Have You Met Yourself?

Posted on by Will Marre

Do you know what you are especially good at? Do you know why people especially value your work or your personality? Do you know that whatever secret faults you have they are not secrets to anyone else? It’s no surprise that findings of a recent study by the Hay group on differences between male and female leaders showed that no matter which gender you are we’re mostly clueless about ourselves. Of the critical drivers of human effectiveness men and women ranked dead last on the same trait. That trait is self-awareness. That’s not good.

Decades of research confirms that emotional intelligence is the most hair-on-fire critical element of effective leadership, management, as well as just plain getting along with others. Research, using 50,000 360-degree surveys shows that supervisors and subordinates most often agree on the strengths and weaknesses of a particular manager. The person who has the most distorted view is the manager himself or herself! That’s you and me. We simply don’t know how we come across to others. In fact, we are terrible at it. It’s not our fault really.

Our brains are constantly conducting a crazy inner dialogue that provides a personal color commentary on everything that’s going on in our lives minute to minute. We mistake this color commentary for reality. So we think others actually understand our thoughts, motives, and intentions.

But except for a very, very few of our closest loved ones, they don’t. It’s true. Most of us cruise through life thinking others hold us in higher or lower esteem than they actually do. Most of us have a very foggy idea of our impact on others. The result is that our influence, effectiveness, and genuine human connections are smaller than they could be.  A lot smaller. That’s what happens when you experience yourself through your intentions and others through their behavior. I learned this the hard way.

After years of success and failure I discovered that many people viewed me as a bulldozer. What they experienced was arrogance. What I was feeling was confidence. What they experienced was commanding. What I was feeling was urgency. Some small adjustments caused me to actively seek contrary points of view, which led to big improvements.

The point is, I just didn’t have a clue. The following is how I advise people. First, realize you are not normal. We are all quirky as hell. What’s normal to you is, well, abnormal to nearly everyone else.  Second, ask others who know you well, the four questions below. I’ve found it’s best to do this by urgent email. Tell people you mail it to that you’re having an interview tomorrow morning so need an immediate, off-top-of-their-head’s response. If you don’t create a burning fuse your friends and colleagues will put responding off indefinitely.

Here are the questions:

1. What do you most value about me?

2. What do you think I am best at?

3. If I were going to invest a lot of time to learn and master something, what do you think I might do?

4. If you could wish that I stop doing one thing that’s holding me back, what is it?

You don’t need a 360-survey or even a coach to start a journey of self-awareness, that could change your life. You only need an email account.  Go ahead… give it a rip.

 

Don’t Be Stupid… Work Like a Genius

Posted on by Will Marre

What if the worst thing you could do for your personal capability is exactly what you are doing?

You probably are. We all are. Brain scientists have confirmed that multitasking makes us stupid. No I am not exaggerating. If we define practical intelligence as our ability to learn, solve problems, and create new solutions then we are making ourselves mentally challenged. Here’s why. Our brains are designed for efficiency.

They quickly create patterns of thought called Brain Activity Patterns that connect sets of facts, experiences, and reasoning ability into useful knowledge clusters. The faster these clusters of knowledge connect the faster we learn, solve problems, and invent solutions. The fuel for fast thinking is focus and oxygen.

When we don’t focus and when we sit too long we literally run out of gas. And it seems the worst thing we can do for our brain is to try to put our attention on more than one thing at a time. True multitasking is essentially impossible. Research is showing that no amount of video games or texting while driving trains our brain to think about two things at once. Instead we just scramble our brains.

A decade of testing by the military and scores of universities confirms that multitasking leads to more errors and lengthens the total time it takes to complete a series of tasks. But that’s not all. Multitasking prevents our brain from forming important Brain Activity Patterns that are necessary for mastery and expertise. It’s like this. Picture traffic moving through a chaotic, over stuffed city in an under-developed country. Motorcycles, trucks, bicycles, and cars driving in a frenzy where traffic laws are ignored and fatal accidents abound.

