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Put on your own oxygen mask first

Posted by Constance Ward on December 12, 2011 | Comments Off

My sister was traveling back from a holiday in Florida with her two-year-old granddaughter. Before the plane took off, a flight attendant came by to remind the adults in the group that in case of an emergency, they should put on their own oxygen masks first and then put on the baby’s mask.

The corollary to this advice applies to busy executives, too. Do you remember to put on your own oxygen mask first before trying to help others? How do you ensure you have enough “air” to survive hectic schedules on a daily basis and still have time to think?

During these times of crisis and instability, are you still able to get enough balance in your life? How do you fit in work, family, friends, chores, fitness, hobbies, newspapers, business books and leisure reading like novels and magazines…just to name a few activities.

In such a packed schedule, how can you shoehorn in “being a stronger thought leader”? Leading the industry forward as a thought leader takes time and dedication to the task. Are you having difficulty fitting in “thinking time” between all the meetings and daily demands of running a business?

What gets prioritized gets done, so are you blocking time in your schedule for thinking? Have you set aside time daily or weekly for deep, focused thought — a time when you can “come up for air” and think about the bigger picture? You need to make time for critical reflective activities. You need to make time to ask, assess, then act. We’re here to help.

Photo by Miikkahoo on Flickr

Debunking the bunker mentality myth

Posted by Constance Ward on December 4, 2011 | Comments Off

“My dad’s nuclear bunker is bigger than yours,” my stepdaughter from London wrote on her Facebook page after her last visit to Zurich. Swiss apartment blocks like ours…and even many homes…have fallout shelters in their basements. They are prepared. Well prepared. For a neutral country that hasn’t actually seen any fighting on its soil for, well, a very, very long time, they are, you might say, over prepared.

Are you prepared for “attacks” from your competitors? Are you well prepared? Is it even possible to be over prepared for doing battle in a competitive marketplace?

You and all of your employees need to be ready for the insurgence of competitors into your space in the market. Building your nuclear bunker in business terms means that all of you are equipped to protect your “turf” with the right strategies, tactics and tools.

On the other hand, having a bunker mentality can limit your ability to be a successful thought leader. Of course, being vocal about where you think your industry is headed will allow your competitors to gain insight into certain parts of your company’s strategy. But the overall benefit of being a thought leader outweighs the risk of over sharing.

Taking a defensive stance is certainly important so that you aren’t giving away the recipe for the “secret sauce.” However, you as a thought leader will instinctively know where to draw the line between revealing too much and just enough on a case-by-case basis.

So come out of your bunker — nobody is going to “nuke you” and you don’t need to fight an enemy that may not exist. How exactly should you do that? Ask, assess, then act. We’re here to help.

Sending the right and wrong signals

Posted by Constance Ward on November 28, 2011 | 1 Comment

An intriguing article published by the London Daily Telegraph on this year’s anniversary of Armistice Day told the story of a “fake London” that France built during World War I to trick German planes into bombing a city to the north rather than the City of Lights.

The French began to dummy up buildings, the Champs-Elysées, factories and railway stations but didn’t complete the construction before the war ended. Without a highly developed radar system, enemy planes might be fooled into attacking the wrong site and bombing the phony city.

Is your “enemy’s” radar trained on you? What signals are you giving out that might allow your competitors to understand your strategy, to follow your trail? Does that give them a competitive advantage in the marketplace because they’re able to read these signals and anticipate and predict your destination?

A strong thought leader is less concerned about leaving a trail for competitors than blazing the trail for the industry. Yes, a certain amount of transparency of your own company’s strategy is a result of leading the industry in a particular direction.

Obviously as a thought leader, you believe the market will follow you, so you must clearly identify the destination. Others in the industry will therefore assume you’re leading your own company in that direction.

But that doesn’t mean you need to “give away the recipe for the secret sauce.” Thought leaders are skillful at being strategically specific when it applies to the industry and tactically general when it applies to their company. It’s a balancing act.

Are you able to lead the way in the industry without giving out such unambiguous signals about your company’s strategy that your competitors can imitate –or block – your tactical approaches to delivering on that strategy? Act, assess, then act. We’re here to help.

