Tag: vision

Leading Through Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt

On By Joe DeRosaIn LeadershipLeave a comment

From What’s In It for Me (WIFM), to Keep It Simple Stupid (KISS), there are countless acronyms we’ve all heard, and used, throughout our careers. Given today’s challenging climate, a leader’s mettle is tested in times of (FUD) fear, uncertainty and doubt. Leading from the front when the wind is at your back is far easier than walking into gale force winds in your face. Said differently, any average leader can lead with tailwinds, but high performing leaders are those that can advance the cause in the face of the strongest headwinds…in the face of fear, uncertainty and doubt.

Many of us are having to do just that today – lean into the headwinds. Macro conditions are reeking havoc on buyers and accelerating the FUD factor. As buyer behavior changes, FUD spills over into our teams…how can it not? As I spend time self-reflecting on the leadership behaviors and attributes that I have experienced during other times of fear, uncertainty and doubt, including Y2K, the dot-com bust, 9/11, and the Great Recession to name a few, it became evident to me that:

  • Leaders must balance confidence and reality with empathy. Too much confidence makes you appear disconnected. Too much reality can create more fear. Empathy makes you human…relatable.
  • Leaders need to be curious. In times of FUD, leaders need to ask questions. Go deep. Get under the covers. Learn first hand what’s going on. Your curiosity is responsible for identifying new paths forward for your team thereby calming the troops.
  • Leaders need to have courage. Not every decision will be right. In fact, many will be flat out wrong…once you have hindsight. You make the best decisions you can, in the moment, with the best available data…and own it.
  • Leaders need to have conviction. The decision is your decision. Right or wrong, you own it. There’s no escape. The art of decision making is knowing when to lean in, and knowing when to admit that a course correction is necessary.
  • Leaders are responsible for identifying and communicating the silver lining. Economic cycles come and go. History tells us that there are bull markets, and there are bear markets. Markets move. Every rain storm is preceded by sunny skies, as well as being followed by sunny skies. It’s the leaders job to reassure their teams that while it may be raining at the moment, the sun will in fact shine again…that’s a fact.
  • Finally, leaders need to be visible, in the trenches, shoulder to shoulder with their teams. Great leaders don’t hide behind Zoom, or a curtain, (we used to refer to the ivory tower), but instead face the same heat/fire their people face with customers, vendors, suppliers, investors, etc. After all, as Stephen Covey said, “people don’t care about how much you know until they know how much you care”. Great leaders demonstrate this by being present.

Recently I had a conversation with a colleague. Story telling, analogies, and metaphors have always been my go-to communication style. I got to thinking about our role as leaders as it relates to a ship’s captain…

The waters are rough…it’s beyond your control…

The ship is creaking and rocking…you can’t control that…

As captain you’re not sure whether the boat will stay together or start breaking apart…you can’t control that either…

You embrace the storm knowing you’ve sailed through storms before and made it through…this experience gives you conviction…

You’ve carried your crew through rough waters before and they’re counting on you to get them to solid ground…

You chart your course and sail into the wind…this is your decision…

While your internal doubts may be high, you push those doubts into a corner of your brain and lock them there while you focus on sailing through the storm and delivering your crew to solid ground…

You never give up fighting for your crew. That’s the captain’s job.

Why Hiring Up Pays Off

On By Joe DeRosaIn LeadershipLeave a comment

SteveJobs

Building a high performing team is the #1 responsibility of all leaders.  It requires vision, skill, intuition, conviction and a clear understanding of the company’s objective and purpose.  It also requires courage.

Early in my career I received some hiring advice that was worth its weight in gold from my boss.  She said “hire people you wouldn’t mind working for in the future.” I have lived by this advice throughout my career and it has served me well.  Here are the two major take-aways from living this hiring philosophy:

  1. Your focus should be the candidates capacity, and desire, to learn new things and not based solely on what they know today.  To a large extent your focus should be on their attitude not their aptitude.  With the right abilities, the proper does of desire, and some passion, any one can accomplish anything.
  2. The circle of life is more than just a famous line from the movie Lion King.  Work in a management or leadership role long enough and you’ll experience people coming and going, and moving up and down.  I see it as a blessing that I have been able to provide leadership to many who have risen in the ranks, some even faster than I.  Being able to develop a new generation of leaders is something I’m most proud of.

By hiring up, you demonstrate confidence as a leader.  We’ve all seen leaders (I use this term loosely) who hire a warm body.  A robot.  Someone willing, and able, to take orders but not capable of having an individual point of view.  And then there are those leaders who everyone else wants to work for.  These are the people who hire up.  They look for those that are smarter than they are, have more ideas than they do, and who see the world through a different lense.

Assembling a team of talent that surpasses your own, demonstrates your leadership strength. I’d much prefer to be surrounded by people smarter than me than to be the only one with any answers.  There’s great truth to the saying, “if you’re the smartest person in the room, then you’re in the wrong room.” Build a team that can teach you as much as you teach them.  A team that can generate ideas faster than you can on your own.  A team that is willing to take on any issue, problem, or challenge because they know they have a better chance of winning by leveraging their collective brilliance versus trying to win with a single idea from just one person.  Hire really smart people and then get out of their way. I think Steve Jobs was onto something here.

Hire up.