- Be a continuous learner – what got you into the CRO role won’t keep you there.
- Create a culture of innovation – willingness to try new things without the fear of failure.
- Demonstrate teamwork and camaraderie – people will watch and observe your behavior before they act.
- Focus on the people – this means getting to know your colleagues beyond their quotas.
- Be authentic – this equals consistency and predictability. Wild mood swings are often due to people transitioning from their “real” self to their created façade.
- Be vulnerable – show you’re human, it’s okay.
- Confront reality – denial wrecks your credibility. Quotas are huge, don’t act like they’re no big deal.
- Provide a path to success – it may be a difficult path but a path none the less. Remember, the leader’s job is to provide the vision…the possibilities.
- Be honest – shoot straight, share what you can, not only what you must.
- Always have an active ear – listen…actively. People want to know how much you care before caring about how much you know.
- Never surprise your boss – understand what’s important to the CEO and how/when to best communicate.
- Be deliberate in your actions – an environment of uncertainty is a byproduct of hedging bets. Your team will know if you’re not all in.
- Be kind – nothing in this job should justify taking someone’s dignity.
- Be gracious – say thank you. Give credit and recognize people consistently.
- Look for the good – every day find a good deed, or success from a colleague, and then share it.
- Know your numbers – where are you this month to quota, next month, and quarter standings.
- Know your business – what external factors may arise to get in the way of achieving your goals and those of your colleagues?
- Always be planning – “In preparing for battle I have always found plans are useless, but planning is indispensable.” ~ Dwight D. Eisenhower
- Stay fit – CROs tend to be the heartbeat of a company. Work hard to have and maintain a healthy heartbeat.
- Always, always, remember (and thank) those who helped you arrive – family, friends, former bosses, mentors. No one gets to where they’re going totally alone
Tag: self improvement
Growth Through Adversity
Our lives are filled with crucible moments. Situations that shape and mold who we become as people, workers, managers, and leaders. These moments, whether we face them in our personal lives, or professional life, shape the core of who we become. They inform, and direct our future beliefs, habits, and behaviors. They can strengthen or weaken, improve, or deteriorate.
Most of these moments are unplanned. They sneak up on us and force our hand. They force us to buckle, retreat, or forge ahead. These moments-in-time, although difficult to persevere, help strengthen our constitution…or weaken us. The choice really is our own. How we react to adversity is in fact a choice. Famous, U.S. Men’s Hockey Coach, Herb Brooks, said, “Great moments are born from great opportunities”. First let me say I have great admiration for Herb Brooks and his legacy. That said, if I may be so bold, I’d make a minor change to his quote and add that great moments are born from either a great opportunity, or adversity. After all, it’s friction that creates the most beautiful, and valuable diamonds in the world. The same can be said about our greatest leaders – past, present, and future. While not always pretty, the world’s great leaders have experienced their share of friction, adversity, and disappointment. From Washington to Reagan, from Henry Ford to Steve Jobs, from Sam Walton to Elon Musk, each of these leaders experienced their share of hardships and challenges…crucible moments that shaped their views, perspectives, ideas, and leadership styles.
Spend some time taking inventory of your crucible moments. I was first exposed to the concept of life journey lines when working for Lorrie Norrington who at the time was the EVP with Intuit in the early 2000’s. In fact, Journey Mapping is still very much a part of Intuit’s culture. Looking back, Lorrie is still one of the most influential leaders in my career. She taught me the importance of quantifying my capabilities and having the confidence to embrace them and act. Creating a life journey line is an effective way to identify one’s crucible moments, and more importantly understand how those moments shaped us and the new skills and capabilities we acquired because of those moments. Taking the time to think about these critical moments in life helps to provide clarity on your capabilities. Steve Jobs famously said, “You can’t connect the dots looking forward, you can only connect them looking backward.” That’s not to say, or suggest, we should live in the past, but rather to understand our ability to endure, preserve, learn, adjust, and succeed.
What are your crucible moments? How did they shape you? What changes did you endure? Positive or negative?
Every person we encounter on a day-to-day basis has gone through, or is currently going through, a crucible moment. Our ability to empathize is critical. How we assess these moments, and learn to adjust and adapt, based on this new knowledge and experience, is what enables our future success…and the success of the teams we lead.
The Leaders List of Critical Books to Read
Curiosity is a key competency for those looking to grow and lead. Curiosity about a business, its industry, people, customers, competitors, investors, are all necessary to excel in today’s high speed world of hyper-competition. There are many ways to satisfy your curiosity including doing, reading, researching, and interviewing.
