Leadersmart Blog- Mark L. Peterson

Combining Influence and Leadership

In the movie "Twelve Angry Men," Henry Fonda plays the role of an informal jury leader who flawlessly practices the art of building power between a group and himself.  As the movie unfolds with the jury deliberating over a murder trial, eleven jurors all voting "guilty" quickly gang up on Fonda and his single vote of "innocent."  The remainder of the movie is a textbook case of Fonda using both facilitative leadership and empowerment skills to build his power and influence within the group, eventually achieving a unanimous vote of innocent for the once condemned defendant.  Watching Fonda's ability to increase his power within this group is a great case study and example for leaders to learn from.  However, although building power can be simple to understand from case studies, it is usually more challenging for leaders to put into practice in the real world.  In this blog post I will explain two practical methods essential to a leader's ability to build power.   

The first of these skills is the practice of facilitative leadership.  Not difficult to understand theoretically, facilitative leadership can be challenging to practice without an over-arching management model to guide one's behaviors.  One such model is the theory of Appreciative Inquiry, which is more commonly referred to as AI.  AI, which can be applied to a number of core management practices such as strategic planning or performance management, empowers a new inter-organizational dialogue that is centered around building on what works as opposed to fixing what doesn't.  As this dialogue evolves, the creative element within an organization, which often is oppressed by the command-and-control model, is enlivened and empowered, therefore enhancing the individual's and/or organization's capacity for collaboration and change.  Over time, many organizations realize increased innovation and focus by implementing the AI platform.     

The second of these skills is learning to lead one's staff from the bottom up.  In the simplest of terms, this means motivating your people with empowerment and getting them to think for themselves.  Again, this is not a difficult body of theory to understand but can be challenging to practice without a few overarching models to guide one's behaviors.  One of these models that should be considered is the entire body of research commonly referred to as "Personal Strength Theory".  After identifying our strengths and our weaknesses, modern strength theory compels us to place the majority of our effort toward developing our strengths, therefore, debunking the past notion of "well-rounded" development for all.  Once we focus more fully on our strengths we continue to gain confidence, fulfillment and inner motivation as we move toward a more natural state of being, commonly referred to as "Flow."  Once establishing our strengths and unique intelligence, the last resource helps us to place this knowledge into our natural personality style.   

Another model to enliven one's empowerment and motivational strategy is the use of psychometric assessments, particularly the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI).  The MBTI allows us to plumb the depths of established personality theory further identifying who we are via one of sixteen personalities.  Once claiming one of the validated personality styles, we learn what behavioral and attitudinal tendencies are central to that personality and how best to express this central persona in our work and life.  This practice allows us to express our most skillful tendencies in most work-related and personal situations, therefore allowing us to reach a heightened state of self-confidence and individual accomplishment. 

Today's leaders will be more successful, as will the organizations they lead, if they are empowered to achieve the agendas they are charged with.  These skills and models are just a few of the many available to help a leader increase their power and achieve their goals. 

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Conducting Effective Performance Appraisals

Lately I’m seeing and hearing of an increasing number of leaders who are sacrificing their organization’s mission because they can’t untangle themselves from the effects of ineffective employees.  Effective leaders need to be focused forward on opportunities, not reacting to recurring operational challenges and mishaps caused by a disengaged or unmotivated workforce.  Leaders who oversee these disengaged employees often suffer a loss of time and lack of control that consumes any semblance of leadership effectiveness, leaving them frustrated and confused.  The solution to this problem in many cases is improved performance management practices including a collaborative performance appraisal process. 

While the key to overcoming employee engagement and motivation issues is a successful performance appraisal process, misapplication of this process is actually worse than not having one at all.  Employees who are participants in a haphazard performance appraisal cycle can actually feel less important, not more, resulting in decreased engagement, employee frustration and increased attrition.  In worse case scenarios, the employees actually come to resent the poorly executed performance appraisal process, which is supposed to provide them with heightened motivation.  In the brief video below, taken from the popular British television series, “The Office,” we see an employee reacting to a poorly implemented appraisal process.     

  

It’s not that leaders don’t have good intentions.  Many well-intentioned leaders in the workplace attempt to manage employee’s performance effectively but just don’t have the knowledge or skills to do so.  What are the preferred methods and best practices of effective performance appraisal processes?  Listed below is a simple process that can improve the leader’s performance management effectiveness significantly.

