Jun

25

The Broken Open Heart of Leadership

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Friends,

Thanks, to the many of you who responded to my Fathers Day invitation to reflect on the lessons and gifts your fathers gave you. If anyone is in need of some inspiration – especially if you wonder whether your own efforts as a parent are bearing fruit – I encourage you to spend a few minutes perusing the powerful “everyday fatherhood” testimonials at www.danmulhern.com/wordpress.

Speaking of powerful . . . Parker Palmer, a Quaker writer and author, delivered a remarkable talk this weekend at a Kellogg Foundation gathering. Parker offered the notion that in our personal lives our hearts are sometimes broken open, and we become transformed. At first though, our hearts just feel unbearably broken, as loss of some kind makes our reality excruciating. Perhaps you have had this experience of loss, and grieved and reflected so that you emerged from it with a larger heart – more real, more open, perhaps more forgiving and empathetic. And you emerged with deeper knowledge about yourself, others, and your world. But at other times – or before our heart breaks open – we act in fight or flight. We sedate ourselves or react angrily, lashing out at (whatever appears to be like) the cause of our downfall or suffering.

Palmer suggested persuasively that there is a similar phenomenon with groups and states and even nations.* The experience of 911 broke our hearts, he argued, but perhaps we couldn’t stand having them broken open, and we never really got the lesson; in our haste we lashed out at a problem, but quite clearly not the underlying problems. Worse, we have run the very real risk of exacerbating the conditions and perceptions that have made the U.S. unpopular in parts of the world. That is once again . . . a heartbreaking reality. Parker’s argument is both spiritual and practical. From a spiritual standpoint, as leaders we have to stand in there – as Lincoln did – and hold the pain – the pain like cancer or a fatal accident or a fire – that makes no sense. And then we have to do the disciplined work that my friend M.A. Hastings would describe in this way: “don’t leave the loss without the learning.” Figure out what’s really causing the pain and what you can constructively do to avoid a recurrence.

After Parker’s talk I had the extraordinary opportunity to pair up with the person who happened to be seated next to me and reflect on how he and I were managing some of the discomfort of America’s pain and the pain in our own lives of leadership. I went first. Bill thanked me for my candor about my struggles to lead when I feel like I am — like my country is — falling short of the ideals I and we hold. When it was his turn he shared that Palmer’s talk was challenging, “because,” he said, “my wife died on the 93rd floor of the World Trade Center.” Bill travels with the families of other victims. They have gone to Spain and England to console those victimized by terror. And in their work they seek a deeper understanding of the madness going on in our world, and they work to build bridges to end the ignorance, misunderstanding and painful violence. Now, that’s what I call

Leading with your best self!

Dan

* Parker Palmer’s brilliant essay is contained in a book out called Deepening the American Dream: Reflections on the Inner Life and Spirit of Democracy.

By: Parker J Palmer

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Jun

18

A Simple Father’s Day Tribute

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Friends,

I end every installment of Reading for Leading with the line “lead with your best self.”  In my case no one had a clearer picture of “my best self,” nor conveyed it with such confidence as my dad did.  He was for me an extraordinary leader and a truly fantastic coach because he continually gave me the impression that he saw greatness and goodness in me.  He excelled at the first job of a great parent, coach, or leader:  seeing something greater in those they lead than the followers see in themselves.

Because I don’t really know how to communicate thanks to my dad – now ten years deceased – allow me to honor him with the question he inspired:  Do you see – and make clearly known — the greatness you see in those you lead?  Work to see it, work to convey it, and they will 

Lead with their best selves, 

Dan 

P.S.  Why not comment on today’s RFL, or share your own Fathers Day tribute to your dad, by commenting on my Reading for Leading blog?   

 

Jun

11

Managing the Risks of Candid Feedback

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Friends, 

Last week I wrote about the refreshing quality of Bill Ford’s candor.  (I have posted the full interview; to hear it click on this link:

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

.  It’s about a half hour long, so it may take a bit to download).  Readers blogged on this RFL, each shining a light on a different aspect of candor.  As one reader put it, “If Mr. Ford had difficulties in changing the culture, where is the hope for others?”  She wrote that candor creates peace of mind, but those who express it “compromise their career growth because the existing culture does not accept them.”  This theme of the risk of candor was repeated by others.  It begs further comment.  