Unfortunately for many, reading takes the very last seat in the back, with the most common excuse I hear for not reading – “who has the time?” To which my response is, “Apparently only the highest of high performers.” What exactly are you willing to invest in improving yourself and your skills? How much time? How much money? How much of your freedom? Why freedom? Because, when others are using their freedom to golf, ski, hit the bar, head to the gym, or sleep on that cross-country flight, you’re using your freedom to expand your knowledge base and perspective.
Whether you’ve been a leader for a year, or twenty, we all experience ups, downs, wins, losses, triumphs, and failures. One thing I’d say is that your top reads will almost always be driven by your immediate, or anticipated circumstances. My suggestion is to have a stable of those books identified and ready to go. In addition, practicing the habit of self-reflection will also super-charge your results when combined with building your arsenal of perspectives through reading.
If you’re wondering how much to read, I simply say, get started. Everyone’s pace is different. Some like turning pages, others like reading on a tablet, and still others prefer listening via audiobooks. No matter your preference, just start. Set a goal. Pick a book and set a goal to complete it within 2 weeks. Two weeks is a good timeframe to get through a book that’s between 250 – 300 pages once placed into your routine. Make no mistake, a routine it must be.
A few thoughts before revealing the list of critical reads for all leaders…first, all leaders need financial acumen. However, most of us, unless you were classically trained, have learned while doing. This doesn’t make for a very strong financial foundation. Public companies view the world quite differently from privately held companies, or even more specifically those owned by private equity.
Second, to be a great leader you must learn and understand what it means to follow. This means that all great leaders take the time to learn as much as they can. If you don’t have a very healthy dose of curiosity, then find one quickly. Your leadership life span will be limited by the depth of knowledge you acquire and accumulate as it relates to your business and the industry.
Lastly, conduct regular assessments on your personal performance. Find a number of folks who will be brutally honest with you about your style, your results, your core competencies. Play to your strengths and stop dwelling on your weaknesses.
Here is a list of the top reads for all leaders:
- Financial Intelligence and Valuation are two of the best books written to help leaders understand what’s important to your investors, lenders, and Board. Situational awareness is critical, so get to know and understand your business’s key financial metrics. What are they? What drives them? How do they behave over time, or under certain conditions?
- Failing Forward is one of the best “get your head straight” books I’ve read. Written more than a decade ago, the teachings of this book still apply and help to keep things in perspective. Other strong additions include: Unfu*k Yourself, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fu*k, The No Asshole Rule, and On Speaking Well.
- To build your problem solving skills be sure to read Power Questions, The McKinsey Engagement, The McKinsey Mind, The Ultimate Consultant, Good Leaders Ask Great Questions, Judgement, The Customer Mindset, and Transparency are all solid books to help you inform your thinking through a combination of asking better questions, quickly assessing different situations.
- Establishing your leadership style happens over time, as well as through the circumstances in which you experience. Some of the greatest insights have come from coaches, world leaders, and history in general. Check out the following books that all have strong leadership lessons: Who Says Elephants Can’t Dance, John Adams, Wooden on Leadership, The House of Dimon, The Last Man Standing, 1776, Solider: The Life of Colin Powell, His Excellency, Forged in Crisis, Quiet Strength, On the Brink, and Team of Rivals.
- Finally, all great leaders are curious about other success stories. What made one company great, while another failed? Understanding the concept of best practices, or at least those practices that helped enable success within a specific corporate culture, are a strong part of a leader’s development. Consider the following books: The Nordstrom Way, Hershey, Big Brown: The Untold Story of UPS, Inside Steve’s Brain, Disney U, and Built Not Born.
Growing Through Adversity
Positive growth can happen even under the toughest of conditions. Perseverance, determination, and the ability to adapt are what’s needed to push through the challenges and capture the growth that’s yours. New skills, new perspectives, new ideas.
As I walked around our property today I saw this beautiful petunia growing in-between some pavers. Oddly this is not a flower we have planted anywhere on our property, yet here it is. With temperatures in the high 90’s this past week, and no rain or water, seeing this thing of beauty grow in the most difficult conditions made me realize how possible growth is in any environment.
It reminds me of the line in Jurassic Park – “Life will find a way.” You really can do anything you set your mind to.
