It's Tuesday at 2:00pm! (PST Time: I live and work from Southern California)
Greetings to you!
Each week I send out a short leadership blog that's called "Tuesday at 2:00pm". The purpose of this is simply to provide a brief thought on leadership that you can read and think about in just a few minutes. I send it out every week at 2:00pm (PST) and encourage you to make an appointment with yourself to pause and think about the thing I'm writing about.
Russ...
LEADERSHIP QUOTE:
"People will resist change when it's done to them, not with them." Ken Blanchard
What does this stir up? Either write me HERE or comment at the end of the blog post HERE.
A LITTLE BIT DEEPER:
This last look at organizational culture this month comes from Ken Blanchard. You can catch up on the past posts HERE.
I was doing some digging into Ken Blanchard and his thoughts on Servant Leadership for next months theme, and I found this quote from him and thought it would end our CULTURE theme this month.
This thought rings so true for any team and any organization who is addressing change, which is all of us.
Often as leaders we focus on communicating change to our people because we've all been told that we don't communicate enough, so we try to overcompensate with straight communication, and this isn't the only thing people want... They also want to be a part of the conversation.
I say "they" but I mean "we". We want to be heard, we want our opinion to matter and we don't mind change as long as it's not a complete surprise. Bring us into the conversation and let us be a part of it.
There are some simple steps you can take to help your team members embrace change, and it's really a Change Management Model which ultimately defines your culture.
1) BE UPFRONT ABOUT THE CHANGE
Don't surprise people. Talk about it, let them know you're thinking and working towards something.
2) LISTEN TO THEIR FEEDBACK
Give your team an opportunity to feed into the decision and into the change. You'll learn some things that will help you!
3) MAKE THE DECISION & COMMUNICATE IT
Don't drag it on, but when it's time to make the decision, communicate it clearly.
4) ADDRESS PEOPLES CONCERNS & PAIN POINTS
Help people to understand, answer their questions, help them adapt, and reward them for their efforts to dive into the change.
5) CONTINUALLY EVALUATE AND TWEAK THE DECISION
You won't get it all right the first time. Adjust it, respond to your team members, and invite further feedback.
Change comes to us all. How do you develop a culture in your organization that can react and adopt change in a healthy way?
DEEPER STILL:
On a personal level, I HATE TO BE SURPRISED BY CHANGE!
That's a pretty strong statement, but it's really true for me.
I am not afraid of change, I don't avoid change, and I welcome change, but what I don't like is to be SURPRISED by change.
You might agree with me on this.
Sometimes change HAS to come as a surprise to a team, but as a leader, I work hard to avoid that if at all possible! What I've learned is that many times the reason this happens is because the leader didn't want to do the work needed to navigate the change in a positive way.
I remember when I was introduced to my NEW BOSS in a job I had early in my career. I was surprised, I wasn't consulted, my opinion wasn't needed and I had no idea how to respond.
It really had nothing to do with the person that was being put over me as a boss. That worked out fine, but the process broke some things down in our CULTURE:
It broke down TRUST
It broke down COMMUNICATION
It broke down MOMENTUM
It broke down TEAM DYNAMICS
It broke down ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE
All of these things could have been held together, and actually grown had the change been handled differently by the leader.
Keep your team CULTURE in mind and find ways to BUILD IT and not BREAK IT DOWN!
Have you ever had to make a decision that became a surprise to those on your team? How did they respond to that? What did you learn along the way?
Things I'm Reading, Listening To and Watching This Week:
The Ken Blanchard Company: You'll see more from him as we look at Servant Leadership next month.
I'm really enjoying listening to Charley Crockett on Apple. Really good music!
We're enjoying following our friend Bryan Olesen and his journey on The Voice. He was in our home last year doing a live show for Harbor Ministries and now he's on a national stage. Follow along and vote for Bryan! Here's his first audition
I just re-read this book from Lencioni: The 3 Big Questions for a Frantic Family. Teaching it at our upcoming Leadership Summit!
Found these cool solar lights on Amazon for our back wall. Installed them this weekend and they look great!