Compare that to a new multilane freeway system at 11 am with a few cars and trucks moving safely at high speed to their designated off ramp. Those two scenarios describe the difference between a multitasking chaotic brain filled with random thoughts constantly assaulted by new data, new requests, and new problems, and one that is focused on one important opportunity or relationship at a time.

Yes, it makes a big difference. In a recent study of the work habits of 150 geniuses, from Edison to Einstein, researchers found that these geniuses have work habits 180 degrees opposite of what you may be doing. Here’s their pattern: They get up early, sometimes very early, and work in a state of focused concentration until their noon meal. And yes, they drink lots of coffee and eat breakfast.

After lunch they take a long break – up to two hours – and either walk, nap, or pursue a creative hobby like music or art. In the mid-afternoon they refocus on work, often with colleagues, to keep projects, inventions, or organizations moving. At night they eat, often socialize with friends or loved ones, and then go to bed early.​Of course the complete lifestyles of many extraordinary geniuses are plenty quirky so I am not suggesting every excessive habit should be copied.

Rather, I’m suggesting that there seems to be a clear pattern of work that leads to extraordinary achievement. The pattern is based on long periods of intense focus followed by some engaging form of refreshment and recovery, followed by working with others that leverages all the smart things done in the morning.

What greatness clearly doesn’t look like is a crazy mental pinball game of responding to texts and email while “half-brain” attending an endless series of meetings and conference calls. So why not try this new pattern for a week or two? Imagine what might happen. Imagine what breakthrough you might have.

Just imagine.

 

Refuse To Be Domesticated

Posted on by Will Marre

Too many of us have become domesticated. We are so persistently taught how to figure out how to please others to get what they tell us we should want that… we lose track of ourselves. We never learn what we deeply want.

I have found this to be profoundly true for leaders. They are always focusing on what their investors want, analysts want, or bankers want.

They listen constantly to what their own senior team wants, their employees want, and what their customers want. But simply bundling up this huge pile of wants into a business that you could actually run is prescription for relentless stress and mediocre results. The leaders we most admire are clear on what they want and single-mindedly pursue it. I know, that could sound selfish and willful, which is exactly the kind of leader we don’t admire. So what do I mean exactly? Well, I am defining deep intrinsic desires as wants.

I am referring to enriching and improving the lives of people by making a valued difference. The difference perhaps only you can make. What your banker or investors want is to make a lot of money. Your employees want generous pay and few demands. Your customers want a deal. What leader can become great listening to those wants? Instead ask yourself, “What is the greatest thing I could do?” Walt Disney famously said, “I don’t make movies to make money; I make money to make movies.” That says it all.

His leadership had a purpose derived from his deepest desire to create extraordinary experiences to make people happy. This Disney style, purpose driven leadership is what we all admire. When Blake Mycoskie started TOMS shoes in order to put shoes on barefoot children, most people though he would fail. Instead he has sold over 20 million pairs of shoes so he could give away an equal number.

When Howard Schultz wanted to unite humanitarian values to a five-dollar latte, everyone thought he was foolish. When Richard Branson wanted to start hundreds of companies to disrupt hundreds of markets, true professionals thought he was insane. When Zappos’ Tony Hsieh started selling happiness in the form of a transaction to buy shoes, he was ridiculed. It’s interesting, isn’t it?

These business leaders are household names. These are leaders we admire. Meanwhile the army of technocrats and financial engineers that run most companies are invisible. Many of them operate like robots playing with PowerPoints and spreadsheets as if they were all the mattered. These hard changing people aren’t bad, but they are often disconnected from their own healthy desire to really do something that matters. Do something you believe in so deeply you are willing to do whatever it takes to succeed so you can make your difference.

You don’t have to be a leader to fall into the trap of living someone else’s life. All you need to do to lose your own way is not look inside and notice what you are doing, saying, and learning when you are most alive. What the world needs most is not a better, cheaper version of what we already have.

What the world truly needs from you is to show up every day and do what you are uniquely designed to do and make it extraordinary. What the world needs for each of us is to invest ourselves in our most worthy purpose and not quit. For Walt Disney it was making movies. What is it for you?

 

Being Strong Can Make You Stupid!

