Author: ACEC

I use science—neuroscience, behavior change & lean communications—to help leaders thrive in our VUCA world. www.connectconsultinggroup.com

Change comes by choice. Or by force. 

Take this year, which has taken us by force. More than likely, you’ve experienced disruptions in your life related to the extreme uncertainty swirling around us from the pandemic.

While we humans may prefer predictability over uncertainty, we’re equipped both to navigate uncertainty and make changes by choice, thanks to our brain’s executive function. Plus, we naturally band together with other humans to collaborate to survive and thrive. As a result, we can counter the many surprising curves that uncertainty sends our way. 

Our superpower is our ability to communicate with each other. We humans share our thoughts, concerns, wants and needs with each other and then discuss, question and decide what to do.  

Yet herein lies a big problem — or opportunity, for us humans who prefer the positive. Even with this extreme uncertainty, many of us get stuck using old, sloppy communication habits.

We still believe that others receive our messages as we intended them. As the famous playwright George Bernard Shaw observed more than 70 years ago, “The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.”

Most of us pay so little attention to the fundamentals and nuances of how we send and receive messages that our communication is more likely to turn into miscommunication than clear, actionable messages. And worse, we tend to shirk any responsibility for the consequences of the poor communication.

How many times during 2020 have you asked or heard someone say one of the following?: “Did you get ___?” “Are you sure you sent that to me?” “It’s not clear what am I supposed to do.”  

How do we break these patterns so we reduce the ambiguity, friction and errors we experience and improve how we use our communication superpowers?

Let’s commit to these five principles:   

1. Recognize that communication is both a process and a goal. The goal is to reach a common understanding through a process of conveying and exchanging meanings. (Note that the words “common” and “communication” share the same root source.) If we don’t reach the goal, the meanings will be different, which produces the illusion, not the reality of communication taking place. 

2. Make a deliberate and disciplined effort to reach our goals. We tend to take our communication ability for granted and fall short of achieving shared meaning and understanding.

For example, when sending messages, we make too many assumptions, favor taking lazy shortcuts, and use the go-to communication channels we like best. For example, if we prefer email, we tend to send emails to everyone, even to those individuals who respond better to phone calls, texts, instant messaging or whatever. Oh, and do you sometimes use acronyms, assuming everyone knows their meaning?

When receiving messages, we may not give them our full attention because we’re multitasking. Or even if we think we’re focused, we may be preoccupied with something else and therefore may not listen or read carefully or ask clarifying questions. Or, we may not have a foolproof system for tracking all the messages we receive and therefore let deadlines fall through the cracks.

3. Show more respect when sending and receiving messages. Let’s rename the roles to emphasize the importance of each. If the “supplier” sends the message and the “customer” receives it, we may act more responsibly. For example, do you ever call your customer and hang up on them? Or when a supplier is providing a solution to your problem, do you stick your fingers in your ears? By adopting a customer-supplier metaphor, we might pay more careful attention to our communication and work smarter to reach a common understanding.

4. Take time to map your process before you communicate. For instance, when you’re acting as the “supplier,” sketch out what you want your “customer” to do after receiving your communication. Think cause and effect.

As a result, you’ll improve your ability to “see” what steps are needed to enlist others to help you get something done. This may be to provide an instruction, make a request, relay details or interpret information coming from someone else. (And don’t forget to include check-in steps to make sure everything is on track.)  

Take into account how well you know the individuals (that is, your customers), what else they’re doing, where they are and how familiar they’ll be with what you’re asking them to do.

Also, consider how all the different communication channels, such as email, text, online conferencing, phone calls, drawings, specifications, contracts and signs, affect your process. These channels help you make connections and convey information, but they cannot ensure shared understanding.

By conceptualizing communication as a dynamic process rather than considering it a casual act, you’ll be better equipped to deal with all the uncertainty in the environment.