Keep the embers burning!

Posted by Constance Ward on November 19, 2011 | Comments Off

A preacher was trying to get a parishioner to return to church after a long period of not attending services after the elderly gentleman’s wife died. He called on the man one evening and was invited in to sit by the fire. Rather than talk to the old man directly about his church attendance, the preacher just sat rocking in a chair by the fire. He reached over and took a poker and then pushed the remains of one small burning stick away from the rest of the fire, and they both just watched it as those embers turned from red to cold gray. The preacher left and the following Sunday, the man was sitting in the pew of the church.

So what lessons on internal communication does this vignette hold for thought leaders? The obvious answer is that actions speak louder than words – sometimes it takes courage not to talk, but that’s the right thing to do. Other, more subtle lessons can also apply.

If your company has suffered a loss, like most firms during the Great Recession, your “surviving” employees may be feeling isolated and alone and negative about the organization. It’s important to continue to communicate frequently with them by bringing them together for town halls or internal meetings so that they can air their concerns. Don’t take this metaphor too far and start sermonizing to them, of course!

But communicating with particular individuals can also help strengthen the weakest links in your organizational chain. Are there are few key influencers inside your organization who are needing some one-on-one time with you right now – time when you can help them by your actions, as much as by your words, to strengthen their bonds to the company? Are you making it easy for people to “stick” to your organization so that when the bad times have passed, they won’t flee at the first opportunity? What can you do now, in the “mourning period” to ensure your employees will be there for you when the good times start to roll? Ask, assess, then act. We’re here to help.

Getting unstuck, not undone

Posted by Constance Ward on November 12, 2011 | Comments Off

One of the Thought Leader Zone partners, Bob Tipton, published a great book titled JUMP! Get Unstuck. Along with its strong story line, the book captures many lessons on leadership. He encourages readers to blast through their fear and uncertainty and to JUMP! into action by recapturing their passion, renewing their purpose and delivering quantum leaps in their results. The photo from Singapore attached here illustrates my taking the book title perhaps a bit too literally…But the book did profoundly affect me and nudge me into an awareness of the dangers of what Tipton calls the “Status Quo Bias.” It helped me get unstuck – and inspired me to launch Thought Leader Zone. Is the Status Quo Bias holding you back as a thought leader right now? How can you recognize that bias, deal with it and overcome it? Ask, assess, then act. We’re here to help.

Two faces of a thought leader

Posted by Constance Ward on November 5, 2011 | Comments Off

The 9-year-old daughter of a close friend introduced me to a cool, free iPhone application called CamWow. One of the special effects can be seen in this photo of my husband David. I wanted to share this photo because I think it points out what it’s like to be a thought leader. So here goes with a metaphor as stretched as that photo.

A thought leader has to constantly look in two directions – the past and the future – from his/her “seat in the present.” Thought leaders also have to look at both the strategic and the operational aspects of their business simultaneously. Another challenge is that they have to be adept at looking internally and externally at the same time. They have to deal face-to-face in an open manner with their leadership teams, as well as their employees. And finally they have to find a balance in their lives so they need to keep an eye on their personal lives, not just their professional lives.

I’m sure there are even more stretched points to be made, but instead, I’ll pose this question: Are you able to mirror your efforts in these parts of your daily life or is one direction getting more attention than another? Ask, assess, then act. We’re here to help.

The hazards of overconfidence

Posted by Constance Ward on October 31, 2011 | Comments Off

The Hazards of Confidence from the New York Times Magazine In late October a thought-provoking article “Don’t Blink! The Hazards of Confidence” from the New York Times Magazine was making the rounds of desks and cubicles here in Zurich. In a nutshell, it warned against believing in overconfident experts or even in your own certainty. The author labeled it the “illusion of validity.”