Posted on by Will Marre

Most of the time I walk around with the inner illusion that nearly everyone likes me. “After all,” I think, “what’s not to like?” Well, it turns out there is plenty not to like. It’s especially hard to like someone who assumes everyone thinks they are wonderful. Yah, there are plenty of people who think I am a little less than absolutely wonderful…but I am clueless. It’s true.

Research on self-awareness confirms that the person least likely to have a clear view of myself is me. We are all so filled with an inner story of who we are we miss how we actually show up to others. Confidence comes naturally to me. I didn’t have to work hard to develop it.

It was just always there. Confidence is great. But too much of it, I’ve found, is arrogance. And arrogance is repellent. In fact, arrogance makes you stupid. When you are really, really sure of yourself, you simply miss seeing the truth about things that matter. So what’s the answer to being so confident that I fall into arrogance? Well it’s not being less confident. It’s being more humble. Not humble in a “I am not that great” way but humble in the “I have a lot to learn” way.

Confidence balanced with humility can be a powerful strength. Without that balance I am just a jerk. The man who taught me this is Charlie Kim, the CEO of an unusual company named Next Jump. Next Jump is a New York City based ecommerce company that has set a new standard for recruiting and developing extraordinary employees. Charlie’s engineers come from the Ivy League’s top schools. They are all smart. They brim with strengths. But Charlie found that without balance, a strength can make you useless.

Not very many people in organizations seem to understand this today. Training people to use their strengths is a huge multibillion-dollar business. It all started with some research the Gallop organization did which they turned into books, assessments, and programs called thinks like Strength Finder.

The big idea is that people succeed because of their strengths…so discover your strengths and use them to accomplish great things. Sounds great doesn’t it? It certainly appeals to our narcissistic culture. Who doesn’t want to hear, “You are awesome and can become successful by pumping up your awesomeness.” It’s the ultimate self-serving psychological temptation. And that’s one reason it’s so popular.

Some brand of discover and develop your strengths is found in almost every company I come in contact with. In some companies this strengths-based culture is so strong both employees and leaders insist they only do things that use their strengths. They then warn others of their weakness with the subtle message of “deal with it” as if what makes me strong makes up for what makes me weak.

This is not a wise development. I have observed that in the real world the truism that people are hired for their strengths but fired for their weakness is the whole truth. Human beings have three great psychological weaknesses. These are the assassins of both our happiness as well as our achievement. Here they are:

  1. Deny …you have a problem.
  2. Blame …others for your failure.
  3. Rationalize …that failure, in this instance, doesn’t matter.

Most of us seem to be Olympians at excusing our weaknesses. But we don’t have to collect more gold medals for failure. Instead we can develop balance. In studying the research on personal strengths here are some of the most common balanced pairs: Assertive – Patient Analytical – Intuitive Focused – Flexible Charismatic – Authentic Committed – Open-minded Decisive – Reflective Directive – Collaborative Passionate – Prudent Innovative – Practical Confident – Humble Just give yourself a score on a 1 to 10 scale on each side of the list.

Then go to your most insightful, honest friend and ask them to score you. It just might increase your humility. In coaching high achieving powerful people for over thirty years what I’ve seen is that balance is the greatest strength of all. People who are 8 on decisive and 7 on reflective are far more successful than someone who is 10 and a 4 on the same scales. Most of our suffering is self-inflicted.

If you’re not getting the results you want consider what you might be doing to cause the results you are getting. Then make a balanced investment in developing your future self. What I’ve discovered is that I have no secret flaws. Everyone else sees me more clearly than my inner story of myself allows me to. Rather than fret about that I’ve discovered working on improving my balance is what makes me stronger. If life is a sport, balance is the core skill.

 

The Growth Agenda Of The Future is: Good, Grow, Gain

Posted on by Will Marre

The popular and currently accepted MBA-approach view of business is as a stockholder wealth-creating machine.

MBA PowerPoints reveal a business logic mindset of Gain, Grow, Good. This business logic directs leaders to first think of a way to make money (Gain), then use a more-with-less business model to grow profitable revenue (Grow), and if there’s anything left over – to do some well-publicized, social responsibility (Good).