How Sharing Can Accelerate Results
In today’s rapidly advancing digital age, information has never been easier to access. We shop for clothes, cars, computers, and countless other consumables and services through the internet. We research our customers, competitors, future employers and employees, and bosses. We share our experiences and opinions about banks, hairdressers, mechanics, and restaurants on sites like Yelp, Facebook and Google. In fact, by the time you finish reading this blog, more than 1 million posts will have been made on Facebook (assuming you can finish this in 2 minutes or less).
With so much information, so quickly accessible, why do businesses still operate in silos? Why do management teams, and executives, feel compelled to withhold information from their teams? Are there still people that believe in Jack Nicholson’s position in A Few Good Men? Perhaps some might not be able to handle the truth but most are far more capable than you may think. In fact, if you consider real-life General Stanley McChrystal, in his book Team of Teams, he talks about transforming the U.S. Military from a command-and-control operation to a “shared consciousness” where there is an organization-wide “understanding of the whole.”
So why do executives hold back? Why do they covet information at all? The answer is FUD – Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt. Fear of embarrassment, uncertainty of reaction, doubt in the character and tenacity of the people on their teams. Harold MacMillian said, “A man who trusts nobody is apt to be the kind of man nobody trusts.” This couldn’t be more true.
Sharing for the sake of sharing is a waste of time and effort, however, sharing for the sake of establishing trust is an accelerator of positive results. How do can you tell if sharing is real? If the information the leader is sharing is sensitive, in that it makes him vulnerable, he’s sharing. If the information is sensitive, in that it may make the company vulnerable, she’s sharing. If there is any level of personal, professional, or company risk, this qualifies for real sharing. When real sharing is being demonstrated, a culture of trust can begin to develop and teams begin to form. A leader who shares real stuff is confident, comfortable being vulnerable, and willing (and interested) in learning. Those are the leaders people seek to follow.
Still think sharing is a crock? If you need further evidence that sharing can accelerate growth, look no further than Berkshire Hathaway which currently holds the title as the highest priced stock on the NYSE at more than $320,000 for a BRK-A share as of this blog post. If you, like me, believe that sharing is a critical ingredient to building trust, consider the words of Berkshire’s Charlie Munger, “By the standards of the rest of the world, we over trust. So far it has worked very well for us.” It certainly has.
How much courage do you have to start sharing?
Thoughts on Leadership
“He who cannot be a good follower, cannot be a good leader” ~ Aristotle.
Great leaders possess empathy and emotional intelligence. Caring enough to ask, and then listening, is the beginning for all great leaders. Charting a course that depends upon the contributions of others requires courage, fortitude and judgement. Leaders understand they are nothing without followers. Great leaders know that their success depends on the relationships they have with those followers. Trust, respect, and caring are ingredients that strengthen the bond between a leader and his, or her followers.
People want to know how much you care before caring about how much you know. Asking versus telling, guiding versus directing, teaching versus demanding, coaching versus demeaning…these are just some ways to demonstrate great leadership.
Leading others requires the leader to be vulnerable. It requires experience and judgement. Good judgment comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgment. There’s no shortcutting experience. You make the best decisions you can given the information at hand. Hindsight will always be 20/20, but we must live in the present which means the possibility of making a bad decision exists for each of us every day.
Embrace the learning. Be curious. Engage others and listen…truly listen. Open your mind to new perspectives. Create a list of leaders you admire and the attributes they possess that you strive to emulate. Getting comfortable being uncomfortable is the path to growth. Try many things. Fail fast. Don’t worry about being wrong. Nothing of greatness has ever been created on the first attempt. Diamonds take billions of years to create. The first mobile phone was a brick. The first car came in only black and had no windshield wipers. Progress takes time. The key is to keep moving, observing, doing, learning, adjusting. Trying to live life without failure is a wasted life. Life without failure is a blank canvas.
“We all want progress, but if you’re on the wrong road, progress means doing an about-turn and walking back to the right road; in that case, the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive.” ~ C. S. Lewis
Kindness – The Greatest Difference Maker
What makes a friend, a friend? What makes a candidate worthy of extending an offer of employment? What makes a great boss? What makes a life-long partnership work – personally or professionally?
In pondering these questions they have led me to other questions such as who do I like spending my time with? If I was stranded on a desert island for a month, who would I want to be with? What type of person? Who do I turn to when I’m happiest? And who do I turn to when I need help?
There are many ingredients that go into making a great employee, boss, spouse, and friend. Yet when all those ingredients are boiled down, there is one that rises to the top…kindness.
Intellect without kindness is arrogance. Discipline without kindness is abrupt. Motivation without kindness is dominating. Persistence without kindness is simply annoying. Determination without kindness is Machiavellian.
