It’s all in the What

Susan called me last week in the midst of big frustration.  She had just left a meeting in which her designers slammed the breaks on a new product launch.

“I can’t believe this team.  They’re constantly putting on the breaks with new projects; especially ones that will make the biggest difference in this company.  I don’t know what to do because this is exactly how it goes here… people come up with terrific plans for new products and the culture squashes them.”

Susan jumped into a dissertation about how she was going to develop a strategy to get her team enrolled in the project, create a timeline that fit within the current culture and hope that her design team actually aligned with the plans.  Although she mentioned it, she didn’t even dare to guess what the production team would say.

Does any of this sound familiar?  You’ve been promoted up through the ranks of your organization, adhered to the operational and cultural parameters, produced results, and have deep technical knowledge of your business.  You are a brilliant leader.

Yet, just like Susan, you find yourself stymied by “how it usually goes”.

In Susan’s example above, the next step is to figure our how to make this new product launch happen.  She knows the product development process intimately, knows just how far she can push the process, and is very knowledgeable with the literal and perceived limitations of her team and the production team.

At least this is the familiar process she finds herself in.  It’s just that the possibility this new product presents to the organization will insist the organization do things very differently.

So now what?

Susan’s fallen into the ageless trap of trying to figure out the “how we’ll get this done” part of moving projects forward.  This is where most of us live most of the time.  How will we get this done?  How will I have that conversation?  What exactly do I need to say or do to make the situation turn out another way?  All based in “how“.

Now, this isn’t all bad.  Understanding “how” to coach supports me in my business.  Knowing “how” to measure assists a carpenter in producing a fine product.

But as a leader in your organization, are you paid to “do” the work (the “how” stuff)?  Or are you paid to motivate, inspire and create?

Let’s go back to Susan.  After having a brief conversation with her, she approached her production counterpart with the following statement:

“I need your production team to assemble a machine in six months rather than the 13 it usually takes for our new packaging product.”

Within a day, she had a promise from her production counterpart that he’d be able to do eight months rather than 13.  Susan completely surprised and ecstatic.  Never had the production team made a promise like that.

Here’s the key shift:  Susan simply made a declaration combined with a request.  She did not get hung up (as she typically did) with figuring out “how” the production team would make it work.  She trusted her production counterpart and left the “how” to him.

In other words, her only focus was on the “what“.

Leadership Practices:

1. Grab a note pad, pen and clean out the ears… listen for and keep track of all the times you ask the following question (or versions of it) – “How will I do that?”
2. Make a list of all the “what’s” you want to have or to happen in your business.
3. Practice declaring these “what’s” into existence without worrying about the “how”.  I.e. “I will increase sales by 35% this quarter”, “We will hire a new technical manager by July 1, 2009″, or “I will put $750 per month into savings.”

Identify and invite at least one person who could support you in each “what” declaration.  I.e. invite your sales manager to come up with 5 ideas on “how” you’ll increase sales by 35%.

Leadership is not “doer-ship” or “how to-ship”.  It’s about leading, inspiring, making bold promises and speaking and listening from greatness and possibility.

What difference will it make in your business and life if you began giving up figuring out “how” and just made requests around the “what“?

Happy What You Want,

-Coach Preston

That’s One Way to See It

• You walk into a retail store on a Monday morning in February and the store clerk says, “Pretty cold out there, eh?”
• A work colleague sends you an email sharing words about the promotion of another colleague.
• You create a plan for sales growth that exceeds all past sales projections and results by 75%.

What does each one of these three scenarios have in common?

If you guessed that each has something to do with you, then you win!  But that’s not where I’m looking.

The common thread of each of these scenarios is that none of them have an opinion or interpretation attached to it.  In all instances, there is nothing but facts.

So what’s the point?  I’m curious about what opinions and interpretations you’re experiencing right now in reading this.  Are you frustrated?  Are you hoping that I actually make a good point?  Are you sensing you’ll be really bored with my musings?

Exactly.

You see, we all exist in a world of interpretations.  Whether we walk into a retail store, get an email from a colleague or make plans for the future, we rarely experience any of those activities without assigning meaning to them.  What’s it mean that the store clerk said what he did?  What’s my work colleague really trying to say?  How am I going to achieve these new sales goals in the current economy?

No matter how long you or I replay these examples, we’ll end up assigning some type of meaning to them.  Why do we do this?  Because as emotional creatures, we strive to have everything mean something or align with a value system to keep order in our lives. 

Ask yourself the following question, “What’s the meaning of life?”  If you’re like 99% of folks, you’ll come up with an answer to that question, no matter what it is.  Whatever your answer, you’ve assigned the answer meaning.  Meaning that fits into your version of how things should or shouldn’t go or be.

Just to be sure, there’s nothing wrong with this process.  We live successful and fruitful lives by leveraging this process.

