In the Beginning…Ask Questions

A friend and colleague, Mike S, recently wrote to me, “I enjoy reading your thoughts on leadership and know you have dealt in the past with how a leader sets an example, acts and lives, but I was wondering if you have considered the topic I will call ‘how a leader starts’. This topic intrigues me because I am about to start something new and the timing is appropriate.”

I am starting a new role as well so this is a great moment to explore the subject of ‘In the Beginning’. In a series of posts I will outline some of my thoughts as I start this new role. The last blog was about “listen” this one is about “ask questions”.

Before you can listen, you sometimes have to ask questions. There are all sorts of techniques to asking questions:

• Open and closed ended questions
• Using a funnel
• Probing questions
• Leading the witness
• Rhetorical questions

While these are useful, they are merely the manner in which you try to elicit input from an individual or group. No matter what technique you use, your posture becomes the most important attribute when you “ask questions”

I want to be clear about the use of the term posture. I do not mean the position of your limbs or the carriage of your body as a whole. In this context I am talking about the definition whereby posture is a mental or spiritual attitude. Your internal attitude as you ask question, no matter what technique you use, will have profound impact on the way the organization operates.

It is human nature to be fault finders. In our natural state we run around, seek out imperfections and crush them. Think about almost every strategy or planning meeting you have been in. It usually has this question somewhere in it, “All right folks, let’s figure out what is broken and let’s go fix it!” I am at the front of the parade, completely guilty of this approach. Of course, this is sometimes necessary in every business or endeavor, so I am not advocating that we never look at what is going wrong and put plans in place to recover, fix, turn around or eliminate the brokenness of an organization.

That said, we have to be careful that we do not fall in a trap where all of our questioning comes from a posture of, “what’s wrong?” Why not? There is an important principal at work here; human systems grow in the direction of what they persistently ask questions about. If I continue to ask questions from a “what’s wrong” posture, the organization will focus its time, energy and ultimately its attitude around broken things. It will grow towards what is wrong. We need to invert this outcome, instead of negation, criticism, and spiraling diagnosis, we must send our organization in the direction of discovery, dream, and design.

How do we do this? How can we send our organization in the direction of what works? There is a fairly significant body of work around the field of Appreciative Inquiry. Appreciative Inquiry joins two powerful words.

Ap-pre’ci-ate, v. valuing; the act of recognizing the best in people or the world around us; affirming past and present strengths, successes, and potentials; to perceive those things that give life (health, vitality, excellence) to living systems

In-quire’, v., 1. the act of exploration and discovery. 2. To ask questions; to be open to seeing new potentials and possibilities.

How does appreciative inquiry manifest itself as you ‘ask questions’? Think of these two questions; “We are trying to grow this business, what is wrong? What is broken? Why can we not seem to grow the business?” Or; “We are trying to grow this business; can you tell me some examples of where growth has worked? How do we replicate those examples?”

You can picture the difference in my posture as I ask those two questions. You can almost sense the difference in the room during these two very different conversations. This mode of questioning repeated time and again at all levels throughout the organization can have a profound impact on the attitude, energy, initiative and success within a company. In fact, David L. Cooperrider and Diana Whitney assert in some of their writing on Appreciative Inquiry, “The single most prolific thing a group can do if its aims are to liberate the human spirit and consciously construct a better future is to make positive change the common and explicit property of all.”

In the beginning…ask questions. But check your posture. Beyond your questioning techniques, what is the core of what you are trying to find out? Are you trying to discover all that is broken or examples of where success is occurring?

Winston Churchill said, “A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.” We have to ‘ask questions’ in such a manner that we give our folks the chance to see the opportunity in the difficulty.

In the beginning…Listen

At the end of the series titled Joshua’s lessons on leadership, I asked for input on topics. A friend and colleague, Mike S, wrote me this in response, “I enjoy reading your thoughts on leadership and know you have dealt in the past with how a leader sets an example, acts and lives, but I was wondering if you have considered the topic I will call ‘how a leader starts’.  This topic intrigues me because I am about to start something new and the timing is appropriate.”

