Can people set their clock by what you say?

‘Think for a moment about all the colleagues in your immediate circle, whether they are your peers or people you manage. Which of them can be trusted to follow through when they say they are going to do something? And which ones make you think, “Hmm, that’s probably not going to happen. I’ll have to follow up”? This quote is from a strategy + business ‘How good is your say-to-do ratio?’ article by Adam Bryant. For 20 plus years when someone comes to me with an idea for a business venture, or I consider hiring someone to do work for me, in our first meeting I tell them that the following three behaviours are vital to us working together:
  1. Show up on time.
  2. Do what you say you’re going to do, when you say you’ll do it.
  3. Finish what you start. **
From experience, I expect 75% plus of people who say they’ll do those three behaviours – to not, do them. Here are other vignettes from the article . . .  “It comes down to trust,” Durand said. “If you look at the essence of trust, it’s a one-to-one ratio between say and do. If over some period of time, I observe a good ratio of someone doing what they say they will do, they will earn my trust.” He added: “There are some people who are

so reliable that I could set my clock by what they say.

And then magic happens, because I will give them full autonomy—‘I trust you, make the decision, and go.’” “That’s one reason I like to say that the three most beautiful words in the English language a manager can hear are “I’m on it.” Employees who say it—and mean it—share the important quality of owning the responsibility for following through. They get things done. And they are gold if you can get them on your team.” ** (To be clear I don’t always do the three behaviours. Over the last 10 years, I’m probably at around 90% completion).

Own the Conversation

Here’s my suggested action for you: Over the next seven days:
  1. Write down five commitments (or even three commitments) you’ve given to people.
  2. On the day seven, score yourself on your completion of those commitments.
  3. In the following seven days repeat step#1, aiming to improve your say-to-do ratio.

My three, top tips for more productive hybrid meetings

Hybrid meetings will be with us – forever.

Let’s clearly accept, that hybrid meetings will be difficult . . .

… and just get on with making them as productive as possible.

Recently, a client asked me for my top, three tips for conducting hybrid meetings. Numerous ideas and techniques came to mind.

Leaving aside how to make meetings better overall, as well as the criteria for when to schedule a meeting – I selected these three tips, -if I only could name three.

My three tips for productive hybrid meetings:

(please adapt the tips to your environment)

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Does your culture foster inquiry or punishment?

#1 How can we make it safe to question? #2 How might we make questioning rewarding? #3 How might we make questioning productive? #4 How can we make a culture of inquiry stick? In prior posts, I’ve shared many ideas from the landmark book The Book of Beautiful Questions. The above questions are from page 189 of the book, in a chapter titled Questions for stronger leadership. Below are expansions on the questions from the author, Warren Berger: For point ONE: ‘many employees – about two-thirds of them, according to one survey – feel “unable to ask a question a work”. They worry that the question will be unwelcome for various reasons, or even that is may be seen as insubordination. Have you ever even tacitly suggested you don’t welcome people asking questions? For point TWO: ‘one subtle way that

questioners in business are sometimes punished is by being “rewarded” with more work.’

For point THREE: ‘For people to be more productive in their questioning, it’s important to teach them that questioning can and should be aimed at achieving a desired outcome …not to debate philosophical questions endlessly, nor to wonder just for the sake of wondering.’ For point FOUR: ‘What if you ask employees to come up with one ambitious question a week, to be shared with their colleagues?

Own the Conversation

Implementation suggestion:
  1. Make a nine minute appointment with yourself in the next seven days, in a space away from your office.
  2. Choose one of the four questions to ask and answer.
  3. Make a definite time to share the question and answer it with a trusted colleague.

Are you just winging your presentations?

It continues to surprise me how many executives miscue when delivering large audience presentations. Recently, two of my clients shared separate vignettes of C level executives leaving a poor impression after their respective presentations. Executive number one was obviously unaware of, or didn’t care about, the importance of the crucial impression a leader leaves with the first presentation to his/her organisation (a major Sydney start-up hub). ** My client who had observed the presentation said something to the effect of: ‘There was no take-way message and no energy in his delivery . . . it left me uninspired and feeling that the person had wasted my time”.  Ouch. Executive number two held a high ranking role with a large multi-national IT company. My client who listened to this executive, found him uninspiring. He came across like he was winging it. ** Here is the research of Harvard University, Nalini Ambady who coined the term thin slicing.