However, consider that although it serves us many times, when it doesn’t serve us, it does some real damage.  Here’s an example:

An insurance agent had to let a salesperson go last week.  The agency has clear expectations of performance and the salesperson wasn’t meeting the expectations.  However, when the agency owner called the salesperson into her office, the salesperson put up a huge fight.  “You’re firing me because you don’t like me.  I’ve seen you with the other folks all nice and such.”  Whether that was the case or not, the salesperson disrupted the entire office for most of the afternoon because he made his lack of performance MEAN that the agency owner didn’t like him.

The salesperson felt “snubbed”.  Or at least that’s the interpretation he created.

So what action do you think this salesperson is taking now?  Is he seeking another opportunity or trying to “right” the perceived “wrong” by complaining and threatening to sue his former employer?

If you guessed the second, you win again!

More often or not, your actions are a direct reflection of your interpretations or the meaning you assign things; empowering or disempowering.  The trick is not to stop creating interpretations, but to become more aware that you’re doing what we all have been programmed to do – create interpretations.

Since we create disempowering interpretations, it means we can create empowering ones as well.  So when you go to take your next action on a project, sales goal or in a relationship, first check to see what your interpretations are of the current state of affairs.  That check-in may prove very empowering.

Leadership Practices:

1. There’s nothing to “fix” about creating interpretations.  That would be like trying to fix how your brainwaves operate – good luck.  Rather, practice being more aware of where, when and how you act based on interpretations.  The more aware you can become, the more you’ll be at choice rather than being a prisoner of undistinguished behavior.
2. When you do get hooked (upset) by an interpretation, look to where this interpretation likely originated… in your past somewhere.  In our example above, our salesperson was getting hooked by a past experience of being told he wasn’t good enough.  Being let go from the insurance agency had nothing to do with that past experience, but his interpretations made the connection.
3. When things don’t go the way you want them to, take a moment to ask “What actually did happen?”  In other words, distinguish the facts from the interpretation.  Many times, this is all that’s required to create a new set of actions that move you in the right direction.

Happy Meaning-Making,

-Coach Preston

Problems are so 1990…

My client, Dan (not his real name), has been seeking a way out of financial stress for the past three years.  Week after week, conversation after conversation, he’s still in the same place he’s always been.  Dan has managed to rack up more than $300,000 in debt without any plan to pay it off.

“Man, do I need to get my money in order.  I can’t keep living like this… barely able to keep creditors at bay and never knowing whether I’ll be able to make the mortgage this month or next.  I can’t stand this and I just want it to stop… to go away.”

Although this example likely isn’t familiar for you, many folks find themselves in similar situations today.  What seemed like a small issue in the past has transformed into an enormous problem.  Perhaps it’s around money, relationships, careers or businesses.  Regardless of the content, the issue is still the same – stuff happens and we assign meaning to it.

Now meaning-making is okay.  It’s as natural for us humans as having pizza and a beer on Friday night.  And just as too much pizza and beer might cause some issues, so does the meaning-making.  A frequent outcome of this process = problems.

So what does this have to do with breakthroughs?  Here you go…

Consider that my client Dan is relating to his financial situation as a problem.  “Well, of course” you might say.  But I invite you to get some altitude on problems for a moment.

A problem is created when we focus on an external circumstance; for example, not enough money.  We focus on the external circumstance defined by the value of the numbers printed on our bank statement.  We then look to external factors or resources to fix the problem.  Sometimes that works.  And many more times, it doesn’t.  The worst part is it just becomes about getting rid of the dog-gone problem.  “If that problem just went away, everything would be just fine!”

But what if a problem was just a disempowering relationship to a circumstance?  Or, what if a problem was just an expression of you saying “This shouldn’t be!”?

This is where we might create a new relationship to the stuff that happens to us.  A relationship called “breakdown” rather than “problem”.

A breakdown is the by-product of a commitment getting off course.  For example, if my client Dan has a commitment to pay off all his debt, and he runs into a temporary shortage of money, he’ll relate to the shortage of money not as a “problem” with all its usual drama, but as access to the next appropriate action.  He might take a look at how he can create more income, reduce weekly household expenses or call his creditors to create a repayment plan.

Whatever the action, Dan would be moving toward his ultimate commitment of being debt-free.  As crazy as it sounds, he just might invite breakdowns as part of the journey.

So now’s the time to look in your life and business.  Where are you drowning in the drama of problems?  You know the ones that keep you up at night and bury you during each day?

What if you were to take on problems not as unmovable burdens but as opportunities to create action and movement?  If you did, you’d now call them breakdowns.

Leadership Practices:

1. Make a list of all the “problems” you’ve got in an area of your life.
2. For each problem, ask “what commitment is this problem in the way of?”
3. Re-create your problem list as your commitment list using the answers to question #2.
4. Declare a “breakdown” in any of the commitments that aren’t moving forward.  I.e. – in client Dan’s case, he’d declare his lack of money a “breakdown” in his commitment to be debt-free.
5. Finally, come up with 2-3 actions you can take today to move closer to your commitment.

Problems are dramatic, ugly and rarely provide any relief.  On the other hand, breakdowns are powerful, beautiful and delicious… all in service of your ultimate commitment.

Happy Breakdowns,

-Coach Preston