Mike S, your timing is impeccable. I am starting a new role as well so this is a great moment to explore the subject of ‘In the beginning’. In a series of posts I will outline some of my thoughts as I start this new role including what is effective and what is a dud. Mike thanks for the idea – this series may turn out different than you thought, but let’s go on a journey together. I hope others contribute; you all have plenty to share about your own individual ‘In the beginning’ experiences.

Napoleon said, “Take time to deliberate; but when the time for action arrives, stop thinking and go in.” When you start a new role folks around you expect immediate action. Chaos will reign. There is new terminology to learn, decisions are waiting for you, people will use your arrival to advance their agenda, meetings to go to, trips to take, people to meet and all sorts of pop-up crises. Breathe deep and know that ‘In the beginning’ is a rare moment when you are most in control of your calendar. Heed Napoleon’s advice and take time to deliberate. In amongst the cacophony you must answer four simple questions:

What needs to be done? How will it get done? Who will get it done? When will we know it is getting done? With these questions answered you will be far more effective at ‘go in’.

Your most potent tool to discover the answer to these questions is the art and skill of effective listening. If I do a Google search on ‘effective listening’ I get 1,940,000 responses. Cleary a popular subject, yet not one I can cover completely in a blog post. However, I would like to share a few lessons taught to me by my friend and mentor, Margreet van de Griend, senior partner at the consulting firm Axialent (www.axialent.com).

Margreet counsels us to think about interpersonal interactions in the context of a 2x2 matrix where the vertical axis is level of advocacy (low to high) and the horizontal axis is level of inquiry (low to high). This provides four different modes:

1. Low advocacy/low inquiry – observing
2. High advocacy/low inquiry – asserting
3. Low advocacy/high inquiry – listening
4. High advocacy/high inquiry – influencing

In order for us to take advantage of Margreet’s framework, we have to exercise effective advocacy and inquiry skills. Effective advocacy requires that we clarify our intentions, remain centered, express ourselves, support the expression of others and persist with our perspective through the objections of others.

Effective inquiry requires that we park our agenda, attend to the other person through body language, amplify their ideas through encouragement and clarifying questions and reflect the other person through effective summarizing and paraphrasing.

In addition to learning, practicing and implementing these skills we have to determine which mode to operate in given the situation. It should be a purposeful decision to be observing, vs. asserting vs. listening vs. influencing. Think back to the key questions we need to answer; what, who and how. Can we get these questions answered by merely observing? If we spend our time asserting our position, can we discover what we need to know? The answer to both questions is a resounding ‘no’. We need to be either in an influencing or a listening mode. Both call for a high level of inquiry.

Look back at the list of skills under inquiry. If we could pick only one to execute it would be ‘park your agenda’. Here is a challenge. Pay attention to the next five conversations you have. Notice how often during the conversation you are timing the other person; trying to determine when they are going to take a breath and formulating your point or counterpoint to whatever they are saying. If you are like me, the only way for someone to finish a thought sometimes is for them to never breathe. I find myself waiting to pounce on any moment of silence. When that is happening, I am not truly listening. Park your agenda; it is likely the most important action we can take to improve our ability to listen and influence.

In the beginning we are likely more objective than at any point in our tenure. We probably have more control over our time than we will ever have. Objectivity and time are critical ingredients for effective deliberation. There will be a moment to ‘go in’. Take a moment now to deliberate, discover, inquire and park your agenda.

In the beginning…Listen

Joshua's lessons on leadership - Inner Strength

In a series of posts, I want to discuss what we can learn about leadership from Joshua ben Nun, of the tribe of Ephraim, which would become known as the most militaristic of the tribes of Israel through Joshua's campaigns.  If this is the first post in the series you have read, please do a quick review of the March 30, 2009 blog titled  “Joshua's lessons on leadership - Intro”; that post highlights why I am looking into Joshua’s life.

In the last entry, I discussed the importance of “See the truth; but not for worse than it is”.  In this post, Joshua shows us “Inner Strength”.