Own the Conversation

Implementation suggestion: Choose an upcoming presentation and put extra effort into planning it. Note the result.

If you’re hesitant to ask for help – you’re an amateur

href=”https://www.amazon.com.au/War-Art-Steven-Pressfield-ebook/dp/B007A4SDCG” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener”>The War of Art, by Steven Pressfield.

‘A professional does not hesitate to ask for help

Tiger Woods** is a the greatest golfer in the world. Yet he has a teacher: he works with Butch Harmon. And Tiger doesn’t endure this instruction or suffer through it – he revels in it. It’s his keenest professional joy to get out there on the practice tee with Butch, to learn more about the game he loves.’

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Leadership lessons from psychopaths

Below is a clip of a TED talk by luminary psychologist Nashater deu Solheim titled What working with psychopaths taught me about leadership. FIRSTLY, let share my analysis of deu Solheim’s communication of herself and messages. Overall, the affect deu Solheim portrays, is one of calm assurance. The calm assurance is conveyed by:
  • A stance with feet positioned at hip-width, a quiet body, and by relaxed, non-distracting body movement, and ‘ownership’ of the stage.
  • A warm, accepting, enthusiastic facial expression.
  • An un-rushed, measured speaking cadence.
The presentation would be a worthwhile one for you to use for expert modelling practice.** The entire talk is worth listening to. If you’re pressed for time just watch the first 1:30 minutes of the clip. SECONDLY, the main messages from the talk that I took away are these: #1 Project authenticity with empathy (instead of with brutal authenticity ) by:
  • Know your role and stay within the bounds of that role.
  • Be prepared and do your research. Know what drives the person(s) you’re interacting with.
  • Remain curious even when you feel challenged.
#2 Authenticity comes in many shapes and forms. Here is the LINK for the clip.

** Expert modelling process

1. Choose a 50 second section of the du Solheim clip that resonates with you. 2. Watch the section and memorise it verbatim.  Film your practice delivery of the section: the words, and your imitation of du Solheim’s cadence, body language and voice delivery. 3. Repetitively deliver and playback/watch your performance (the words, voice cadence, body language) and compare it to du Solheim’s delivery. 4. Continue Step #3 until you can perform 50 seconds at a high level, while putting your individual mark on it. 5. In safe interactions, practice ‘channelling’ the body language, cadence and voice you’ve practiced (obviously with different words). Reflect on its impact.

Own the Conversation

My implementation suggestion is to do one of the following: #1 Do the Expert modelling process. #2 Reflect on one of the following points when preparing for a challenging interaction you’ll have in the next seven days. Keep the point in mind during the interaction:
  • Know your role and stay within the bounds of that role.
  • Be prepared and do your research. Know what drives the person(s) you’re interacting with.
  • Remain curious even when you feel challenged.

Every meeting is an opportunity for self-branding

Consider the following excerpt about the research of Hajo Adam and Adam Galinsky from pp 143 of Deviate by Beau Lotto:

‘This area of research is “enclothed cognition” and shows that not only do others project expectation onto us according to what we wear, but we ourselves project similar expectations that directly influence our perceptions and behaviour…

priming refers to one stimulus influencing behaviour and perception when confronted with a subsequent stimulus . . . 

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Performance contributes only 10% to career growth

I recently read a post from David Wee titled The Three Drivers that Deliver Career Success

The statement Performance contributes only 10% to your career growth made me stop and think.

In the post Wee explains this proposition and three drivers for career success as follows:

‘You need to PERFORM every day. But doing your job well will not necessarily get you promoted to big roles. Why? Only your manager knows you are good.

You need EXPOSURE with influential leaders. And if they have a positive IMAGE of you, they can help you get bigger roles.

In short, promotions are driven by three drivers – Performance, Image and Exposure.’

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