Most leaders today understand the importance of having clearly articulated values that guide the decisions and behaviors of team members. But it seems that many organizations treat “core values” as just another couple of buzz words. Leaders get excited about creating core values that they hope will inspire both team members and customers.

The values are printed on a document that hangs prominently in the CEO’s office, or might even be displayed on the company website. Unfortunately, many organizations never move beyond this point. As a result, it’s difficult to find team members, or even leaders, who consistently live the core values or use them to guide decisions. I recently had the opportunity to speak with S. Chris Edmonds, author of the great new book entitled The Culture Engine. Chris shared several powerful tools for creating a workplace culture where values are inspiring, and result in a culture that people enjoy being a part of and produces great business outcomes because the values are actually lived on a consistent basis.

The Organizational Constitution

The central component of Chris’ work is what he calls an organizational constitution. This document defines the culture at an organization. The first key element of the organizational constitution is a clearly defined purpose that goes beyond producing a product or making money. Although it may take some time to uncover a deeper purpose that is inspiring for everyone on the team, it is well worth the effort. An inspiring purpose can significantly improve engagement levels of team members.

Limiting Core Values to the True “Core”

Another key element of the organizational constitution is the list of the most important values in the organization. This should not be a list of 15 or 20 values. It should truly be the absolute most important values that are non-negotiable. Chris recommends no more than five. By really getting clear on the absolute most important values and limiting them in number, it’s much easier for people to remember them and apply them. For organizations that have already been in existence for a while, Chris suggests that you make an effort to include team members in the process of defining the core values, leaning heavily on your top performers. Thus, there will be more buy-in from team members.

Clearly Defining Values with Associated Behaviors

If you ask five people on your team what “integrity” means to them, you will probably get at least several different answers. If you want to ensure that people are clear on what each value means, each value has to be defined in terms of the two or three behaviors that are most associated with that value. Chris recommends defining values with “I” statements. For instance, the value of integrity might be defined partly with the behavior, “I do what I say I am going to do.” In addition to making it easier to understand what is meant with each value, defining them with behaviors also makes them easier to measure.

Measure Values with the Same Effort We Measure Performance

Nearly every organization does a great job of measuring things like sales and quality and expenses. However, many organizations could do a much better job of measuring the alignment with the stated core values. We should place just as much importance on values alignment as we do on business outcomes because values alignment is what creates the strong culture that drives long-term business outcomes. The first people to be measured should be the leaders.

Leaders should be rated by peers and subordinates on the degree to which they live the values of the organization. When values are lived from the top down, the results include higher levels of trust, engagement, innovation, and ultimately business outcomes. Chris reports that organizations that follow through with designing and abiding by well-crafted organizational constitutions often see dramatic improvements in engagement levels, customer service, and profits within 12-24 months.

To see the full interview with S. Chris Edmonds, click here.

Intellectually, we all know that the one constant in the workplace – indeed in each moment of life – is change. We know that each moment is never quite the same as the one that precedes it. Yet, for many of us, change is a significant source of anxiety that limits our performance and our potential.

When change comes at us like a big wave in the ocean, we feel as though we might drown in the surf. Fortunately, we can actually train our minds to more effectively cope with change, and to even embrace change. We can learn to ride the waves of change just as a surfer would ride the beautiful wave above.

Embracing change in this way makes us significantly more effective in the workplace, and in life. The key is to transform our intellectual understanding of the constancy of change into wisdom. The evidence-based practice of mindfulness can help us do that.

The Difference Between Knowledge and Wisdom

There is, of course, a significant distinction between understanding something intellectually and actually having wisdom. The difference is simply a matter of experience. For instance, if Joe has never driven a car but has read 50 books on how to drive a car, we might call him an “expert.” Intellectually he understands every aspect of the task. However, he has no experience actually driving, so he lacks wisdom. Susan, on the other hand, has never read a book on how to drive a car, but she has been driving daily for 40 years. Susan has a tremendous amount of wisdom on the subject. If we needed a ride somewhere, we would surely choose Susan over Joe. Mindfulness allows us to develop wisdom about the truth of change by helping us to see change much more clearly, and thereby experience it viscerally versus only having an intellectual awareness of the fact that change has occurred.