Step 1- Set performance expectations at the beginning of the annual performance cycle.  This is a collaborative process that begins with the employee writing their own annual objectives under the guidance of their supervisor.  As with other strategic organizational activities, these SMART objectives need to reflect the larger organization’s objectives.

Step 2- Hold informal performance conversations regularly, informing employees of their progress toward their objectives.  An effective supervisor who is paid to accomplish work through their employees realizes that the majority of their workweek should be spent in performance conversations with these subordinates.  Topic-wise, these conversations provide both corrective and reinforcing feedback in a coaching format, increasing the employee’s ability to expand their thinking and solve their own dilemmas.  The frequency of these planned and spontaneous conversations change by subordinate as each individual has unique needs and desires for performance feedback.

Step 3- Hold at least one mid-year performance review with your employees.  Although less formal than the end of year review, this should be a formal review of progress made toward the objectives set at the initial planning meeting.  The purpose is to check on the progress and make any final adjustments to objectives that are under or over achievable.

Step 4- Hold an end of year performance review with your employees. This is a formalized milestone to celebrate the results of a year’s worth of effort by formally rating the final performance of the employee.  Due to the regular performance meetings throughout the year, there is nothing of surprise for either supervisor or employee at this meeting.  This final meeting is a ritual, highlighting the importance of the employee’s effort to the achievement of the larger organization’s objectives and should be handled with the utmost of ceremony.

Effective leaders find success by combining the process of visualizing and communicating an effective future with supporting their employee’s ability to create it.  Confusing these activities by not providing a proper performance appraisal process for your workforce, well, just doesn’t make sense. 

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Leadership Strategies for Facing Conflict

Leaders must realize that conflict in the workplace is on the rise.  As power and decision-making continue migrating to the front-line of contemporary organizations, leaders have increased opportunities to prevent and mediate unhealthy conflict between newly empowered co-workers and overly-competitive teams.  But this is certainly not an opportunity that is sought after, considering the tendency for most organizational leaders within the United States to eschew conflict.  Leaders who continue to adopt a "conflict averse" persona, developing the conflict resolution skills neither within themselves nor their subordinates, become wholly destructive barriers to increased communication, innovation, and teamwork within their respective organizations.  The first of two leadership development tactics for improving conflict resolutions skill is understanding the common approaches toward conflict.   

The Thomas-Kilman Conflict Mode Instrument has long established the five foundational approaches toward conflict that we see in organizations today.  The approaches are: Competing (assertive, uncooperative), Avoiding (unassertive, uncooperative), Accommodating (unassertive, uncooperative), Collaborating (assertive, cooperative), and Compromising (intermediate assertiveness and cooperativeness).  Leaders begin by increasing self-awareness for their preferred approach toward conflict both in and out of the workplace.  Once this understanding is in place, the leader will know which approach they are drawn to and which approach is their least preferred.  This self-awareness can then increase awareness of other's preferred styles, heigtening empathy during conflict.  As these approaches are all useful on some level, leaders must increase their ability to behaviorally shift into each style as appropriate and proactively attend to conflict when it arises.

Learning to shift into each conflict approach is based on development in two areas: situational understanding and behavioral practice.  Situational understanding is the strategic awareness and accurate choice of applying the correct style to the correct situation in an organizational context.  For instance, a team working through a series of quick decisions of moderate importance would waste valuable time and energy choosing the collaborative approach toward conflict when the compromise approach would certainly do.  Further development in this area can be had by reading the book, "The Conflict Resolution Toolbox" by Gary Furlong and by seeking out the assistance of a certified and experienced coach.  

As leaders we must embrace conflict as a necessary facet of our increasingly effective culture, not a barrier that we need to turn away from in fear.              

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The Key to Effective Leadership- Emotional Intelligence

"Self-reverance, self-knowledge, self-control.  These three alone lead life to sovereign power" (Lord Tennyson- circa 1870).  "Know Thyself" (Thales of Miletus- 624 - 546 BCE, estimate).  Rooted throughout antiquity, the portrayal of self-knowledge as being a primary stepping-stone to enlightened thought is both hollow hyperbole and practical proverb.  That is, this is a concept that is easily understood intellectually but is more difficult to practically apply.  As a consultant charged with engaging numerous people on this workplace topic annually, my recommendation is that the entire workforce become practically familiar with the current workplace research around knowing thyself, known as Emotional Intelligence (EI).               