Sure, we all need a level of intellect, discipline, motivation, persistence and determination to succeed. And yes, there are many who succeed with these attributes in the absence of being kind. Why is that? Kindness costs nothing. You don’t have to take a graduate course to learn kindness. Maybe that’s the problem? Have we lost the ability to see the simplicity of success when kindness is added as the final ingredient?
Kindness doesn’t mean losing. Being kind doesn’t mean taking the back seat. Kindness does not operate from a position of weakness, but rather a position of strength. Being kind is a conscious choice. Your buyers feel it, your employees feel it, your spouse feels it, and yes, strangers feel it. That random act of kindness from someone you don’t even know that puts a smile on your face and warms the heart. We can all learn from kindness, and kindness is ours free to give. It’s your choice.
A Thought on Empathy
Life is about perspective. It’s how we experience situations and the lens through which we view things…good, bad, or indifferent. Empathy is a powerful attribute for us all. Being able to relate to each other is what makes human beings…human.
I just watched the movie The Forgiven starring Forest Whitaker and Eric Bana. This movie is based on real events that took place in S. Africa. It is incredibly moving and serves as proof that it is possible – even under the worst circumstances – that we can all find common ground, forgive when needed, and find a positive path forward. Rarely have I seen something so powerful in a film.
#Empathy
#Coaching
#Selfimprovement
#SelfAwareness
Business – it’s all personal
Business exists to serve peoples needs. It doesn’t matter if you work for a B2B, or B2C company. Somewhere downstream in the process, is a consumer who is making a decision to buy a product or service you make, or contribute to making.
Business is very personal. Only people can care, a business cannot. A business may be a culmination of caring people but by itself, a business is nothing more than an idea. People bring ideas to life. People bring passion to their work and workplace. People bring thoughtfulness and caring for one another and a community. That all happens with people. A business can only serve as a conduit to deliver what the collection of these people express.
When I hear “it’s not personal, it’s just business”, I would say, it’s all personal. People give their most valuable asset they have to a business…their time. With that time they could invest it elsewhere to generate different returns. With their families, with other businesses, other ideas, other objectives. It is a trade-off. Yet once that trade-off is made, an individual is committing themselves – their person – to the business. This is how business gets done, and it becomes very personal.
Empathy is a key emotion to bridge the gap between business and personal. Why? Because time is the only thing that binds us all together. We all have a set amount of sand in our hourglass. When it’s gone it’s gone. Take some of your sand, and use it with others at work to demonstrate that you hear them, you understand their challenges, and you have ideas to share that can help them. By doing this you add value. And while no one can put more sand into anyone’s hourglass, we can all put a little value into each other’s lives…in, and outside, of business.
Type A Personalities – 3 ways to confront anxiety
Hard charging, Type A personalities, often struggle with taming their fear of failure. Most would agree that fear, when kept in check and under control, is an emotion that can both protect and propel us. Understanding the cause of the fear you’re experiencing is the first step to developing a plan to calm it, contain it, control it.
Anxiety is the result, or symptom, of fear. If I fear I won’t be able to hit the ball, anxiety causes me to dread my up-at-bat. If I fear I will fail my statistics class, then anxiety will kick in and cause me to block any learning that will ultimately help me pass the class. If I fear I will miss my monthly sales number, my anxiety will cause me to go into rapid-fire mode doing as many things as I can simply to create the appearance that I’m working hard.
Anxiety perpetuates fear, creates the stress, and force, strong enough to shut you down. Dealing with anxiety is critical to successfully navigating change, taking risk, and managing failure. Here are 3 ways to keep your anxiety in check:
- Ask the question “why not me?” When we think we will fail it is because we don’t feel competent, smart enough, savvy enough, or insightful enough to win. Why not? Rather than thinking about the failure, replace that thought with the question why not me. I’m smart, why not me? I’m intelligent, why not me? I’ve accomplished a number of great things, why not me?
- Turn anxiety into excitement. Replace, what if I fail, with what will I learn? Replace what if this doesn’t last, with how much better will I be no matter how long this lasts? What will I have experienced that will make me more valuable, more fulfilled?
- Breath. The power of 10 minutes of just breathing is quite powerful. Call it meditation, self-reflection, self-empowerment, or self-love, whatever you call it the purpose of this 10 minutes is to rebalance your inner self. To bring calm to any internal bubbling that’s taking place. There are thousands of books on this subject, apps for your smartphone, and calming music for your ears. Get one, or some, but act now to calm the storm from building.
Joseph DeRosa 