The story of Joshua’s “Inner Strength” occurs at the end of his mentor’s life.  Joshua had been #2 to Moses for almost 40 years.  Together they had led the tribes on a nomadic journey that lasted an entire generation.  At the end of the journey, when they are just about to cross the Jordan River and change from being nomads into their permanent residence, Moses summoned Joshua and said to him in the presence of everyone else, "Be strong and courageous, for you must lead these people to their future home, the home we have discussed this entire journey and you must divide it among them as their inheritance”.

There is no great time to take over for a legend.  There is no perfect moment to step into a giant’s shoes.  However there are some moments more difficult than others.  Imagine Joshua, “What Moses?  Where are you going?  Just wait a few more miles, get the tribe to their new home and then I can take it from there.  And can you go ahead and divide the land before you leave?  You have a lot more credibility than me.  What if they do not listen to me?”

I had a similar (albeit substantially less dramatic and important) moment in my work life.  I was at a company and had just been asked to take over the leadership of a large organization.  My task was to take over from someone who had been at the company for a long time, was well liked, fire about 20% of the organization and then restore morale.

Gulp.

The day after we let a several hundred people go we had an all-hands meeting.  The meeting was in a large building with bleachers along one wall.  I came in the back of the building and had to walk down the bleachers to the floor and turn around and address the team.  As I walked down the bleachers, I could feel the fear, distrust, frustration, anticipation and worry emitting like raw electricity from the hundreds of people in the room.  Alone, walking down the stairs, all I could see was a solitary microphone like a lost child in the middle of the room.  I realized at that moment, the people in the room did not really care about me personally; they cared about themselves, their future and what was going to happen next.  They really just wanted and needed to know that whoever walked up to that microphone and opened their mouth had their hands on the wheel and was willing to drive.  I was alone.  Fortunately I had a mentor just moments before tell me, “Alex – be strong and courageous, you can do this”

Moses tells Joshua he believes in him, he tells him to be strong and courageous in front of the entire gathering of people.  We learn from the story that Joshua was filled with wisdom when Moses transferred power to him.  Then Moses climbed the 3,300 foot Mount Nebo on the northwest edge of the Dead Sea just across the Jordan River from Jericho, looked into the future home of the tribe, and died.

At that moment Joshua is by himself.  He is the picture of leadership and loneliness.  Joshua is isolated and the only thing he can rely upon is “Inner Strength”.  He looks to that which gives him inner strength.  For Joshua it was his creator and he heard, “Be strong and courageous, because you will lead these people, be strong and very courageous.  Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged”.  Three times he heard these words, the same words he heard from Moses and this provided him “Inner Strength”

In our journey there will be moments when we are alone.  The great philosopher Dr. Seuss tells us this in his seminal work, Oh The Places You’ll Go!

All Alone!  Whether you like it or not, alone will be something you'll be quite a lot.

And when you're alone, there's a very good chance you'll meet things that scare you right out of your pants.  There are some, down the road between hither and yon that can scare you so much you won't want to go on.

In those moments, you will need to determine what gives you “Inner Strength”.  For me in my lonely moment, it was having the one person I needed to believe in me, believe in me.  A person who knew well the words of Thomas Carlyle, “Tell a person they are brave and you help them become so”.  For Joshua it was the belief that his creator was supporting his next steps. 

What is it for you?   Whatever it is, you must find it and have it, because you will need it.  In those moments, if you do not have “Inner Strength” you will not be prepared to lead.  You will be defined by these crucible events where the only thing that gets you and the team to move forward is your “Inner Strength”

Joshua's lessons on leadership - Obedience

In a series of posts, I want to discuss what we can learn about leadership from Joshua ben Nun, of the tribe of Ephraim, which would become known as the most militaristic of the tribes of Israel through Joshua's campaigns.  If this is the first post in the series you have read, please do a quick review of the March 30, 2009 blog titled  “Joshua's lessons on leadership - Intro”; that post highlights why I am looking into Joshua’s life.

In the last entry, we dug into the backdrop for Joshua’s leadership lessons, in this entry, I want to look the very first time we hear about Joshua, when he “fought the Amalekites as Moses had ordered”.  When Joshua arrives on the scene, he teaches us an unforgettable lesson about obedience. 

