Let's Ban "MISTAKES WERE MADE!"

   Mistakes were made...Every time I hear that phrase I cringe...How about you?

   Mistakes were made--so vague, so passive, so un-leaderlike.

   Yet, people keep using it. It screams out from the headlines and assaults our ears from the TV.

   Mistakes were made. At first it looks like the leader is taking responsibility for the mistakes. But study your English grammar a little more closely and another picture emerges.

   Mistakes were made. What does it really mean? 'Mistakes' is the subject of the sentence in this passive voice. But the object of the sentence--by whom--is implied. By whom? We don't know.

     Mistakes were made. What the leader is really saying is, "OK, folks, we tried to hide the mistakes but now you've got the evidence so we have to say something that sounds like we're on top of it and sounds like we're taking responsibility. It also buys us time to decide whom to sacrifice...whom to throw over the back of the troika to the wolves--the press, the public, or the employees? Maybe, while they're gnawing on those bones, we can think of something else to divert their attention."

     Mistakes were made, indeed! The first mistake is that we made a bad decision. But then we compound it by ignoring it, covering it up, blaming someone else or taking actions that are incorrect.  There is only one correct answer.

     "I made a mistake. I take responsibility. Here's what I'm doing to fix it." And on a personal note, "Here is what I've learned and how I will apply that in the future." And, by the way, "I will take the consequences."

     I interviewed a wide variety of leaders for my book on strategic leadership, Conventional Wisdom: How Today's Leaders Plan, Perform, and Progress Like the Founding Fathers. I chose them because they had a track record for translating their visions into reality and transforming their organizations. I asked each, "What was your worst business decision and what did you do about it?" They all had similar reports. These are typical:

     "There was a story in the newspapers about a major mistake that we made. You can make excuses for it or you can be transparent about what happened. I sat with the media and I walked them through it and they accurately described it to the public. I hope other companies who read the story will learn from it. But the key is to take an adverse incident like that and turn it into something that we can learn from so it doesn't happen again."

     "Mistakes? I've made some doozies! The ones I've always regretted were the ones where I reacted and said something I didn't mean or that was based on wrong information. One was very visible and I was confronted by a reporter with an email that I had sent. I learned a lot from by boss that day about what a great executive does. He told me to go immediately to everyone on the list and apologize and be humble. It was hard but I did it. The press kept going but all but one individual was satisfied. I learned a lot from that."

     How do you create that environment of responsibility for the entire company?  Listen to another CEO:

     "I want everyone to see our corporate values walking down the hall every day. Let's combine the mind and the heart. It's all about having a mission, and a culture. They've heard so much about making money, budget, and business plans. When we switched back to emphasizing the mission, the values and the culture, the metrics followed and we went from single digit returns to double digit returns."

     Nary a one of the CEOs I interviewed said 'mistakes were made' or any of its variants. Their message was clear. Real leadership, strategic leadership, is about taking responsibility every day for the decisions you make and living your values in your actions.

     I heard a story on the news some years ago that brought it all home in a different context. A high school student's parents were suing a teacher and the school system. The student, who had a good record, made a decision to turn in a class project late after a school trip. The teacher had made it plain that late projects would not be accepted so the student earned a failing mark. The student made the decision not to turn the project in before the trip. Now the parents are suing for the trauma to their daughter. Mistakes were made! What lesson is this young person learning? What lessons are we teaching our employees and colleagues?

     I have some advice: Let's ban that despicable phrase, 'Mistakes were made,' from the language. Let's take full responsibility for our bad decisions, learn from them AND take the consequences. Let's demonstrate our values 'walking down the hall.'

     What's the "mistakes" culture like in your organization? Are people rewarded for accepting full responsibility or are the thrown under the bus? Does every leader take responsibility for his or her mistakes? Or is blame the name of the game and "mistakes were made."

Learn more about your work environment and receive feedback about how it compares to other places. Take our survey, labeled the Whacky Workplace. http://tinyurl.com/jl9cn8p You will also receive a copy of our comprehensive study when it is published next year.

© Rebecca Staton-Reinstein and Advantage Leadership

Read more about what successful strategic leaders do about handling their mistakes in Conventional Wisdom: How Today's Leaders Plan, Perform, and Progress Like the Founding Fathers.

Join me on LinkedIn.

Rebecca Staton-Reinstein, President, Advantage Leadership, Inc.

