We say we want a mentor, a coach, a trusted advisor.
We want to grow and become more effective.
We ask for help. For "feedback."
This is what you need to make it a success:
The patience to listen, the humility to hear, and the courage to act.
Do you have all three?
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Giving and getting help--at work and elsewhere--has prompted some more deep thinking on the part of some good thinkers.
Author, Consultant, and Blogger Jim Stroup chimes in:
"This is a great topic, with a lot to think about. It seems to me though that if we become too inwardly focused about it, obsessed with what it says about us, it will wind up saying things that are not particularly flattering.
I think the best way to avoid that sort of self-absorption is to focus on the work, and ask what one's request for or offer of help would do to advance it. Perspective is important, too. Peter's story points to this: we sometimes want to be wanted, to be viewed as the heroic helper everyone hopes will arrive just in time to save them. But instead we just overwhelm ourselves and cripple their self-development. That's a lesson that needs to be learned from both sides - when we feel prompted to offer - or to ask for - help.
So, it's a tough one for both the manager and the managed. . ."
It is a tough one in great part because it's about relationships. Jim suggests focusing on the issue and how the issue can be advanced through a specific kind of help. Sounds right to me.
But when a seemingly innocent "helping" conversation starts to get uncomfortable, maybe the issue of self-absorption has crept in. You start to hear a little voice in your head saying: "I know we're talking about 'help' but I don't have any sense of mutuality or equality. Something's just not quite right."
Listen to Language: You'll See What's Going On
Part of my professional practice involves being called in to quietly intervene in conflicts between executives. These aren't serial killers; these are people who have somehow locked horns and have begun to enjoy the war more than the peace. What has been most consistently fascinating in these situations is this:
1. The executives in conflict are almost always committed to the organization's specific goals and what is best for the organization.
2. They've both agreed that they need help and have agreed to get help.
3. They are well aware that once the conversation starts, it will probably hit a point where it gets ugly before it gets pretty.
Derek and Phil (not their real names) were, respectively, Corporate CFO and Business Group President of a global company. Phil believed that a large capital investment for a new facility in Asia would lay the groundwork for a significant increase in profitable business. Derek's numbers--and some first-hand experience--caused him to take a negative stand on the idea. Both were experienced, successful, and strong-willed. Both were doing what they thought was best for the company.
By the time we got into the meeting room together, there was a flurry of accusations and name-calling.
After setting the ground rules, I let them enjoy their verbal jousting and justifications for a while. These included expressions of surprise on each man's part that the other didn't see the "help" being provided.
The breakthrough: While listening to them, it began to dawn on me that every one of Derek's sentences began with "I" ; Phil's were about "Asia."
Derek was self-absorbed, Phil appeared issue-absorbed, neither was self-aware in a healthy way.
So that turned out to be the "intervention." I tracked how many times Derek said "I" in a certain period of time and played it back, along with the implications. While Phil seemed to be focused on the issue--Asia--it was about his view of the issue.
Fast forward: We got to a civil working agreement--it did get ugly --both left feeling as if their positions had been heard--neither could figure out, in the moment, what had actually happened.
The bad news: The company followed Phil's recommendation and lost a ton of money.
The amazing news: Derek and Phil now regularly vacation together with their families.
The crazy human part: In hindsight, Derek simply wanted to be right. He was proven right.
Phil simply wanted to get the Asia start-up started up. He did, and apparently had fun playing with it while it lasted. (Yeah, hold off on the comments about what that meant to the shareholders).
The take away for helpers, consultants, and coaches: Listen for the language and watch for the intensity of engagement regarding one's "issue." It may not be about the issue at all--it may be just as self-absorbed as the "I" posture.
What I learned and continue to use:
1. When the language signals self-absorption, I say just that to the individual(s). Then I introduce the distinction between self-absorption, self-awareness, and ask them what they want to pursue from that moment on. (Most get the answer right:-)
2. Success, when it comes to "helping" in issues of deep conflict, is measured by mutual, peaceful agreement on a working relationship that is healthy-er.
3. Even after a conflict is minimized and people are able to move on, the organization still may not get the very best decisions from the parties involved. Why? Because those decision processes are separate from the conflict resolution itself. (Note: the ability to ever arrive at the best decision may have been hindered as a result of data-gathering/sharing being inhibited during the time of conflict).