Throughout the article, the author builds his case for doubting that the world is actually as regular and predictable as we often think it is. He cautions us to be aware of the risks of fast thinking, which is not prone to doubt. The key paragraph in the article, in my opinion, also applies to decision-making as leaders:

The confidence we experience as we make a judgment is not a reasoned evaluation of the probability that it is right. Confidence is a feeling, one determined mostly by the coherence of the story and by the ease with which it comes to mind, even when the evidence for the story is sparse and unreliable. The bias toward coherence favors overconfidence. An individual who expresses high confidence probably has a good story, which may or may not be true.

Are you as a thought leader overconfident in your evaluations? Do you have an “exaggerated expectation of consistency” of your results based on your past experiences? How can you best avoid these common errors of logic? Ask, assess, then act. Contact us – we’re here to help.

Lessons on leadership from a pig race

Posted by Constance Ward on October 18, 2011 | Comments Off

St. Gallen is a quaint medieval city in eastern Switzerland that’s famous for having one of the top business schools in Europe and for hosting the annual Olma agricultural fair. The highlight of this event is a pig race with six already well-fed contestants running around the arena to get to a feeding trough on the other side. About a dozen kids from the audience helped to move the pigs away from the trough and back to the starting block for the next heat. Predictably hilarious incidents resulted when the pigs refused to be guided back to their stalls. One young boy, much to the horror of his parents and the gasps of the audience, not only pushed and shoved the crowd-favorite Aurora to get her to obey – he kicked the pig. Suddenly, Aurora, and the rest of the pigs, too, turned and ran directly (well, mostly directly) back to their pens.

Now I’m not recommending leaders physically kick their teams into obedience, of course. But sometimes one or two “errant teammates” need to be visibly disciplined if what they’re doing could be damaging to the cohesiveness of the team. Others on the team will get the message that you’re serious about the behaviors you are expecting. Are you letting things slide on your team and allowing a few to undermine the standards you expect them to uphold? Is there a fair way to enforce and reinforce positive team behaviors so that others will be reminded to demonstrate them? Be a thoughtful leader. Ask, assess, then act! Contact us – we’re here to help.

Dobson at TedX Zurich: Should Colleagues Compete?

Posted by Constance Ward on October 15, 2011 | Comments Off

The Value of Co-opetition

During her presentation at TedX Zurich on 4 October, Eleanor Dobson, the experimental particle physicist from the CERN Atlas experiment– the Super Collider – in Geneva, made several other important points that apply to teams.

For example, she observed that the science of the future – like the business of the future – is one of collaboration. But teamwork is also enhanced by competition, she pointed out.

Her team faces stiff competition daily because they are co-located in the same building as their “shadow team,” which is working independently to verify their experimental results.

Like for any team in business, such competition can be healthy because it encourages people to try harder to get the right results faster. How can you harvest the energy that competitive spirit brings to an organization? Do you see your competitors as stakeholders in your own success? Ask yourself those questions and then take action to channel that competitive spirit productively. Ask, assess, then act. Contact us – we’re here to help.

Tagged teams, TedX Zurich

Building trust… in “small worlds,” and yours

Posted by Constance Ward on October 14, 2011 | Comments Off

Aerial view of CERN

Eleanor Dobson lives in “the world of small.” She is an experimental particle physicist from the CERN Atlas experiment– the Super Collider – in Geneva. Her presentation at TedX Zurich on 4 October was one of the best of the day; and she had an important lesson to teach us about teamwork and collaboration, which she says are key to the success of the project.

Because of the massive size of this experiment, 4000 scientists are involved in an assembly-line-like process. Holding up a single piece of paper with charts and calculations, she explained that this document represented the result of the efforts of all the team. When a miscalculation arose along the chain of thousands, no one single person was pointed out for blame; but everyone just pulled together to recover from the error.

Once established, deep-down team trust and collaboration – like that demonstrated by the CERN scientists – can’t easily be shaken. It’s hard to establish but well worth the time and effort to consciously build that spirit when teams are being formed. Existing teams may also need a “refresh” of that basic competency on occasion.

In your “world of small,” do your teams function with a sense of trust and collaboration? How will you ensure your future teams work well together? Think about those questions and if you don’t like the answers you give yourself, it may be time to take action to remedy that situation. Ask, assess, then act. Contact us – we’re here to help.

Tagged collaboration, TedX Zurich

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