First, it is risky.  One of our teenage daughters was talking about how hard it is to confront their friends or to tell us things that might get them or others in trouble.  She wanted me to “get” that, to appreciate that telling the truth is fraught with some danger.  I did appreciate that.  But I also told her: Telling hard truths will never be easy.  It’s not easy to tell your husband something that will make him uncomfortable and make you unappreciated.  It’s not easy to tell someone you think they have a drinking problem.  Not easy to discipline a worker you really like, or challenge a boss whose close-mindedness is getting in their way.  But real relationships and strength of character are built not on deception but on the gift of truth telling.  And these dynamics of relationship and character get multiplied in organizational cultures. 

You may lose a friend.  May lose favor in the company.  Or lose a job.  At some point there may be that kind of either/or, go-for-broke moment. 

Yet being candid is not always played at this brink.  If you’re feeling compelled to confront someone with a tough truth, there are steps short of suicidal bomb-throwing.  Begin by gathering data.  Are others seeing things the same way you are?  Gather data not to prove yourself correct, but to genuinely learn what’s out there; you can’t afford to be overly partial when the risks are high.  Second, consider with great seriousness the times in the past when you have seen the intended recipient of your candor receive feedback: When have they accepted feedback? Who delivered it?  How did they do it?  What’s the listener’s likely initial reaction based on past situations?  Does someone standing their ground help in their eyes, or do they need to be approached gently and given to think about it?  This approach also forces you to do one of the hardest things of all: Figure out why they should care about it.  To be successful you have to put it in terms of their values, e.g., for you it’s about their not hurting people’s feelings, but to them it may be about not hurting the bottom line; so you have to show how rough treatment generates lousy results.  

Finally, consider employing the power of a good question.  Taking a firm position, stating an opinion without equivocation, may be necessary at some times, but not always.  Asking: “Have you considered the possibility that . . .” is a whole lot less likely to create dangerous defensiveness than, “You don’t seem to realize…”   Try inquiring before declaring.  Seek to understand what it is they actually know, rather than being committed to have them see the world through your eyes!  

These are some key steps before speaking truth to power, to 

Lead with your best self. 

Dan 

Jun

4

Candor: Powerful yet in need of protection

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Friends, 

Candor may be one of the most powerful tools in the leadership arsenal.  How remarkable when a teenage child straight up tells you the unsolicited truth. Trust is born.  How awesome when a boss articulates his or her previously nonverbal ambivalence, and tells you in clear terms what it is they like about something you’re doing and what it is they don’t.  And how much more effective do you feel when someone who works with you actually points out something you’ve been doing that has been getting in the way of your effectiveness so that now you can be more intentional and more powerful?  There is always some risk with truth telling, because the truth is not always pleasant, and we do shoot messengers.  But there’s a big upside. 

“Big” leaders are often times seduced not to tell the truth or to be candid.  They want to look competent, and they also know that the people who depend upon them often don’t want to hear that their leader is not competent or has some serious limitation.  That’s why I was so blown away when Bill Ford Jr., chairman of the Ford Motor Company, was so very straightforward when I interviewed him on my radio program last week.  To be honest I wasn’t sure he would take the interview.  One of the questions I intended to ask would have sent a lesser man running in a different direction.  I wanted to and I did ask him: What was it like for you to step down willingly and to seek someone else to run the company?  He replied: The company needed a turnaround, and I had no experience in turnarounds, so I went out and found somebody to do it.  Real candor is like that: simple, matter-of-fact, and without a lot of varnish or bells or whistles. 

I also asked Mr. Ford about the irony that he had been ahead of his time in calling for green technology in the automobile industry, yet his company, at least so far has not been able to grab the lead and capitalize on his incredibly strong passion and leadership.  I wondered why he thought that was so.  Here’s my paraphrase or characterization: the culture ate Mr. Ford’s strategy for lunch.  He was straightforward on this topic, saying that his talk about fuel efficiency and alternative fuels had people in the industry treating him “like a Bolshevik.”  He said he just wasn’t able to overcome the bureaucratic entrenchment and the resistance to new ideas within his own culture.  He brought in an outsider, Alan Mullaly, who’s now hard at work on reforming that culture.   An existing culture — whether in a family, church, business or society — has a way of humbling those who seek to change it. 

One of the lessons I draw from this — which I discuss in the chapter of my book dedicated to inclusion — is that it is vital to protect those voices that challenge the culture and system.  When someone as huge as Bill Ford, chairman and CEO, finds himself checked by the system, how much more is that the case for regular folks who are working to bring a new viewpoint or necessary change?  How open are you to new ideas?  And do you look for ways to be an ally to those who are bringing change or at least carry fresh but challenging ideas? 

Express and appreciate candor, and generate openness to new ideas, in order to: 

Lead with your best self, 

Dan   

 

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