Clarity of Awareness

The first step in the process is to train our awareness to be more stable. For most of us, it is very challenging to maintain present-moment awareness for more than a minute or so without being distracted by our thinking. Although change is always occurring, when our awareness is scattered, we fail to see the exact moment when one thing ends and another begins. For instance, we all know that our thoughts and emotions are always changing. However, we don’t see the exact instant when one thought ends and another begins, or when one emotion ends and another begins. Mindfulness practice involves making the effort to keep our awareness open to what’s happing in the present moment, without being pulled away by our thinking. Over time, awareness becomes much less scattered. As awareness becomes more collected, we start to clearly see things that many people never see.

Investigating Reality

The second step of the practice of mindfulness is to investigate reality. We make an effort to pay attention to the changes we experience in both our inner and outer worlds. With the more collected awareness that develops through mindfulness training, we are able to see moments of change with great clarity. We actually experience change deeply. This gives rise to wisdom. The more often we clearly see the cessation of things, and experience change deeply, the more we comfortable we become with the truth that nothing is stable for more than an instant. We see the absolute futility in trying to maintain things exactly as they are or have been. We are able to more easily let go of our fixed expectations and be open to the incredible opportunities that come along with change.

Ever since the Conference Board began studying it in 1987, employee engagement has steadily declined. A recent Gallup Poll reported that only 30 percent of Americans are actively engaged while at work. Have you ever wondered why this is happening? I recently had the opportunity to interview Mark C. Crowley(above), the author of Lead From the Heart: Transformational Leadership for the 21st Century. He had an excellent explanation for why employee engagement has been steadily declining for almost 30 years. He also shared some powerful ideas for how to fix it.

The Power of Engaged People

Most of us are aware of the importance of having actively engaged people in our organizations. The State of the American Workplace report makes it clear just how vital this is. The report showed that “companies with 9.3 engaged employees for every actively disengaged employee in 2010-2011 experienced 147 percent higher earnings per share (EPS) on average in 2011-2012 compared with their competition. In contrast, companies with a lower average of 2.6 engaged employees for every actively disengaged employee experienced 2 percent lower EPS compared with their competition during that same time period. “The exponential boost in earnings due to a higher engagement ratio is a competitive advantage that business leaders can’t afford to ignore.”

We Aren’t Giving People What They Need

In our interview, Mark C. Crowley stated that there’s a very simple explanation for why employee engagement is so low. What people need from their workplace environment is continuously evolving. But, to a large extent, the way we lead hasn’t changed. We continue to apply management techniques that were created in the industrial revolution. It seems we are reluctant to let go of our old belief that people are primarily motivated by money. But Mark makes it clear that our primary drive is finding an environment where we feel truly cared for. In essence, we’re all like oversized children who really only want to feel safe and appreciated.

A Sad Road to Happiness and Success

Mark began working to care for the people he led as a reaction to his upbringing. After his mother died when he was young, he was left to be raised by a very emotionally abusive father. So when Mark first began to lead others in the finance industry, he made a vow to give the people on his teams the things he never received while growing up. Although he set very high expectations and demanded excellence, he also made sure to really connect on a personal level, to be an advocate, to help people grow, and to offer frequent appreciation for the work people did. His approach worked very well. His teams achieved extraordinary success, resulting in rapid promotions for Mark. After being given a national leadership position at Washington Mutual, his division set records for both revenue and profit in 2008, and he was named “Leader of the Year.”