4. Helping with conflict means getting the parties un-stuck and able to function on their own. If you find yourself being drawn back for more than two, maybe three, meetings, you are doing long-term therapy and not effective helping. A consultant/coach's job is to make people independent at a given task. Any consultant or coach who is enjoying being needed at the same thing for the long term may want to do a self-absorption check.
What's your experience with helping, conflict, self-awareness, and self-absorption? What else have you seen or done that's genuinely helpful?
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When I asked, "Do You Have The Strength to Ask For Help?", I had no idea that the discussion would bring forth such meaningful and insightful responses. It also stirred up memories of situations of people being talked at when what they really wanted was to be asked and heard.
Check out the full range of comments from pros such as Lisa Gates, Karin at KISS2, Lead Well and Prosper author Nick McCormick, long-time leader and executive Dean Fuhrman, trusted business advisor Richard Calderwood, EQ expert Galba Bright, and Dr. Peter Vajda: coach, consultant, and seeker of truth.
Help! They're Trying To Help Me
Have you ever been the recipient of "help" and wondered what the heck was going on?
(Sure, that's a cheap, cheesy, rhetorical question, but I've got to make the segue somehow).
If you are going to be a helper, then you've got to do some work on your own discernment at two levels:
1. Your ability to discern the origin of your own intentions
2. Your ability to discern what kind of help is actually helpful
Is It About You Or Them?
Most of us want to be helpful when we think we see someone in need. A problem arises when our own urge to help is the driving force for our action.
Whose real need is about to be satisfied?
(Secret bonus for men and husbands only):
Exceptions to the rule:
a. Putting out the trash
b. Sawing firewood (unless your wife is from Montana)
c. Buying jewelry at any time of the day or night, even on the Home Shopping Network
How do I know this? Let me count the undiscerning ways. . .
(End of secret guy paragraph)
Discern Before Acting
If you define helping as "facilitating another's growth", it may make it easier to filter your ultimate action--or non-action--through a more discerning lens.
Peter related a tale in one of his comments that says it all. So I won't. Here it is:
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Employee engagement, management engagement, leadership, passion in the workplace. . .
These rallying cries fill books, blogs, and backroom banter. The real issue: "How can we get done what needs to get done and create a sense of "we're in this together" at the same time?
It's actually quite simple:
To Get Something Done, Ask for Help
There is nothing that sparks the human spirit--and thus adds meaning to a task--than the satisfaction of providing help to someone who needs it.
Yet my experience--at least in many western cultures--is that it is somehow viewed as "weak" to ask for help. After all, if I'm a guy who gets things done, I don't want people to think that I can't get things done.
I know you already see the fallacy in this. Most textbook definitions of management include some version of: "Management--getting things done through others."
Hmm. As a manager that means, by definition, I need your help.
What Actually Happens Vs. The Simplicity of Help
See if this isn't a little closer to the norm:
Manager: "Andrew, our sales goals are up by 8%. You supervise the customer service reps. You need to be able to support that. Make it happen."
Now, that 's not too bad a directive at all in the grand scheme of things. (For those who only respond to warm and fuzzy, it's probably not). It's fairly specific, understandable, and has an action attached. However, we've got an entire generation of management research that everyone has been exposed to through workshops and reading. The essence of that research is that people want to be respected, involved in solutions, and have a sense of meaning in what they do.
So, I suggest:
Manager: Andrew, our sales goals are up by 8%. I need help. (Shut up).
Note to managers: Really, you do need help. You're getting paid to make the 8% happen--through other people.
Andrew: How can I help?
Honestly, if the manager & Andrew have a decent relationship, "helping" is about as meaningful as life can get at that moment.
Manager: You supervise the customer service reps. We need to be able to support that 8% bump. How would you go about doing that with your people?
(In the event that Andrew struggles a bit, this is the "teachable moment" for management coaching).
What will you do?
What someone does for a living is part of the working agreement. How they do it is why they--as individuals--were (hopefully) hired in the first place. When you allow someone to exercise the personal how, you have created the intersection of individual meaning and engagement .
Are you strong enough to ask for help today?
Special thanks to Adrian at Slow Leadership for sparking today's thoughts.
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This article is the thirtieth in a series about Change from Steve Roesler.
Decisions get made. It's time to start.
The Goal is clear. There is a picture of what the end should look like.
Now we just have to "do it."