320 S. Flamingo Road, Suite 291, Pembroke Pines, FL 33027

Rebecca@AdvantageLeadership.com  www.AdvantageLeadership.com

If it’s Kind to be Tough, it’s Tougher to be Kind

I’ve always been an advocate of Tough Love. Lots of leadership books advocate this approach. We admire folks who can carry it off with grace and get the job done, especially when making almost impossibly difficult decisions and forcing people to develop. In retrospect the kindest things leaders did for me was to be tough and insistent upon my change and growth.

I could recount several stories from my own life, both personal and professional and I’m sure you could also. Sometimes it took me years to see the correctness of the other person’s action and appreciate that tough love.

So I’m NOT going to rant against this kind of toughness.

What I want you to consider is an addition; Kindness.

I’m not talking about being wishy-washy, overlooking issues, or avoiding tough conversations. I’m not saying everyone gets a trophy, gold star or free pass.

I’m talking about genuine kindness. You remember what that is...think back to when you were a kid...helping a friend with her math homework when she was struggling...putting a hot water bottle in the new puppy’s bed to comfort his first night away from his mother...writing Princess Elizabeth a sympathy note when her father died...

 

Kindness often gets lost in our hard-charging world. I was reminded of this recently when I heard a remarkable leader talk about her "leadership secret sauce." One of her 10 rules was Be Kind. The audience of business executives was a little surprised when Marylouise Fitzgibbon announced this one. She has built a reputation in the hospitality industry as a rising star with a track record of drastically improving properties. Now as General Manager of the W Hotel on Fort Lauderdale Beach, her hotel is steadily becoming a leading representative of the brand. 

Kindness is very different from tough love. Fitzgibbon is talking about getting out of our own way. Think about a time when you’ve had an employee, peer or friend do something truly awful. We humans tend to react with anger in these situations and whether we take the flight or fight route we are almost never kind when dealing with the person. If we decided to confront the person, most of us find it extremely difficult to control body language, words, and tone when the metaphorical smoke is leaking out our ears. If we decide not to confront, the overwhelming urge to gossip and put down the other person usually takes over with just a dollop of sarcasm to keep it spicy.

The alternative kindness path is much harder than either of these reactions. Being kind in these situations is NOT reacting. Being kind means putting ourselves into a very different space; a place of genuine caring for the person who has acted so badly. It’s more than deep breathing or counting to 10. Kindness requires us to get in touch with that part of us that is capable of genuine caring about the other person. Only in this state can we talk with the other person and, more importantly, listen to what he or she has to say with openness, compassion, and engagement.

This is a tough order. It goes against some of our firmly held beliefs and the notion of what a strong leader is and does. When you are open and kind in this way, you can now deliver the tough love message so it can be heard by the other person. You are not holding back on the consequences or necessarily taking any different action than you would have in the situation. Instead you are treating the other person as a person and being rigorously honest with yourself.

 

You are acting. You are returning the love to tough love.

At the end of the conversation and action you won’t feel the elation of self justification or winning. You will feel a sense of peace because you acted with integrity and allowed the person to keep his or her dignity intact, often accepting the consequences, which is where the real growth we want from tough love comes from.

To learn from Marylouise Fitzgibbon’s full 10 leadership tips watch this: 

http://youtu.be/fibpbLlEXyM 

What’s an example of when you were kind when you could have been hardhearted in a tough work conversation? Share it as part of our quest for leaders who cast a long shadow.

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I'm beginning work on my new book Washington's Shadow: How Leaders Cast a Long Shadow and Create a Positive Culture. Please share your stories or nominees for leaders you know who have transformed the organizational culture positively. This will be a "how-to" book to help others do the same.

Washington casts a long shadow... Do you?

The US celebrated President's Day this week with the usual patriotic events – giant sales at the malls. If you were out in the crush of traffic or just enjoying a day off from work it was easy to forget the holiday put together former February birthday celebrations for Presidents Abe Lincoln and George Washington. Today the holiday has become a generic occasion to honor all the US presidents…including the ubiquitous Abe and George ads hawking flat screen TVs and the latest fashions.

About once a decade, C-SPAN conducts a survey amonghistorians and presidential experts and ranks all the presidents. The 2009 survey findings are relevant and interesting for anyone anywhere who is a leader. Scholars use these leadership traits to rank the presidents:

• Public Persuasion
• Crisis Leadership
• Economic Management
• Moral Authority
• International Relations
• Administrative Skills
• Relations with Congress
• Vision/Setting An Agenda
• Pursued Equal Justice For All
• Performance Within Context of Times

Moving from the political to the organizational realm, you might want to exchange Relations with Congress for something like Relations with Stakeholders and you might want to add some other topics. For the most part, these are a good list of critical leadership traits.

How would you stack up? 