It’s Truly a Matter of the Heart

When Mark began writing his book he was asked why his approach to leadership was effective. Could he prove it works? Is it replicable? An answer to this question came after a discussion with a leading heart doctor. Mark learned that the heart is no longer seen as just a muscle that pumps blood. Over the last 20 years or so, it has become increasingly clear that the heart has its own intelligence, which is primarily emotional in nature.

An institute called Heart Math has grown around the research, which shows that the emotions of the heart are the primary driver of human performance. Mark was able to create and sustain highly engaged, highly successful teams because he was able to reach the part of people that drives engagement. He was able to affect people’s hearts, which is the secret to getting people engaged. By truly caring for the people he led, he was fulfilling a deep and universal need — a need much more important than money.

Hire for Heart

In our interview, Mark shared a quick summary of two of the four principles that he and other highly successful leaders apply to achieve greater levels of long-term success. The first principle is to make sure that the people we hire will be able to put their heart into their job. Talent isn’t enough. We must ensure that people are not only good at their jobs, but also passionate about them. If we ensure that people are doing jobs they actually enjoy, we take a big step to ensuring they’ll be engaged while at work.

Institutionalize Recognition

Too often, Mark says, leaders fail to provide appreciation frequently enough. We often get so caught up in the push for continuous achievement that we forget to take to time to recognize what people have already achieved. Mark recommends that we actually schedule time for recognition each week. If it’s on our calendars, we’re much more likely to actually take the time to recognize what people have done well. He also recommends that we don’t just recognize the top two or three performers. This can create a culture where most people don’t feel appreciated. We should recognize each person on the team who either meets or exceeds goals.

Give People What They Need and Engagement Follows

The formula for leadership success that Mark C. Crowley lays out is a simple one. By helping to fulfill a deep, universal, human need, leaders can create and sustain extraordinary teams comprised of highly engaged people who achieve very high levels of success, and this is a matter of the heart. If you’d like to see the entire interview with Mark, please click here.

It has been said that influence is the foundation of leadership. I was recently reminded of the essence of influence and how to create it as I watched some rather magical balloons float up to the heavens. I was grabbing a bite to eat on the lovely terrace outside the Terrace Café at Shands Cancer Hospital here in Gainesville.

It would be an almost 13-hour day at Shands working on our Kids Kicking Cancer program, and it was nice to just take in the view of the sky, the clouds, the trees, and the Fountain of Hope, all of which were in clear view as I ate my dinner. Suddenly, the view changed as I noticed two balloons floating up in front of me, only 20 feet away. I’m not sure if they were released intentionally or by accident.

Maybe it was a bit of both. They floated up rather quickly, but I noticed as they rotated in the breeze that both balloons read, “Get Well Soon!” Almost as if the balloons were intending to do so, they headed over towards the windows of the patient’s rooms. And, as if to further give the impression that these balloons were somehow magical, a couple times they seemed to pause for a second or so as they floated in front of a patient’s room.

I could only imagine how nice it must have felt for a person sitting in a hospital room to receive such a lovely gift – a magical balloon that seemed to be meant just for them, wishing that they be well. This is a gift that we can give each person we meet, which just might also be one of the most important things we can do as leaders, whether we have a title or not.

Influence is the essence of leadership.  If we are unable to influence the behaviors of others, then we are not effective as a leader.  Some people still think fear is a good way to influence behaviors, but most of us know that it doesn’t work very well, and certainly isn’t sustainable. A very effective way to build our influence is to show people that we truly care about them.  When people know that we are committed to their well-being and success, they are much more likely to follow us. A wonderful and simple technique for building our capacity to care for and help others is to make a new mental habit.

As you approach an interaction with another person, you can simply ask silently in the mind, “How can I help this person to be happy?” You don’t need to immediately have an answer. You just need to ask the question. A way to help them may present itself while you interact, after you interact, or not at all. What’s most important is that you set the intention for the interaction as one of service.