The battle with the Amalekites occurred right after events that have provided idioms in almost every culture.  Have you ever heard, “like manna from heaven” or “get water from rocks”?  Well, the Israelites had just been led out of Egypt and through the parting of the Red Sea.  They were about six weeks out of Egypt and they were complaining to their leader Moses that they had nothing to eat – this is when strange bread like substance called manna started appearing every day.  Manna is cross cultural, it is also identified in three different places in the Qur'an, each mentioning the divine supply of manna as one of the miracles with which the Israelites were favored.  Then the Israelites started whining that they were thirsty and wished they had never left slavery and according to the story, Moses struck the rock at Horeb with a stick and caused water to flow from it.

It is against this backdrop that Joshua is ordered into battle.  The entire tribe is whining for food, which they are given, then whining for water, which they receive.  I can only imagine that going in to combat was not high on the list of things folks wanted to do - much whining was going on for sure.  All we know about this battle is that the Amalekites, aboriginal people of Canaan and the Sinai Peninsula that waged constant warfare against the Hebrews started it.   The Amalekites attack and in response Moses tells Joshua, “Grab some men and go attack the enemy, I will be hanging out on the hill watching you”

Joshua does it.  I am not sure I would be as obedient as Joshua.  I am not sure it was real easy to find folks in the tribe willing to go fight.  My response might have been, “What, I am going to battle and you are going up on a hill with a stick in your hand?”  But Joshua does it, and check out what happens next.  This is the narrative we have of the battle, “So Joshua fought the Amalekites as Moses had ordered, and Moses, Aaron and Hur went to the top of the hill.  As long as Moses held up his hands, the Israelites were winning, but whenever he lowered his hands, the Amalekites were winning. When Moses' hands grew tired, they took a stone and put it under him and he sat on it. Aaron and Hur held his hands up—one on one side, one on the other—so that his hands remained steady till sunset.  So Joshua overcame the Amalekite army with the sword.”

Wow, to me that is obedience to a leader.  Joshua is down on the field of battle sweating, bleeding, suffering and he looks up and watches the ebb and flow of the battle depend upon his leader's arms rising and falling.  “I am down here swinging a sword and you are up there waving your arms?”  He has to give it all he has got, obedient to the task and dependent upon his leader’s actions.  

When you read the work ‘obedient’ over and over again, does the hair on the back of your neck stand up?  Mine does, I am not sure I want to be ‘obedient’.  Why?

“The strongest is never strong enough always to be master, unless he transforms strength into right, and obedience into duty” - Jean-Jacques Rousseau, French writer whose novels inspired the leaders of the French Revolution.

What is Rousseau saying?  Turn obedience into duty?  Rousseau understood the very nature of humans that we take pride in duty and see it as strength of character.  Yet we scorn obedience allowing the mental image of a dog and master creep into our minds.  Obedience is the act of complying with authority.  Duty is something that one is expected or required to do by moral or legal obligation, the respectful and obedient conduct due a parent, superior, elder, etc.

Duty and Obedience are essentially the same thing; one noble and one mocked.  Why do we feel different about the two?  It is because with duty, we feel that we have had some choice in the matter and by choosing created a voluntary compact that is honorable.  Obedience on the other hand feels like it is laid over us like chains, we had no say in the matter and we are treated like slaves.

Alcibiades, Athenian commander in the 1st Peloponnesian War, said, “If force must be employed with a subordinate, take care that it be minimal.  If I command you, "Pick up that bowl," and set a sword-point at your back, you will obey but no part will own the action.  You will exculpate yourself, accounting, "He made me do it, I had no choice."  But if I only suggest and you comply, then you must own your own compliance and, owning it, stand by it.”

Obedience must be taught and learned.  But to teach it, you must first submit to it and experience it, the good type of obedience and the bad, so that you know the right way to install obedience in an organization.  Not with a sword to the back.

We see the making of a leader start with the obedience of Joshua.  Joshua showed us a key truth, how can you ask others to obey, unless you have first learned what it means to obey?

Passion Part V - Style

In this series of posts, I write about passion as a force multiplier in an organization and the creation of passion through individuals who know their role, are convinced their role matters and see the good of their work.  I argue that leaders must focus on five elements to create this level of passion; vision, culture, principles, style and sacrifice.  The previous posts discussed vision, culture and principles, this post is about style and it starts with a question for you - are you an inspector or a coach?

