Intercept Experience

Enhancing Leadership Skills

Tanya Lacy

Uncomplicated Leadership vs Complicated Leadership

by

Why your leadership approach must stop being complicated…

If one of your team members told you they didn’t understand you, would you blame them? Or would you be prepared to look in the mirror at your own approach? 

Whatever the reason for the lack of understanding is, the net result is disconnect, and you are not going to achieve the results you want. So let’s have a deeper look at this for a moment. What does complicated look like in business?

Complicated looks like long emails, long voicemails and unclear meetings where people walk out feeling confused rather than clear and inspired. It looks like additional clarification meetings, staying back late, still talking on your mobile phone in your car while driving home with conversations that continue in your garage once you’ve pulled up at home and are supposed to be cutting off for the evening. 

Complicated for the customer looks like not getting what they want, long drawn out processes, not being listened to, getting orders wrong, and being ‘shoe horned’ into methods that don’t serve them because the business does it that way. 

The cost of this is business risk. Losing good people, losing good customers and losing business to yourcompetitors. 

When a business team is clear and certain, there is no complication. It means that everyone has confidence in what they’re doing, and how they’re doing it and they know precisely what’s expected of them. 

They love their work, and they love dealing on behalf of the business and would do anything for the team. They go the extra mile because they understand that the business is doing its best. 

When a business team is clear, it means the leadership is clear. It means the leader communicates in a clear manner and that the communication is aligned with the direction of the company. It is easy for the work to flow and for the outcomes you’re looking for as a business to be achieved. 

If you, as a leader, find yourself in a complicated environment and continue to complicate it for those around you, you will create unrest, which can potentially lead to an implosion. Good leaders find ways to simplify things, to get the team focussed on the ‘critical few’ and to be consistent in their communications witheveryone around them. 

No one wants to feel overwhelmed. Being overwhelmed from time-to-time can happen with surges of workflow. However, feeling overwhelmed all the time is not sustainable. 

As a leader, it really is your responsibility to create clarity and certainty for your team. This enables the work rhythm to flow. This style of leadership equips and empowers others, enabling you to step away from the day-to-day, which gives you room to focus on Strategy (your next move) and rewards you with freedom of choice.  

Interested in understanding how you can overcome complexity and activate energy in your team? Apply for a Strategy Call with one of our Intercept team members so that we can understand what’s happening inside your business and share some of our methods. 

On the call, we’ll determine if we’re a good fit to work with one another and support you in creating a high performing team where everyone in your business is on the same page. 

Apply here: www.interceptexperience.com

Or email: hi@interceptexperience.com

Stepping Back vs Stepping In

by

Why you must stop stepping in if you want to step back…

Do you pride yourself on ‘rescuing’ your team? 

We’re always told the number one focus for our clients is to step back as leaders. One of the most common frustrations of the same leaders, however, is that they find themselves constantly stepping in to rescue their team.  

When we review this and break it down, we can see a pattern. 

The leader says they want something, yet at the same time, the actions being taken don’t match the words spoken. Why does this happen? 

Stepping in is actually the wrong thing to do if you are committed to developing the leadership within your team. While you may know this intellectually, it’s tricky to do. Especially if you are someone who loves people and who loves to help others. 

Stepping in all the time can look like jumping in to fix things, it can be solving the problems of your team for them or another similar behaviour. Whatever it is, this can have a very disruptive and debilitating impact on the morale of your team, and you won’t even know it. 

Sam, an employee at an industrial products company, shared with us that the water cooler talk taking place internally was not healthy and you can guess what everyone was talking about: the behaviour of the big boss. He was notorious for jumping in, whichled to the team calling him‘Superman’ behind his back. 

They didn’t mean to be disrespectful – the problem was that ‘Superman’ was not giving them the space to figure things out on their own and to gain the confidence to step into the responsibilities they were given. Sam would also complain that he and his colleagues felt left in the dark. That the meetings and town hall gatherings were platitudes and did not reflect the real deal happening inside the business from day-to-day.