Some don't make it...
.. .individually or organizationally.
Given that there are entire industries built around "doing it"--continuous improvement, change management, life coaching-- there must be some trick to that whole in between area. If you are involved in any kind of a change, here are 5 tips that you can take to the bank. (Ignoring them may put you in the collection agency).
1. Language matters.
"We're going to make a transition from___to____" impacts the brain a lot better than "We're going to change."
(Honestly, I don't want to change--do you? But I don't have any problem making a transition).
2. Friendships matter.
Be willing to talk and be willing to listen. When things change at home or in your family, you have coffee and conversation with friends. Why? It's cathartic. And you don't feel alone. Changes at work are no different.
3. Grace matters.
Transitions and change imply, by definition, that people are trying something for the first time. When your little child tried out her first steps and fell after the third one, you didn't offer a performance appraisal. You hugged her, made a big fuss, took a video, and called the grandparents.
Offer the same to adults who are trying something for the first time. Truth be told, they are feeling like kids at that moment.
Note: I'd avoid the hug and the video; it's your call on whether to phone the grandparents.
4. Accountability matters.
This isn't opposed to numbers 2 or 3. Accountability is an act of deep friendship. Friends don't let friends drive drunk. They also don't let friends do things--or avoid doing things--that are hurting their careers.
5. Small wins matter.
Make an example of anyone or any result that approximates the longer term ideal. Do it often.
If you wait until everyone gets it perfect, there won't be a celebration. There may not be a reason for it.
That's why continuous improvement is called continuous improvement.
What Are Your Best Tips?
I know the readers here are involved in changes of all types. Weigh in with your favorite transitional tips and suggestions and we'll add them to the mix! (With attribution, of course. See #5).
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"I am often astonished at how deeply CEOs really love their work. Some have gone as far as sharing with me, "You know, Tony, as much as I love my family, it's work for me to leave this place, to leave the office and spend time with my family—as much as I love them." I even had one client tell me that if he had to give up either sex or running his company, he'd give up sex."
Anthony Smith, consultant and author of The Taboos of Leadership...from a Business Week interview with Marshall Goldsmith.
If that isn't enough to get your attention, according to a new report only one half of one percent of men in Japan take time off to be with their families. That from Tom Stern in his Fast Company article Wins of Our Fathers.
What You Can't Not Do
Readers here will recognize the expression. When people ask about pinpointing their strengths and talents, my first response is always "Look at what you can't not do." It's in your DNA. And if you have leadership DNA, which seems to be intimated as well in the Business Week interview, then the inclination would be to lead. And to want to do it well.
At the same time, the very gift that allows leaders to successfully run large, healthy, organizations has the the potential to contribute to unhealthy families. If we really believe, as is so often touted, that "children are our future", then what are the future consequences of absentee parents? Are we setting the stage for young people to figure out life by watching their parents on media clips rather than receiving guidance across the kitchen table?
I'm not offering a sweeping criticism of leaders who love their work. In fact, I'm banging this out before heading to two days of client meetings away from home.
What I am suggesting in light of the articles above is this:
Really good leadership requires a soul-searching journey. Regardless of DNA or ambitions, living a full life as an effective adult also means weighing the totality of our responsibilities, choices, and their consequences.
Leaders are talking, with pride, of "giving back to the community" in order to help create a better world. That's great.
What are you giving or taking away from your family that will have even more impact on them and the world in which they'll have to live as a result?
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Silent Communication appears to be an oxymoron.
It's not.
Silence communicates powerfully. But because it's, uh, silent, the interpretation is left to the recipient.
Is that what we really want?
Dr. Robyn McMaster gets credit for starting this conversation with How Do You Respond To The Silent Treatment?
From her brain-based expertise, she notes:
"When you doubt and feel anxious, cortisol, a chemical hormone literally floods your brain and nervous system. And, it throws you into a tizzy so you do not think clearly."
Which means that silence causes confusion. But we don't like confusion. So we add our own meaning to the silence in order to reach a state of equilibrium. However, Robin's insight shows that our mental state at that time is actually weakened, so that our conclusions may prove to be less than ideal.
Silence doesn't cause a vacuum so much as it does an irrational mental spiral. That's a formula for trouble in any setting.