Would you be able to come close to the sort of scores George Washington racks up survey after survey? Washington's stature has grown and shrunk over the years. In his own time he was worshiped and vilified. Presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin commented recently that she would find it difficult to really get to know him and he has certainly eluded most biographers.

Yet Washington was a personification of the American dream of the self-made man. As a teenager he began jotting down advice about how to conduct himself. He did not have the formal education of many of the other founders and often felt he lacked their polish with language. He engaged Alexander Hamilton and James Madison as ghost writers to turn his thoughts into the acceptable style of the day.

Yet, when army officers threatened rebellion in the 1783 Newburgh Conspiracy, he was eloquent enough on his own. Richard Norton Smith describes it this way…

None of this had much effect until the general retrieved from his pocket a congressional message promising early redress of legitimate complaints. He fumbled with the paper for a few seconds, then reached again into his coat to fetch a pair of eyeglasses. Begging the indulgence of his men, he explained to a stunned audience, "I have already grown gray in the service of my country. I am now going blind." Instantly, rebellion melted into tears.

Examine the areas where Washington rated number 1 with the scholars:

Economic Management

Moral Authority

International Relations

Administrative Skills

Are any of these areas where you excel? The international relations category may not be germane if your organization is not working globally. However, the other three are critical for any successful leader whom we would want to follow.

Economic management: Whether for-profit or not, in today’s economic climate, you must manage the finances of the organization prudently. You must invest in areas that will help you continue to grow and develop while eliminating inefficiency and eliminating unnecessary expenses.

Moral Authority: This is the essence of the Leader’s shadow. Who are you as a person? Do you perform with integrity? Are you trustworthy? Reliable? Do you care about people? Do you inspire people to be their best selves?

Administrative Skills: Can you manage people, processes, and priorities? Do you delegate, motivate, and coach people? Do you turn vision and mission into reality? Do you create a working environment where employees are fully engaged?

I suggest you spend a little time looking through the lists and see where your favorites (and not so favorites) score on each of the issues. Try to remove your ideological and political blinders and consider each president in his leadership role. No matter what country you call home, these attributes make a good checklist for leadership. What can you learn from them? How would your employees or peers rate you?

What shadow are you casting?

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© Rebecca Staton-Reinstein and Advantage Leadership, Inc.

Link to survey: http://tinyurl.com/7arjufg

(note: quote from Patriarch: George Washington and the New American Nation. Richard Norton Smith. Houghton Mifflin Company, 1993.)

I NEED YOUR HELP: I'm beginning research for my new book on the influence of leaders on their organizations (Washington's Shadow) and I'm interested in your experiences or ideas for case studies. Drop me a note: Rebecca@AdvantageLeadership.com  

Learn more about Conventional Wisdom: How Today's Leaders Plan, Perform, and Progress Like the Founding Fathers (http://www.ConventionalWisdomCenter.com  and visit our Author Page on Amazon. (http://tinyurl.com/RSRpage )

Sign up for our Conventional Wisdom blog and read this and other leadership stories and tips. http://tinyurl.com/yk7bgtn  

Rebecca Staton-Reinstein, Ph.D., President

Advantage Leadership, Inc.

1835 NE Miami Gardens Drive, Suite 152

North Miami Beach, FL 33179

http://www.AdvantageLeadership.com  

Rebecca@AdvantageLeadership.com

Are you casting a shadow like Washington or…?

Headlines bombard us about executive pay, the tax code, and growing disparity between rich and poor. Pundits pontificate "They should or shouldn't do this." We react based on our own point of view.

But what about a leader stepping forward and taking action?

I was chatting with such a leader the other day. (I can’t reveal his name or other identifying particulars because they are not public yet.) He’s the top official of a small city suffering like so many others in this economy. Revenues are down, demands from residents and businesses are still high, and layoffs and service suspension have become the norm.

Of course he’s fighting back looking at ways to keep the city viable, growing, and innovative. He is trying to keep morale high for city workers who must meet demands, enforce codes, and keep the city running.

But this guy is going the extra mile at a time when it’s out of fashion. He floated the idea among the department heads and managers about taking voluntary furloughs…days off without pay. No big fanfare, no announcements in the local papers, no breathless reports on the local news. Just an idea. "Let's make a small sacrifice to help our city through a tough time."

He was the first to sign up to ease the city’s budget woes. He knows the pain people are suffering because in another recession he was laid off from his city job. So far a couple of department heads have also stepped forward and more are expected to do so as word spreads.

Now the cynics among us are saying, “of course it’s no big deal. He can afford it and will probably take a nice vacation. It’s just symbolic.”