People will pick up on this unconscious signal that you care about them.  You might find that when people talk about you they say, “I feel good when I’m around her.” You definitely don’t need a title to attract people to you when they feel good in your presence. I believe that this is the essence of truly great leadership.

 

Matt Tenney’s new book Serve to Be Great: 11 Leadership Lessons from a Prison, a Monastery, and a Boardroom sets out to demonstrate that by simply shifting focus away from short-term goals and financial gain toward more effectively serving the people on their teams, leaders can create conditions for superior long-term results while simultaneously making the world a better place. Tenney’s extraordinary past provides him with a unique perspective on the power of serving and caring for team members. In Serve to Be Great, Tenney tells the compelling story of how his attempt to embezzle government funds led to five and a half years in military prison.

During his sentence, Tenney’s perspective shifted from selfish to servant, prompting him to live and train as a monk for three years, and finally, to become a social entrepreneur. Tenney has cofounded and led two non-profits, as well as a speaking and training company devoted to helping leaders achieve greater long-term success while also making our world a better place. Here are his 11 lessons to help leaders achieve higher levels of lasting success while also living a more fulfilling life

1. Focus on developing your influence as a leader.

The qualities that make a great leader are quite different from those that make a good employee. An employee’s worth is judged based on how well she carries out the different tasks in her job description. But a leader’s worth is judged based on how well she is able to influence the behaviors of those on her team. (That’s why Tenney says one of the most common mistakes organizations make is promoting people to leadership positions based on their job performance. Job performance offers little to no insight into whether or not a person will succeed at leading a team to success!)

“The most effective way to build influence with others is to consistently demonstrate that you truly care about them and have their best interests in mind,” he confirms. “Herb Kelleher, founder and former chairman of Southwest Airlines, is a great example of how great leaders develop influence. He consistently showed employees how much he cared by doing things like coming in on Thanksgiving Day to help baggage handlers load suitcases onto planes.

“When he wrote a letter asking employees to find a way to save $5 a day for the second half of a year, he signed it, ‘Love, Herb.’ Employees knew that he meant it. And, as a result of the influence Herb had built, employees saved much more than $5 a day on average, helping Southwest keep their then 30-year streak of profitability going.”

2. Create a culture of servant leaders.

Can you imagine being able to attract the most talented people in your industry, ensure that they’re fully engaged while they’re at work, and feel confident that they’ll stay on your team for the long haul? What would that do for your organization? Clearly, a great workplace culture—which is responsible for all three achievements—is one of the most important competitive advantages you can possess.

“The key to creating a highly effective workplace culture that people want to be a part of,” Tenney asserts, “is to make sure that team members feel cared for and that they’re a part of something meaningful and inspiring. This is accomplished easily when you build a culture of servant leadership. An e-commerce company called Next Jump is a great example of the power of building an organization full of people who are devoted to serving others and serving the greater good. “The leaders at Next Jump consistently show how much they care,” he shares.

“The company actually does the employees’ laundry for them. But they also find ways to help employees grow their ability to serve each other and the greater good. The most coveted award at Next Jump is a $30,000 package that goes to the employee who is voted by his or her peers to be the most helpful, selfless person in the company. “A culture like the one at Next Jump produces extraordinary results,” Tenney says.

“In 2012, the company accepted only 35 new hires out of almost 18,000 applicants. That’s a hire rate of 0.2 percent. And, although turnover in the tech space averages around 22 percent, at Next Jump, it’s less than 1 percent. This is despite the fact that highly talented employees there often receive phone calls from other companies offering two to three times the salary they currently receive.”

3. Increase innovation by being more compassionate.

Most leaders are aware of the importance of innovation, but many make the mistake of assuming that creativity and innovation are synonymous. Creativity, which is the ability to generate novel ideas, is not necessary for innovation. Innovation is a function of sticking with and executing on ideas—whether new or old—that don’t conform to the status quo, which results in turning an idea into something tangible, useful, and differentiated.

