeed we should give silence more space.

Silence is a beautiful pause. It is thought, reflection, clarification. Sometimes, when talking to somebody and allowing for some silence to happen, you can see that something clicks, you can clearly grasp the moment they are getting an insight, a new perspective, a better way to approach the issue.

Learn how to be silent, and how to give others the space to be silent.

Talking is power only when we have something to say. And we often do not.

Beg, demand, or sell

FabrizioLeave a comment

When you ask for something, there are three way to go about that.

You can beg, and that is moved by fear. Fear of missing a deadline, of losing your job, of being misrepresented, of being misunderstood, of failing, of making mistakes.

You can demand, and that is moved by power. Power is fluid, and so even when you are not in a position of power, you can still act assertively, pretending things get done your way.

You can sell, and that is moved by connection. You have something to give, you have something to take. You know when it is time to let go, and what drives you is understanding how to get to a situation where both parties win.