5. Acknowledge that communication is a human process prone to messiness and joint responsibility. Even with these actions, communication is never going to be foolproof. We interpret messages based on our brains’ work, our backgrounds and our life experiences, which may not match the intended meaning. Everyone needs to consider communication as a joint responsibility, which reduces the chances of uncertainty derailing outcomes. Hopefully, you’ll notice your role in the process and stop blaming miscommunication on technology or other human beings.

Communication is a type of dance, with back-and-forth dialogue that helps create a common understanding, and then commits to act. Done well, it can take us places we could never get to on our own.

And by communicating more intentionally and deliberately, we can better cope with the adverse effects of uncertainty, as well as innovate better together. 

Liz Guthridge

Optimistic observers of executive coaching predict that in the next decade, after 70-plus years of unregulated disorganization, one set of competency standards could be established in training, credentialing and skill development for all practitioners. This would delight consumers who have only known a fragmented, buyer-beware market. 

Imagine — finally — a set of global executive coaching requirements being agreed to. Could the major groups of practitioners who compete (e.g., business professionals, psychologists, credentialed coaches) shift gears and collaborate to set new, comprehensive qualifications? The potential benefits are tremendous. Let’s briefly consider why these three practitioner groups might collaborate.

Business Professionals

Executives and consultants continue to be the largest group to move into executive coaching. Not surprisingly, the top reason often cited in choosing executive coaches is business/consulting training and experience. This training (e.g., via MBA programs) and experience gives coaches credibility based on expertise in areas such as leadership, governance, strategy, finance, process improvement, technology and mergers and acquisitions.

While competing with business professionals in executive coaching, psychologists readily acknowledge the value of business training. Dr. William Berman, a respected consulting psychologist and executive coach, emphasizes the critical role of this knowledge in working with C-suite executives and business founders. Another leading consulting psychologist and executive coach and developer of the trusted leadership advisor concept, Dr. Karol Wasylyshyn, strongly advocates for the value of business depth. Furthermore, psychology’s principal professional organization, the American Psychological Association, recommends that psychologists entering executive coaching have both business and psychological training and experience.

Psychologists 

Psychologists are a second significant source of executive coaches and, arguably, the most influential profession in developing coaching over its lifespan. Psychologist participation dates to the early years of coaching, and psychologists have been leading researchers, practitioners and educators in coaching. Psychologists have served as leaders of the International Coach Federation and have founded ICF-accredited training programs. The American Psychological Association offers postgraduate training in executive coaching. 

Many coaches credit psychological knowledge as predating and setting the foundation for coaching competencies (e.g., establishing confidentiality, being fully present, active listening and multi-dimensional awareness). 

Credentialed coaches (e.g., graduates of ICF-accredited programs) recognize psychology’s importance, as do business professionals. Research from a leading business organization, the American Management Association, makes multiple references to the historical and current value of psychology in coaching. 

Credentialed Coaches

Credentialed coaches are a fragmented community and a third source of executive coaches. One estimate is that more than 70 organizations (e.g., associations, consortiums, training programs) serve credentialed coaches so it is unlikely that this community could agree on a single set of professional standards. 

However, an encouraging example of collaboration is an entity formed in 2013, the Global Coaching and Mentoring Alliance. GCMA members include three of the largest organizations supporting credentialed coaches: the International Coach Federation, the European Mentoring and Coaching Council and the Association for Coaching.

Most competencies from the ICF, EMCC and AC are general and non-specific, applicable to any kind of coaching (life, career, etc.). Examples are active listening, powerful questioning, understanding self, enabling insight and learning and communicating effectively. As mentioned earlier, these competencies are rooted in psychology.

By my calculations, less than 10% of competencies from these three organizations call for business knowledge and the skills associated with executive coaching, however.So, overall, GCMA competencies have limited value in setting executive coaching standards and would best be combined with competencies set by business professionals. 

The potential for collaboration among business professionals, psychologists, and credentialed coaches is reasonable if not promising. If these three executive coaching groups could coordinate and integrate their competencies into a single, comprehensive set, executive coaching’s professional standing could improve markedly. 