So if you want innovation, Tenney says, you need to create an environment where people feel safe to take risks and stick with ideas that deviate from the norm. “We need to listen non-critically to ideas,” he says. “We need to encourage and be forgiving of mistakes. In essence, we need to consistently show people that we truly care about them. SAS CEO Jim Goodnight is a great case study for how compassion fuels innovation.

He showed incredible compassion for his people at the onset of the Great Recession by assuring them that no one would lose their job and simply asking that all employees be vigilant with spending. As a result of his care, they felt safe. They continued to disrupt the market with innovations through the recession, setting records for revenues, while most companies in the software industry were struggling to stay alive.”

4. Focus on your most important customer.

Organizations that deliver world-class customer service have a few things in common. First, they spend very little money acquiring new customers because they’re able to keep the ones they have and because those customers are constantly referring others. Second, they don’t have to compete on price because their customers are willing to pay more for the excellent service they receive. And perhaps most important, their external customers aren’t their number one priority. The members of their organization are.

“The best way to ensure that your customers are consistently well cared for is to treat your team members with the same care you expect them to deliver to the customers,” Tenney explains. “By listening well and treating team members with kindness and respect, leaders develop team members who do the same for customers. “When leaders focus on developing happy, loyal team members, happy, loyal customers are a natural side effect.

A very simple way to put this principle into practice is to frequently communicate with team members about what you as the leader can do to help them be happy both at work and at home. Make an effort to show that all ideas are heard and considered, and try to execute on as many feasible ideas as possible.”

5. Get a better ROI on marketing by serving the community.

Push marketing—broadcasting unsolicited messages to large numbers of people—is simply no longer an effective way to reach potential customers. In a world where people consume more information in a few hours than our ancestors did in an entire lifetime, our chances of being heard amid the noise are slim. To stand out from the chaos, Tenney recommends that you make serving the community a priority.

“When organizations develop leaders and team members who really care about others, community service efforts can be really powerful because people tend to talk about and remember them,” he asserts. “In addition to being rewarding (it’s simply the right thing to do!), serving the community is a very powerful way to build trust and rapport with potential customers. “For instance, did you know that the apparel company Life is good has yet to spend a dime on traditional advertising?” he asks. “Years ago, they hosted a festival to raise money for youth going through challenging times.

Afterward, the company realized that the media and word-of-mouth exposure was more valuable than the ad campaigns they had been considering. Up to that point, their growth curve had been pretty flat. Since then, it’s been almost vertical.”

6. Stop fixating on providing perks and pay more attention to the little things.

In Serve to Be Great, Tenney offers several examples of companies that go to great lengths to show employees how much they care by offering incredible perks. But perks alone don’t result in a team culture that people want to be a part of. “The perks aren’t necessary,” Tenney says. “Perks are easily copied and can been seen as a façade. What’s most important is to consistently show team members that you truly care about them—and believe it or not, that doesn’t take a lot of money or effort.

Little things like making time for personal interaction, asking more questions, listening more, and showing sincere appreciation for a person’s efforts can go a long way. Honestly, we leaders need to carve out time for personal interaction; actually put it on our calendars. If we don’t, we might find that we’ve gone days, or even weeks, without connecting personally with team members.”

7. Make serving others a habit.

Hardwiring servant leadership into your behavior is all about being mindful of seemingly small thoughts, decisions, and actions. For example, each time you’re about to interact with someone, ask yourself, How can I help this person? or, How can I contribute to this person’s happiness? You don’t need to have an immediate answer.

Just adopting this attitude changes the dynamic of an interaction in positive ways, says Tenney. He also suggests starting each day by taking at least 5 or 10 minutes to contemplate the question, What can I do to better serve the people on my team today? “The practice that made the biggest difference in my life is using the question, How will this help me to serve others? as a filter for decisions,” he shares. “Before I do something or consume something, I look at it from this perspective. This question helps me to waste less time pursuing things that don’t really matter, and has gradually made serving others the motivation for everything that I do.”