I disagree…not just because I know the guy and he’s sincere. He’s taking a concrete action and setting an example for the rest of the city leaders. He’s walking the talk…something people say is important.

The official is employing "Shadow of the Leader."

Shadow of the Leader is an observation that people in authority through their likes, dislikes, treatment of others, language, personal preferences, beliefs, and values shape the culture of the organization. Employees watch the leader for clues about what’s important.

Although the idea is not new, the first systematic study was done by Larry Senn in his 1970 doctoral dissertation. (In full disclosure, Shadow of the Leader was the subject of my own dissertation in 1979.)

Creating a culture is one of the most important functions of a leader. Whatever example he or she sets will determine whether the organization achieves its stated vision, mission, values, and goals or not. We take our lead from what the leader does, NOT what he or she says…human nature.

In his first inaugural address George Washington stated he would serve without a salary. Congress in its wisdom convinced him to take the salary based on the republican principle that an official who was not getting compensation would be prone to corruption.

It was Washington’s desire to stay above the fray, always display character and rectitude, and set an example for others to follow. He knew his every move would be watched and used to set a precedent for future presidents.

If we are serious about our visions, missions, values, and goals and about leading our organizations, whether a tiny team or a vast country, understanding the power of our shadow and stepping up to take the next right action is absolutely necessary.

So hats off to the city official and those who extend his shadow to help their city in a time of need.

What shadow are you casting?

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(c) Rebecca Staton-Reinstein,  Ph.D., President, Advantage Leadership, Inc.

Learn more about Conventional Wisdom: How Today's Leaders Plan, Perform and Progress Like the Founding Fathers and visit our Author Page on Amazon.

 

Strike up the band for leadership

Learning from great leaders including the US founding fathers is the constant theme of this blog. Today, I want to depart and tell you about a close-to-home example that everyone could learn from.

My husband plays clarinet in a community band. It's a mixed group of professional musicians, many of them retired, students, people who only began to play an instrument recently, and those who have played for decades. The average age of the players is probably around 70. From September to June they play a 2-hour concert once a month in a local community center to an enthusiastic audience. They specialize in marches and show tunes.

For the last few years my father-in-law and I sit in the audience and enjoy the show, tapping our feet to the peppy pieces and singing along to familiar songs. It's pleasant and we have a good time. But...the music isn't always that good. Often in the past it lacked a certain energy...a certain polish.

This past Sunday the band blew our socks off and played for 2 1/2 hours and had us all applauding and begging for more. People were out of their seats and very excited.

So what was different? Well, the band had a new conductor. That was the only difference...and what a difference it was.

• Energy and Focus: The new conductor, although a few years older than the previous one, had a spring in his step, a smile on his face, and an energetic conducting style. It wasn't flamboyant but it was active. Great leaders do that. They exude energy and focus. In fact, new research underway at MIT is measuring this to demonstrate the difference between the merely adequate and the great leader.
• Engagement: As the new conductor put the band through its paces, he made eye contact with different sections, subtly bringing them in, building their sound or lowering their volume. He engaged with individuals and sections to bring out the best in them. Great leaders do that. When they are talking with you, you are the only person in the room. Your own energy level increases and your performance moves toward your true capabilities.
• Highlighting Achievement and Talent: The new director composed a program with the usual marches and show tunes but with a twist. Each one highlighted a particular section -- the brass, the winds, the drums, etc. Each tune gave a whole section the opportunity to strut their stuff and shine in front of the audience. He also had several pieces that featured individual members up front soloing and demonstrating their unique talents. Leaders are proud of the talents of their teams and want them to shine. Great leaders don't have to be the center of attention or the best at everything.
• Making the best with what you have: The community band has a diversity of talent. Some members aren't very good while a few are outstanding musicians. But what makes such a band possible is that everyone is there because they want to be. They enjoy playing music whether they are particularly good at it or not. The former band leader used to spend a lot of time fussing at people, trying to get them to play better. The new director talks about the music with them -- its meaning, origin, and subtleties. Leaders do that naturally. They get everyone focused on a goal -- in this case, playing a particular piece of music as well as possible. They have a clear mission -- bring enjoyment to the community through their music making. He keeps them focused on the goal and mission -- they do their best on their own to meet those.
• Challenge the Team to Excel: The former conductor would always include at least one or two 'serious' pieces -- usually a little slow (even draggy.) All they managed to do was highlight the lack of talent in some players when the tempo slowed and individual instruments were harder to hide in the ensemble. The new conductor had a different approach that both challenged the players and, again, got the best out of them. First, he lengthened the program by about 20 minutes, adding more pieces. Second, he had one more challenging piece, still in the genre the band does best. The band was a little apprehensive but they came through with flying colors -- or rather soaring sound. Their energy was a little lower by the end but still higher than all of last season. Leaders help their teams build on their strengths and remind people of the confidence they have in them.