John Reed PhD, MBA, MCEC, PCC

John Reed has multiple master coaching certifications, a Dartmouth MBA, and University of Georgia Ph.D. in organizational psychology. 

The ripple of empathetic leadership that spread across organizations last year needs to become a tidal wave in 2021.

Our mantra for the New Year—whether we lead a team of 5, 5,000 or 50,000—should be the relentless pursuit of providing opportunity, mentoring and sponsoring others. Opportunity is the gateway for each of us to discover our potential.

We all know what the opposite feels like. When I was in fifth grade, my dad somehow managed to get me a second-hand snare drum, cymbals, drumsticks, and those cool wire drum brushes. Soon, I was playing along with the radio—R&B, rock, anything with a beat. A few weeks later, the school band held tryouts, and I couldn’t wait to show what I could do.

The band director, though, had a different strategy. He just had everyone march around the gym. So there I was, an 11-year-old, stomping to some scratchy marching band record played over crackling loudspeakers—me and about a hundred other kids. After the tryout, I heard them call name after name—but not mine.

Over the years I’ve reflected on that experience as an example of what not to do. Leadership is all about inspiring others to believe and enabling that belief to become reality. However, this requires a shift in mindset because, unfortunately, it’s simply not human nature for most people to focus first on developing others. Yet, indeed, that’s exactly what we need to do.

Ken Blanchard, the leadership guru with whom I’ve had great discussions, often tells a story about his early days as a college professor. His approach was radical. On the first day of class, he gave his students the answers to the final exam. Ken often found himself in trouble with other faculty members, but he defended his decision by explaining his main job was to teach students the content they needed to learn—not to evaluate them along some distribution curve. It’s a concept Ken calls “Helping People Get an A.”

Now contrast that with my daughter Emily’s experience in a class she took last semester. On the first day, the professor proudly announced, “Nobody gets an A in my class.” Having high standards is one thing, but to say that no one can excel is completely demotivating!

We need a radically human approach to leadership and a set of leadership resolutions for 2021. Let’s commit to them heart, mind, and soul. Here are some thoughts:

• It starts with you. Awareness awakens. Before we do anything else, we resolve to take a look in the mirror at our values, motivations, strengths, and blind spots. By knowing ourselves we can manage ourselves first, so we can positively impact others.
• But it’s not about you. We’re not sculptors working alone in a studio, chipping marble or molding clay. We aren’t solo performers. We work with and through others. Quite simply, our success is measured in what others achieve.
• Purpose. At some point, we need to stop trying to make sense of 2020. Instead, we need to create a sense of purpose for 2021—an overarching “why” that will take us out of the wilderness and into a new light—and a new beginning. Purpose always precedes the first step.
• Empathy. Given all that people have gone through, empathy rules the day. It’s all about meeting others where they are, to understand their experience. We used to say, “How are you?”; now it’s “how are you feeling?” But that’s not all. The more empathetic we are, the more we broaden our view. We see beyond our own perspective—through the lens of others.
• Empower. 2020 tripped the circuit breakers; 2021 is the big reset. Change must bubble up from within the organization, not merely cascade down—because the next two years we’ll see more change than we’ve seen in the last 10. To paint tomorrow, people throughout the organization must be empowered to think. I’ll never forget the advice I received from a board member many years ago, when I was a new CEO: “As the leader, don’t tell people what to do—instead, tell them what to think about.”
• Collective genius. It’s been said that the strength of a team is each individual member—and the strength of each individual member is the team. When teams are inclusive, and differences are not just tolerated but celebrated, they become more creative and innovative—and collective genius is born. Let’s create an ethos of inclusiveness in the New Year.
• Shepherd. I’ve met a number of military leaders who led during periods of conflict, and many confided in me, “I’ve never lost a soldier”—revealing a deep mindset of humility and accountability. While most of us won’t face such life-or-death scenarios, we also need to make sure we don’t lose anyone. Think shepherd: occasionally in front, sometimes beside, but mostly behind.
• Own the moment. When most people think about accountability, they immediately think about how accountable others are to them. But first, we need to examine how accountable we are to ourselves—for who we are and how we act. If we want to know how we’re doing, we only need to count the number of times we say, “I’m sorry”—in all its forms, including “That’s on me,” “That was the wrong call,” and “You were right.” That’s how we truly own the moment.
• Be the message. Throughout 2020, we just tried to help people get through—one day to the next—by seeing the blue sky through a tiny opening in the clouds. Now it’s time for the clouds to part—and for people to believe they can punch right through the sky. That comes from inspiration—and it’s best done with stories. As Peter Guber, the Academy Award–winning producer and co-owner of four professional sports teams, once told me, “Leadership is storytelling in a way that becomes memorable and actionable.” And the leader IS the message.