Dr. Rob McKenna is a good friend of mine and Rob has a passion for studying leadership under pressure.  This passion led him to work with the Boeing Company on a project where they followed the careers of 120 executives to explore factors and experiences that had the greatest impact on leadership development (you can read about Rob's work in an excellent article titled "The Differentiated Leader - Specific Strategies for Handling Today's Adverse Situations" - Organizational Dynamics, Vol. 33, No. 3, pp 292-306, 2004).

Through many conversations with Rob, I interpret his definition of pressure to include any or all of these factors; 

1. Driving change and dealing with the associated anxieties in an organization
2. Being on the edge of your performance or capability envelope in a public 
3. Having the possibility of a highly visible failure
4. Operating with other's outspoken disagreement of your decisions and/or direction
5. Assuming responsibility for the direction, success and well-being of other people

Close your eyes and imagine you have all of these factors working against you in a situation.  You are driving change, you do not know what you are doing, your position is visible, factions within the organization are disagreeing with you and many are dependent upon you for their livelihood.  Within the lovely confines of this imagined scenario, one of your folks pulls you aside and unloads a major mistake, issue, decision or option on you. This is not minor; this could significantly divert you and the rest of the team from your mission.

What is your reaction to this person? If you are like me, your antenna tingles; looking for every bit and piece of data about the situation and your brain starts formulating options.  You then proceed to lay out to your young Padawan in a high degree of detail exactly what must get done to accomplish the task.  If you are like me, you become intensely concerned with what they are doing.

It is in these moments that our style becomes evident.  The style we must have to create and sustain passion is coaching not inspection.  You usually get in a leadership role because you have a history of getting stuff done and you are highly motivated.  These two combinations cause collateral fear in others, fear that as soon as the goal is accomplished you will toss them aside.  You probably do not feel that way, but how do they know?  How do they know they are not just a means to an end for you?  Remember passion requires people to believe that their role really matters.  Their role matters when they matter.  You can show them that they matter by coaching, not inspecting.

I have come to realize that the only way to shift from inspection to coaching is to look at someone and genuinely be more concerned about who they are becoming vs. what they are doing.  There is a great story about a promising young executive at IBM in the 1960's.  He had just led IBM into a risky venture that lost $10 million for the company.  When Tom Watson Sr., the founder and CEO of IBM called the executive into his office, the executive arrived with his resignation letter already written.  Watson is reported to have said, "You cannot be serious, we have just spent $10 million dollars educating you!"  Tom Watson was clearly focused on who this executive was becoming.

We do need to get stuff done within our organizations, so this focus on who they are becoming vs. what they are doing cannot be an either/or activity.  We cannot solely focus on who they are becoming.  Instead, I would ask you to think of it as a numerical scale going from -10 to +10.  The -10 end-point is fully concerned with what they are doing and not concerned at all about who they are becoming.  The + 10 end-point is fully concerned with who they are becoming and not concerned at all about what they are doing.  For us to have an effective style of coaching vs. inspection we merely need to spend the majority of our time on the + side of the scale.  We need to have the self-awareness to drag ourselves just barely into the positive side when under duress and it will speak volumes to our team.  When people deeply believe you care about who they are becoming their work will have meaning and through that meaning their passion will increase.

In the late 60's and early 70's the UCLA men's basketball team won ten national championships, seven in consecutive years, back to back undefeated seasons, an 88 game winning streak and 38 straight NCAA tournament victories.  By the standards of this world, UCLA was clearly a winner.  John Wooden was their coach and when asked what was the highest compliment he could receive he said, "The finest thing a player could say about me after he left the team was that I cared every bit as much about him as an individual as I cared about him as an athlete.  It was important to me because I really did care about them.  I often told the player that, next to my own flesh and blood, they were the closest to me.  They were my extended family and I got wrapped up in them, their lives.  Their problems.  There was a great deal of love involved in my coaching.  That is what a team should be to a coach."

Do you care about who your people are becoming or what they are doing?