The cost of this kind of interplay happening inside your team and your company is that it erodes both morale and trust. Once trust is eroded, people withhold information and fail to contribute in ways that bring the business forward and progress the workload.  

This scenario may be one of the biggest nightmares for directors and business leaders who drive teams. While they need their team to step up, the team is afraid to step up, for fear of stepping on toes and jumping in because their boss or overall leader or director typically micromanages everyone. 

When a business team is in flow, an organic method occurs. Everyone knows what they are doing, how to do it, when to do it by, who they are doing it with and the part it plays in the overarching plan. 

When a business’ team’s members are confident, they go the extra mile and even if they don’t know what to do or get stuck or confused, they ask each other for help, which leads to brainstorming and solutions. They support each other in ways that move the production forward at a pace that everyone can feel proud of. You hired your team so you can grow your business – so you need to let them bring their talents to the table and develop their skills for that growth to occur!

The leaders Intercept work with intellectually know that it is their responsibility to create an environment that enables team members to step up. The one thing that will always destroy this is the leader’s temptation to jump back in when it is not necessary. 

If you‘d like to understand how you can create a winning team that steps up without you having to work any harder or sacrifice your own time, to have a team that surprises you with their new ideas and inventive solutions, and a team that goes the extra mile to achieve success, then it’s timeto apply for a Strategy Call with one of our Intercept team members.

During this call, we’ll work with you to understand what’s happening inside your business and determine if our methods are a good fit for your team dynamics. 

We look forward to hearing from you and assessing whether we’re a good fit to work together so that we can support you to create a high performing team that allows you to step back, without any need to step in.

Apply here: www.interceptexperience.com

Or email: hi@interceptexperience.com

Complacency vs a Sense of Urgency

by

Why your team must stop being complacent and embrace a sense of urgency…

One of the most common frustrations I hear from business leaders is that their team members are ‘complacent’. 

Now, let’s have a look at this for a moment. What does complacency look like to the business leader who drives the team? 

Complacency looks like: 

  • Not meeting deadlines 
  • Saying yes and then not delivering on time 
  • Agreeing to deliver and then not delivering 
  • Not really caring if workflow is held up as a result of them being behind

Complacency looks like masquerading as a dedicated team player and then showing up as a self-focused individual who says what people want to hear to get everyone off their back. Complacency sounds like, “I’m waiting for xx to complete their piece” or, “I cannot start until I get xx from xx.”

The cost of this kind of interplay happening inside your team and your company is enormous as it erodes both morale and trust. Once trust is eroded, people withhold information and fail to contribute in ways that bring the business forward and progress the workload. In fact, this one thing is perhaps the biggest nightmare for directors and business leaders who run teams. It results in zero momentum. A high functioning team or business unit has a momentum of its own, and things ‘just happen’ – timelines and budgets are met, goals are achieved and results come without a lot of intervention. 

When a business team is humming, there is a natural rhythm and a natural sense of accomplishment. Everyone is somehow, by osmosis, working to the same song sheet, on the same page and a whole other round of sayings that we hear often in business. While the sayings may sound glib, they’re quite true because the sense of urgency and drive is happening from within. It’s self-generated from the team rather than it being imposed on them by management or leaders. 

When a business team is high performing, there is a lot of nodding and a lot of understanding. There are short meetings and people feel connected and understood. Their boundaries are respected and they are respected as valuable team members, contributing not only to their own deliverables but pitching in and filling gaps that appear when time pressures arise. 

As a leader, it really is your responsibility to monitor work rhythm and what we refer to as the interplay and flow of the team. This style of leadership equips the team and enables the leader to step away from the day-to-day, giving you freedom of choice.  

Would you like to understand how you can overcome complacency and activate energy in your team? Apply for a Strategy Call with one of our Team at Intercept so that we can understand what’s happening inside your business and share some of our methods. We’ll be able to see if working together is a fit, to support you to create a high performing team, and get everyone in your business on the same page. 