By the end of the concert my 96 year old companion was jumping for joy. "I can't believe how good they sound. They were terrific." And they were. Same players, same audience, same instruments, same sort of music, same hall -- Leadership -- a good band leader -- made all the difference.

His transformation of the band reminded me of a quote from Dr. W. Edwards Deming about work and leadership:

Why are we here? We are here to come alive...to have joy in our work. 

The band leader brought joy to his players, the audience, and to himself. Strike up the band for your own leadership.

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(c) Rebecca Staton-Reinstein, president, Advantage Leadership, Inc.

For more about learning from great leaders, check out Conventional Wisdom: How Today's Leaders Plan, Perform, and Progress Like the Founding Fathers, available at http://www.conventionalwisdomcenter.com/

Learn more about how Rebecca and her team can help you develop your own strategic leadership and that of your team at http://www.advantageleadership.com/ 

Casting a longer shadow

It seemed like an insignificant thing at the time. Jim, the CEO of a Midwestern printing company, decided to start drinking bottled water. He made no pronouncement and asked no one else to do the same. Six months later, every manager and supervisor was drinking bottled water and bottled water dispensers had been installed throughout the plant and offices.

What happened? It's a phenomenon known as 'Shadow of the Leader.' Put very simply, people unconsciously begin to act like, and even think like, the leader of the group. For many it is completely unconscious. The leader doesn't force it to happen (unless of course you're dealing with a dictator or megalomaniac or other negative leader.) But great leaders set out consciously to create an enduring culture.

The Shadow has great consequences for the organization. I've been looking at how this plays out in the way things get organized and then get done for almost 40 years. Back in the 1970s a new take on leadership and corporate culture started to emerge. This Shadow of the Leader concept was first studied in depth by Larry Senn in his 1970 dissertation. My own dissertation explored the same phenomenon in a grassroots, community organization. Later as a corporate officer, I went through training by the Senn Delaney company on applying Senn's insights. The idea had come full circle with me.

In my new book, I was back on the same quest -- not to look for trivial examples like drinking bottled water but to find examples that would be useful for every leader in today's new tough reality. Perhaps one of the best examples from the history I explored was George Washington.

Washington was not always an iconic leader. His early military career did not look too promising. But he had a characteristic that ultimately propelled him to the top. He determined to mold his own character into someone he and others could admire. So when he was appointed to head the Continental Army and wrest the country from the British empire, he was ready. He turned a rag tag bunch of farmers, merchants, and ne'er-do-wells into a disciplined fighting force.

But it was his peace-time leadership that illustrates the Shadow concept best. First, at the Constitutional Convention he was immediately and unanimously elected to serve as president of that historic session. Delegates watched his body language closely to see which ideas he favored. Although he never took part in the public debates, his views were well known and held great sway with the delegates. On the last day, when he finally spoke and suggested changing the number of voters for each congressional district, the assembly passed it without discussion.

There was never a doubt about who the first elected president of the Republic would be. In fact, there were a significant number of leaders who believed that he should be an elected king. But Washington was a believer in the republican cause of representative government and refused to turn his office into a throne. He understood his Shadow and thought long and hard about every decision from the most trivial to the most profound -- he knew history was watching.

When he stepped down after two terms, he established a precedent that held until the Roosevelt administration and was then codified in the 22nd amendment to the Constitution.

Washington cast a long Shadow of leadership that established a dignity about the office of the president. (Now lest you continue to see him as the stiff figure in paintings and statues, remember that he was a renowned dancer and enjoyed partnering the ladies in the most intricate and spirited dances of the day.)

Perhaps the most enduring part of his Shadow for leaders to be aware of today was his courage in the face of every danger -- not just in war. As the country was collapsing in 1787, he stepped forward to take part in the Constitutional Convention -- which gave it legitimacy and ensured others would join in. When he took on the presidency of the new republic, he had to invent it and reached out to trusted leaders for advice and counsel -- Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, Thomas Jefferson. He was willing to face the crises of his day -- foreclosures, inflation, civil unrest, foreign threats, falling credit, piracy, and more. He was willing to invent a new form of government to save the country.

Leaders can learn a lot from walking in Washington's Shadow -- there's a lot of light there.

(c) Rebecca Staton-Reinstein, President, Advantage Leadership, Inc.
Author: Conventional Wisdom: How Today's Leaders Plan, Perform, and Progress Like the Founding Fathers www.ConventionalWisdomCenter.com