Tag: values

Side effects

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At some point, we need to start asking ourselves what type of effect our work has on the world.

We can’t continue to celebrate a new way to keep customers glued to the screen, a new technology that allows whoever to spread a message with the face and voice of a celebrity, a new creative ad from a company who is indirectly promoting obesity, a tweak in the algorithm that dumbs down your social media timeline.

Perhaps these are innovation, perhaps they are groundbreaking in their fields, perhaps there’s creativity and execution to be rewarded in these and other pieces of modern work. And perhaps, the very same thing could be used for good.

Yet, we should worry about how things are received and interpreted by the public, how the things we have helped developing and bringing to life are impacting millions of individuals, whether that is intended or not. We need to factor in side effects when talking about the work we want to do, otherwise our story is but a chapter featured in a book that others will complete.

Parenting and leadership

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I would not go as far as saying that people with no kids cannot make a good leader, and yet certainly being a parent gives an edge on others when it comes to leading people.

There are few things that being a father tought me, and that I could translate basically 1:1 to my leadership roles.

First, it’s not about you. The moment you become a parent, you realize you are the least important person around. You don’t do parenting by being a prima donna, as you don’t do leadership by attracting the spotlights. And there’s more to it. You soon understand that while you are on your way out (not matter how old you are and how recently you have been promoted), the people you are helping develop are the future. The way you teach them will have a tremendous impact on what they will do in the world and how they will do it.

Second, don’t fall in love with your ideas. If you are a parent, you know plans change. No matter how much you want to go to the fair, or to the lake, or to the museum, something will most likely happen, and you’ll have to find an alternative despite your disappointment or anger. Flexibility and open mindedness are key when you are in charge of others, as is setting some kind of distance between yourself, your satisfaction, your success on one side, and your thoughts and ideas on the other.

Third, you have to show up. Parenting, as leadership, is not something you can switch off when you do not feel like doing it, when your head hurts, when you are exhausted (for perfectly legitimate reasons). You can’t hide in a room (or in a office) and pretend things are the way you want them to be. This also means that, as there’s no rest, you need to become good at taking your breathing moments without abandoning the ship.

Fourth, you are looked up to. If you have kids, you know how much of what you say and what you do they assimilate. It is often puzzling to me seeing myself through the eyes of my kids, as they play make believe, or as they react to certain situations in ways that are way too familiar to me. There’s so many people in leadership positions that think that what they say and what they do does not matter, because eventually everyone is free to make their own choices and be their true selves. Particularly in the short term, the way authority behaves is the way people around authority will behave.

Fifth and last, you get to clean a lot of shit. It’s not only a funny ending to this blog post, it’s more about taking responsibility for others’ behaviors. If your kid punches another kid at the park, you don’t say “ok, go clean your mess!”. You make sure the other is ok, you apologize and make your kid apologize, you might go as far as talk to the other’s parent to apologize once again and make sure everything is alright. And you take it on yourself to follow up and explain why that was not good and how kind people behave in that situation.

Fair is out there

Fabrizio1 Comment

Who gets to decide what is “fair“?

It’s us, and we get to make that decision many times every day. When we buy something, when we read the news on Facebook, when we click for next-day delivery, when we dumb down on YouTube’s timeline, when we put a pre-cooked meal in the microwave, when we buy at a discount rather than at full price.

The problem is, we usually do not go with what is fair, as cheap and convenient are alluring. That’s fine, as long as we know that fair is out there, waiting to be picked.

Motivated by urge

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If you want people to buy into your ideas and plans, you have to be clear about your thinking and decision-making process.

Why is this more important than what we used to do yesterday?
Why was this option chosen instead of the others?
What does this all mean for my work routine?
What’s in it for me, the team, the company if we are successful?
How does success even look like in this scenario?

When you answer these (and other) questions about your new urgency, and you do it publicly, it is much more likely that people will follow, accept new tasks and overtime, understand the reasons of a late night e-mail. When you don’t, on the other hand, it feels like a managerial caprice, something people are asked to follow now for no particular reason other than gut feelings, a breath of wind in a storm.

Nobody is motivated by urge.

Anybody will do

FabrizioLeave a comment

We have spent the past few decades complaining so much about politics and politicians that now we have offered our countries to businessmen, comedians, men on the street on a silver plate.

Being disappointed with part of a category, or even with a category at large, should not necessarily mean discredit that category completely. And definitely it should not mean that somebody more similar to us and that speaks our language could do a much better job and give prestige back to the category. Honestly, that’s just a way to keep complaining about the category in new forms and fashion few years down the road. And to see the category destroyed once and for all.

We could instead try to take back ownership of the category, refine the definition in a way that is more appropriate to our age and times, be absolutely clear on how we want members of the category to behave and what we will or we will not accept of them. And then, be active in guiding the development of the category in the direction we want it to develop.

It’s all about responsibility after all, and particularly these days we should stop thinking that anybody will do for the job but us.