This is, in fact, the pattern of the old version of the American Dream. Start a business, create a monopoly to get really rich, and then retire as a philanthropist. This was Andrew Carnegies’ and Bill Gates’ pattern. It’s no longer relevant. This “gain first” approach to business no longer works because it kills daring motivation. In fact, a gain first business model creates risk averse cultures that become rigid, silo’d, and bureaucratic.

Trying to build fortresses around business models is a failed idea. The revolutionary forces of technology that have created a new reality in which all information is available to anyone, anywhere (think Google and mobile phones) has changed everything. Now any competitive advantage derived from a gain first mindset evaporates in months by competitors whose employees and consultants are as smart as yours (or even smarter).

The answer to this dilemma is found in the second new success factor. Think Good, Grow, Gain. It means that you, as a leader, begin with asking how much good you can do for people using the assets you have. No, this isn’t a not-for-profit agenda. In fact, it’s the growth agenda of the future. Creating unexpected value grows new demand and benchmark-breaking gains.

That’s exactly what the leaders we most admire are doing. Yet, this “do good first” thinking is such a foreign idea to the trained business mind that I’ve had to come up with a thinking model to jolt some new ideas. It looks like this: When I help retrain leaders’ minds to escape the prison of business-as-usual I teach them a process of answering questions about how they might first use their assets to create unique, innovative offerings that help customers experience a better life through one or more of these six sources of unique value above.

Once you’ve opened your mind to this model, you’ll begin to see how superbrands create consumer insistence (where customers accept no substitutes) and how they generate powerful attractive energy. Brands like Disney, Apple, Nike, and Starbucks inspire us with products and experiences while equally famous brands like Microsoft, HP, Denny’s, and Six Flags inspire only yawns. Just as Google, Harvard, and Oprah create mental energy by making people feel smarter and more capable, Yahoo, University of Phoenix, and Jerry Springer are well known but not for “good” reasons.

As I take leaders through the exercise of discovering the six ways of adding value, I see the light go on in their eyes; that making a difference is the surest way to make money in this constantly disruptive economy. I often see them blow open the cage of old, failed thinking and release their leaders’ personal sense of “unfinished business.” You see, our unfinished business is our personal TRUE work.

The work that most of us never get around to. The work we are designed to do and that our higher selves desire. Work that doesn’t just make us richer but also better. Once leaders understand their best path to personal success is the path that creates genuine value for humanity, their practical idealism kicks in and a new level of courage and conviction takes hold. Yet, even then, after a core mindshift to value-added leadership is set alight, leaders find it difficult to sustain escape-velocity.

The gravity of old ways of thinking and the pressure of short-term investors slows down, and even stops, real change. To boost the energy needed to change, I’ve developed a third step. It’s a revolutionary 21-day brain boot camp based on a set of very short and easy daily habits, designed to literally rewire a leader’s brain to tap their natural strengths and create value-added solutions to tough challenges.

It draws on the full power of new research around personal, positive, well-being to incite permanent change. What’s most rewarding is that these habits light up unique passions and talents of leaders, who want to lead better, but also live fuller lives. As I talk to audiences and work with leaders who believe they have “unfinished business,” I only ever have to ask them to look at their past accomplishments and current work and ask themselves, “Is this the best I can do?”

Those who can imagine that there is more, are those who will change the future, by creating it. For me, releasing a leader’s mind and the desire to be extraordinary is the payoff. You see, I believe that business is the most powerful institutional force that can create the future we want for our children. Imagine a world of sustainable abundance led by value-adding leaders, who redefine winning as the positive difference that only they can make.

Just imagine.  

Are you doing the best you can do? What is your unfinished business?

 

Leading to Win – Everything We’ve Been Taught about Leadership has Changed

Posted on by Will Marre

For the past 35 years I’ve been helping leaders win. Winning is never easy. Especially now. And it’s not just because competition is more fierce and game-changing technology is being developed every nano second. Winning is hard because most of us don’t spend enough time critically thinking about what winning means to us. Instead we tend to accept others’ definition of winning and then start sprinting in a direction that has no finish line. This rarely leads to life’s biggest win—personal happiness and true contentment.