8. Gain power by giving it away.

A common misperception among leaders is that they need to be the ones coming up with all of the great ideas or the people making great things happen. The best leaders, though, are the ones who are able to harness the talent and intelligence of the entire team. You can do this by pushing power down to the lowest levels possible. “This is a great way to serve the people on your team,” Tenney says. “Empowered people become much more engaged in their work.

You can empower your team members by involving them in decision making to the greatest extent possible, ensuring that they truly feel heard. You can also give team members final decision authority on tasks within their area of expertise. Just make sure that you’ve previously communicated the organization’s core values so that they can guide decision making. Let your people know that as long as a decision doesn’t conflict with a core value, you trust that they’ll do the right thing.”

9. Inspire your team to greatness.

One of the greatest gifts we can offer team members is the gift of inspiration. In Serve to Be Great, Tenney cites Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. as an example of a leader who had an extraordinary ability to inspire others. He did so by connecting people to a purpose far greater than themselves and by carrying out his work with impeccable character. “An important role of a leader is to clarify not only what the team does for the customer, but what the team does to make the world a better place,” Tenney explains.

“The leader must also ensure that each team member can see clearly how his or her work contributes to that larger vision and find ways to frequently remind team members of their purpose. “You can also inspire greatness in others by working to develop your character so that you consistently do the right thing, even when the personal costs are very high,” he continues. “At some level, we all aspire to be a person who puts others first and always does the right thing. When we see someone else living in that way, it touches something deep inside us. We are reminded of who we can be. We are inspired.” 

10. Measure the things that really matter.

Most of us do a fairly good job of measuring our progress toward quantitative goals. In our personal lives, for instance, we measure progress toward checking items off of our to-do lists, losing weight, or making money. Likewise, large organizations measure things like sales numbers, expenses, and quarterly profits. “What we need to do a better job of measuring is who we are and how well we treat each other,” Tenney asserts.

“When we measure these things, we make a much better effort to improve in them. Remember, it’s who we are and how well we treat each other that drive long-term success. I suggest that you seek feedback on how well you as a leader live the values of the organization and how well you treat the members of your team. You should also measure those things in your team members. By doing so, you’ll make it clear that they’re important and that people must develop these areas to be considered for a leadership position.”

11. Practice mindfulness to become the Ultimate Leader.

Mindfulness training—a simple, science-based practice for training attention and developing emotional intelligence—was the foundation of the transformation that Tenney underwent in military prison. In Serve to Be Great, he describes how the practice of mindfulness helps leaders become the best they can be. “Most people want to do a better job of serving and caring for the people around them,” Tenney comments.

“Mindfulness training helps us close the gap between intention and action. The practice has been proven to be extremely effective at increasing resilience during stressful situations, which will allow you to live up to your ideals of serving and caring for others even when you’re under intense pressure to hit a goal. The practice also gradually makes kindness, compassion, and a spirit of service your natural response to the people around you.

“Beginning the practice is very simple,” he continues. “Just pick a simple activity like drinking water and make an effort to let go of thinking and be fully present for that activity. Commit to being mindful each time you drink water for a week. The next week, continue with drinking water and add another activity. After a couple months, you’ll be practicing mindfulness during most of your day. You’ll notice that you’re happier, more resilient to stress, and more present for the people in your life.”

“Being successful as a leader and living a meaningful, enjoyable life are not mutually exclusive,” concludes Tenney. “In fact, the two actually fuel each other. The very things that make life truly rich are the same things that create and sustain long-term success in both business and in life. “The best news is that it’s all highly trainable,” he adds. “Any one of us can become an extraordinary, highly effective leader who enjoys going to work each day because we know that we’re making our world a better place.”

Serve to Be Great: Leadership Lessons from a Prison, a Monastery, and a Boardroom is available on Amazon