In this New Year, may we stay resolute—to our resolutions. As radically human leaders, we enable others to exceed their potential and, in doing so, we all will collectively rise.

Gary Burnison
Korn Ferry CEO

The COVID-19 pandemic has probably changed the way you work, whether you’ve gone back to the office or working from home. Fear and anxiety can be overwhelming, and workplace stress can lead to burnout. How you cope with these emotions and stress can affect your well-being and that of the people you care about, your workplace, and your community.

In the midst of a pandemic, looking after your mental health while working is critical. A point previously highlighted by Adena Johnston is how it’s important to recognize the signs of stress, anxiety, and fatigue. Only then can you learn how to cope and manage your emotions and stress.

Here are some effective ways to keep your mental health in check during the pandemic, especially if you’re working from home.

Maintain a regular schedule

Establish a routine and create a regular schedule every day. Choose a particular space in your home for your workday and make sure it’s kept free from distractions.

You should also include periodic breaks in your schedule, as these are your mental breaks that would help in restoring energy. Take a moment to just breathe. The breathing exercises listed by Pain Free Working can come in handy for when you’re feeling stressed out. Try doing the Lion’s Breath, where you breathe in and out repeatedly for equal counts before inhaling deeply through the nose, then exhaling with your mouth wide open and tongue sticking out while making the sound “haaaaaaah.” Though it can feel a bit silly, repeat this sequence several times to release tension and improve your mood.

Establish work boundaries

When you’re working from home, make sure that you set and stay within your working hours, and keep them consistent. You may feel you’re working well when putting in more hours at home, but it can actually be detrimental to your well-being because you tend to experience burnout more. So, it’s important to identify your limitations and know how much you can extend yourself by setting healthy boundaries.

Detach yourself from work

Try setting up your work desk in a different room than in the one you usually spend your leisure time in. It’s recommended to avoid working in your bedroom to prevent forming associations between rest and work-related issues. This will ensure detachment when you go to sleep.

Engage in psychological detachment also by consciously switching off from work commitments after working hours. And make sure there are no active work-related thoughts. It helps to set a schedule for your work notifications to turn off automatically once work time is over.

Stay connected and keep talking

Social distancing does not mean you also emotionally distance yourself from your loved ones. Engage in regular video calls and voice calls with friends, family, and colleagues. There are at least six free apps recommended by USA Today that help you stay connected in this difficult time of physical distancing.

Share your daily experiences with them in a variety of social platforms where you can all express yourselves. This will strengthen your connections and relationships based on constant communication.

Engage in positive distractions

Reinvigorate your interest in hobbies and extracurricular activities that can be positive distractions from work. Engage in activities like playing outdoor games, physical exercise, cooking, baking, mindful meditation, painting, or spending time with your family or pets — basically anything you enjoy doing outside of work. You can also choose from a long list of fun (and free!) online activities compiled by Insider, including ways to travel even in your pajamas and in the comfort and safety of your home.

In situations where you feel that you’re already struggling and the stress is hampering your daily functions, don’t hesitate to reach out to a trustworthy loved one or colleague, or consult an expert or mental health professional. By embracing good mental well-being practices, and relying on others when necessary, we can protect ourselves and those around us.

Article written by Alice Amber
Exclusively for acec.mgmcsolutions.com/