Making Someone Disappear and Re-Appear
The act of making a suggestion or comment--then being greeted with total silence--can be insidious. Why? It communicates that a person's very existence isn't being acknowledged. It's very different than the impact of "Gee, I don't know if that idea will work or not" or "Let me think about that."
The second shows relational acknowledgment and engagement and can be built upon. The first discounts one's being.
If your 'hearing" silence, ask this: "Help me understand whether my (comment, suggestion) is a questionable one or are you thinking about it?"
Getting the conversation going again--even if the answer is "I think the idea stinks"--is better for the soul than being deemed non-existent. And can probably lead to an actual productive conversation.
What if We...
...began intentionally teaching about the impact of silence?
I confess that after years of leading seminars and workshops I only address the issue when it arises as a question. More often than not, it's in a consulting situation rather than in the classroom.
What I've learned from hearing myself write is that it's time to become purposeful about silence, communication, and what it means, to one's self and others.
Makes sense to me. What do you think?
Related articles you might like:
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Eureka, I've found it!
Business-related research that finally allows the kind of cheesy headline to attract readers from all genres while losing my core group in the process.
Please say you'll still love me in the morning.
The headline in Science Daily reads:
Men Choose Romance Over Success
Men may be more willing than women to sacrifice achievement goals for a romantic relationship.
This according to a new study by Catherine Mosher of Duke Medical Center and Sharon Danoff-Burg from the University of Albany.
The findings challenge preconceptions that women are more likely to prioritize people and relationships while men are more focused on themselves and their achievements.
Both groups wanted achievement and relational intimacy. But the men were more likely to give romance the priority if faced with a choice between a relationship and career, education, and travel.
Hmm. Here's a deep "guy" life question:
Shall I spend the day working my tail off, getting up early for a lecture, and standing in line at the airport?
OR,
Do I spend the day making out with my girlfriend? (Please note my totally unapologetic and obviously un-evolved male bias toward a definition of romance and relationship).
The men and women in the study were college students who, as we know, are deeply committed to distinguishing the difference between romance, relationships, and achievement.
Interestingly, the researchers posit that the women in the study may be more strongly committed to career achievement and less likely to sacrifice it for a relationship.
What If It Proves to be True?
Would that change the dynamic when it comes to hiring, promotion, and making assumptions about employee engagement based on demographics?
For a fascinating look at a historical example of the relationship between romance and success, do read "Would You Rather Be Right or Romantic?"
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By the time Curious George reached the southern part of New Jersey we could tell that Tour Director Steve Woodruff and AoC contributor C.B. Whittemore had already set George's star-status expectations pretty high. He's already sporting a monogrammed chapeaux thanks to C.B.
George started off by putting together his posse for the South Jersey stay. He decided to make new friends the quick way by sharing Arun Rajagopal's take on Digital Media Conversationalists.
CG used his resources to dazzle Minerals Technologies VP Jim Brownhill and wife, Toni. When Jim started an after-dinner rave about virtual teams, The Curious One suggested a look at the way Luc Debaisieux approaches the whole idea of Shared Consciousness.
Unable to contain his inner lounge lizard, George commandeered the piano bar with the hope that Director Tom would use his show-stopping rendition of Feelings in an upcoming video.
Barb and I will miss CG (even though his tastes are becoming a little high-maintenance already). Tuesday he makes the commute with me to Manhattan where he'll no-doubt hit on Greg Verdino for dinner and a show.
Most of all: Curious George cares about helping kids through Variety:The Children's Charity.
You can be a part of that with your own copy of The Age of Conversation. With 103 ideas from 103 different authors you'll be the best-informed person in the room, whether it's a meeting room, banquet room, or social setting.
Here are the more than 100 authors who hope you'll join the conversation and reach out to kids in need as a result:
FORMATS & PRICES :
Hardbacks $29.99
Paperbacks $16.95
E-book $9.99
Background
Dedication
SITE : www.ageofconversation.com
About the authors : Arun Rajagopal
Google map of the authors: Matt Dickmann
AUTHORS :
A final note: When you realize that you need to allow a struggle to take place, understand that help means "being there" to support your colleague, friend, or direct report. Being left to struggle without another's support is like being allowed to sky dive without a parachute.
Here's hoping that this week finds you being the parachute. . .
A word of thanks to Mark Shead at Productivity 501 for including our suggestions in his Distraction Free Internet piece.
Graphic source: www.youngwriterssociety.com/