Apply here: www.interceptexperience.com 

Or email us: hi@interceptexperience.com 

Is your business set-up feedback-friendly? If not, what’s the cost?

by

After looking at the different ways to rate leadership, let’s turn our attention to this question: is your business set-up properly for all employees to provide constructive feedback? If the answer is no, it’s imperative to consider the short and long-term costs to your business. First, let’s look at some different approaches for seeking feedback in the workplace.

Formal 360 Feedback

It’s interesting how we’re told not to worry about what other people think, yet in team and Board situations, we rely on the feedback of others. While this can again be fabulous for career development, if the situation is not set-up prior, if the context is not set-up thoroughly, the 360 degree process can in some instances, become a venting session of pent up passive aggression and distort and skew the feedback, being harmful and sometimes hurtful, steering  relationships backwards and creating mistrust. 

Self-Opinion Based Feedback

At the end of the day, we as individuals, have to be open and willing to take on any feedback (and of course, motivated and committed to take the actions required to make change). So if we decide that the feedback is not going to be taken onboard, it won’t be. If we decide the feedback is going to be taken onboard, it can be. This is what it boils down to. The willingness to apply the feedback, and the discipline to apply new habits to integrate that feedback. 

Results Speak Volumes 

The context of the results is key. As is the morale. Is it a positive and supportive workplace you work in? Is there a toxic culture? Or is there a culture of true care and collaboration? Again, the accomplishment of your deliverables (and the method in which you get there) is all relative to the environment you are part of. 

Environment (Non-Verbal Feedback)  

Change your environment or change your environment. This is a statement we use as a discussion point at our events and is part of our programs. We can either infect the environment with our positive power and influence and contribute to shaping it, or we can physically change the environment we are in, fingers crossed tight that the grass is greener on the other side. Either way, you/me/we show up wherever we are. 

Always Seek Feedback 

Even if you decide to not take on feedback, it’s better to have it than have none. Other people’s perspectives can be very useful on our learning journey as leaders. One comment, or one expression, one perspective or one word can make a huge difference to the way we perceive a situation and our own approach, if we are indeed open and willing. 

Perception And Awareness 

A big topic that needs its own article to express fully is the topic of awareness levels. At the end of the day, if the person giving feedback has a different awareness level to the person receiving the feedback or vice versa, this can also distort the quality of what is being said.  What do I mean by awareness level? I mean, where the person is at in terms of what they believe is possible for themselves, for others and for the business. 

Top Qualities Key To Leadership Success  

What are the top qualities for success in relation to where you work? What are your natural qualities as a leader? Do they align? What are the gaps? 

If you’re not clear, why not start the conversation with the business (or your business unit) to explore what everyone believes to be the top qualities for leadership success? Then get everyone on the same page so that you can make life easier for yourself (and everyone else) to rate and track progress.  

Lean into the resources you have: human resource departments, Culture Strategy documents and any Vision and Mission statements to really zoom in on what the leadership traits are that you are expected to live up to. You may find they’re too generic or not easy to translate into operation and behaviour.  In this case, don’t be afraid to raise the topic and seek clarity. If they are too nebulous or they are not easy for you to make sense of, that means others in the business will likely be confused about them too. 

A Leadership Qualities Prompter List 

Here is a sample of some of the less obvious qualities for leadership success we use when we are working with our clients inside their Leadership Coaching and Mentoring Programs. Our list has 36 elements sitting within five areas. Here are a few of the less often thought of qualities:

❏    Emotion Management/Emotional Intelligence 

❏    Listening

❏    Observing

❏    Confidence

❏    Empathy

For more information about these qualities, go to our leadership assessment area over at www.InterceptGroup.co

Compare Compete 

At a common sense level, we can be working to our strengths and display top characteristics when things are flowing well. When there’s a crisis though and the pressure is on, this is where we tend to be at our worst. 

Always remember we as humans are not robots. So things like what’s going on for you and what your capacity to handle things is or what support you have around you, will all play a part in how you value feedback too. 

In the end, you are in control of your interpretation and implementation of any feedback given at any time, in any situation. This points towards accountability, another key leadership trait to highly rate. 

Interested in learning more about setting your business up so that it is feedback-friendly? Reach out to Intercept to organise a confidential Strategy Call.