And increasingly, neither does it lead to winning at making money. So what does it mean to win? A research base of 250,000 business leaders over three decades confirms that humans have three prime motives. This is important. Our prime motive constantly directs our attention and focuses our energy on goals we believe will make us happy. Prime motive number one is distinguished achievement, attaining goals that set you apart.

Number two is beating your competition. And number three is enriching the lives of others, creating value for human beings. These are three very distinct motives each of which leads each of us to invest our daily energy very differently depending on how we define winning. It turns out that the general population divides in approximately three equal segments according to these three prime motives… but not so in business leadership. The higher up we look in organizations more leaders are primarily driven to achieve difficult goals or to beat the hell out of the competition. Fewer wake up in the morning fired up to create meaningful value for customers or to enrich the lives and capabilities of their employees. This has become a leadership problem.

And it’s getting worse. Today’s hyper competitive businesses can no longer count on winning by making money the old fashion way. That’s because everything we’ve learned about effective leadership has changed. It’s pretty simple. If you are a leader your thinking simply has to shift or realign with the new realities or you will fail, and no amount of hard work toward goals that no longer matter can save you. This change of mindset isn’t easy. We all rely on our old thinking habits because being open-minded to new, disturbing information is both unpleasant and inefficient.

And that’s the fundamental problem. Most leaders, especially those driven by achievement and competitiveness, have been seduced by efficiency… whatever the quickest, easiest way is to make money right now. In 1993 I led a project for the American Quality Foundation focused on making Total Quality Manage (TQM) normal business practice in the U.S. It was vital at the time. Japan was making great cars and electronics and the U.S. wasn’t. TQM was driven by engineers who figured out how to use statistics to reduce variance, cost, and people to more efficiently create reliable products.

By the mid-nineties this movement became known as business process reengineering, then Six Sigma, now lean thinking. But the world economy is “leaned out.” There are few advantages that persist from further efficiency. In fact many of the supposed gains through enterprise wide business processes have proven an illusion. We all know businesses cannot save their way to sustainable prosperity.

For that you need to create new value. Real value. Value that matters to human beings. It is only by creating a Unique Value Advantage (UVA) that an enterprise can sustain healthy financial margins to reinvest in motivated employees and make new bets on products, offerings, and markets that provide a steady source of growth. I call this Value Added Enterprise.

This requires leaders to have authentic empathy for both customers as well as employees so they can conceive of value that actually matters to human beings. This requires a different way of thinking—literally, reviving a different part of your brain that enables you to see and feel things that a cost-saving mindset filters out. In order to awaken the dead part of a leader’s brain I use a three step process. First, years of research has revealed that the top 3% of effective leaders do three things really, really well. They 1) set clear direction, 2) inspire and motivate their workforce and stakeholders, and 3) drive results.

The most compelling data on leadership behavior suggests that 97% of business leaders don’t do these three things well. In fact, only 10% of leaders do two of them well. Perhaps that’s why truly great leaders are rare. The interesting thing is that the rarest of the three essential qualities of great leadership is number two—inspiring others. Now we know that’s because people are most inspired by meaning rather than goals.

It’s true, the evidence is we are much more meaning-seeking beings than pleasure-seeking ones. And the root of human meaning is enriching the lives of other human beings, which translates into adding value. It’s even better if it’s unexpected value and best if it’s unique value. If you question that just consider a brief list of most admired leaders and ask yourself what they have in common:

  • Steve Jobs—Apple
  • Howard Schultz—Starbucks
  • Tony Hsieh—Zappos
  • Doug Conant—Campbell’s Soup
  • Mark Parker—Nike
  • Herb Kelleher—Southwest
  • Beth Comstock—GE
  • Sam Palmisano—IBM
  • Blake Mycoskie—TOMS

If you guessed that all these leaders are up to something more than making money, you’d be correct. Each one has created or revived a brand with a unique value advantage based on a value added strategy. Great leadership begins with clear leader intent that comes from the inner passion to make a customer’s life better.

Nothing less.

What is your company currently doing that is adding unique value to your customers?