In a past blog post I defined emotional intelligence, per Peter Salovey and John D. Mayer, as “the subset of social intelligence that involves the ability to monitor one's own and others' feelings and emotions, to discriminate among them and to use this information to guide one's thinking and actions.”  As with any other endeavor that combines learning with the emotional sciences (psychology, counseling, etc.), self-development in the EI sense can be challenging and time-consuming.  Coaching, self-assessment, and meta-cognitive thought development are practices that can certainly help.  In this blog post I'll discuss using these practices for the purpose of increasing emotional intelligence. 

In 1955, cognitive psychologists within the United States developed a tool commonly known today within the fields of I/O psychology and OD consulting as the "Johari Window."  This somewhat simple tool improves individuals' interpersonal relationships through the process of both receiving and disclosing previously hidden characterizations of their personality. Through the ongoing process of genuine feedback and disclosure, the subject becomes aware of blind spots not previously known to him or herself while allowing others to know him or her at a deeper level.  This process, quite common in today's workplace, is partially responsible for the increased organizational use of multi-rater and psychometric assessments.

Multi-rater assessments, such as CCL's Assessment Suite®, are designed to collect qualitative feedback from one's peers, superiors, and subordinates concerning one's performance against a number of performance categories commonly referred to as competencies or characteristics.  More sophisticated methods seek feedback from beyond the immediate workplace to include suppliers and customers as well as family and friends.  When facilitated properly, this process allows for the candidate receiving the feedback to broaden their understanding of their performance in targeted areas (such as leadership skill and effective communication) while increasing their awareness of the interpersonal affects they have on those around them.  Through this process, the candidate receiving the feedback normally achieves heightened awareness of their interpersonal and performance effectiveness, consequently increasing their emotional intelligence over time.

Psychometric assessments, such as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI)®, offer similar methods for increasing self-awareness and empathy.  Instead of obtaining performance and interpersonal feedback from individuals who work closely with you, these assessments provide a validated description of your personality tendencies, preferred behaviors, etc. based on psychometric research.  These assessments normally split the testing population between four to sixteen categories of preferences depending on the test, landing each test taker into a category they are then asked to become familiar with.  When using assessments with higher than average measures of validity and reliability, this process can be more enlightening than multi-rater assessment feedback as it provides the test-taker with an understanding of their unique motivations, preferences, and tendencies.  Understanding one's unique preferences becomes even more useful when compared with other categories of preferences as it increases empathy and deepens one's appreciation for others. 

One of the most important skills developed during the self-assessment process is thinking meta-cognitively.  Meta-cognition very simply means thinking about our thinking or operating with multiple levels of awareness.  Here is an example: you are in a conversation with a co-worker and you notice that the co-worker increases her direct eye-contact, raises her voice, and crosses her arms.  You may pick up on these cues and begin an internal inquiry seeking to understand if there might be anything that you've done or said that could have caused this person to become defensive or angry.  During the course of this inner inquiry, you may also ask yourself if the cues your picking up on are relevant to the current situation or are based on a memory of a previous yet similar conversation with someone else.  This internal dialogue taking place while you remain engaged in the external conversation is meta-cognitive thinking.

Meta-cognitive thought is essential to the development of one's capabilities for being emotionally intelligent as it provides the real-time reflection and action-learning methods used for experimentation and learning.  Without meta-cognition, one follows their usual routine for human interaction without paying attention to the affects their behavior might have on others.  However, when thinking meta-cognitively, one is both in the conversation as well as outside of the conversation, operating...adjusting...learning.  If the Johari Window allows one to gather a deeper awareness of possible blind spots affecting their performance and interpersonal effectiveness, meta-cognition adds real-time awareness to this process, therefore speeding one's development.         

Lastly, leadership coaching is a resource that can combine the use of various assessments, advanced meta-cognitive thinking, and individualized learning in a Johari-esque model of development.  Contemporary leadership coaching takes place in a humanistic yet goal-directed environment that many find renewing, deeply developmental, and enlightening.  An experienced, ICF certified coach normally assists the candidate from two orientations.  First, the coach and candidate complete an in-depth assessment of the candidate's strengths and weaknesses to be used as a foundation for the development of holistic goals.  Secondly, while the candidate works toward goal attainment the coach continues the developmental relationship providing a forum for accountability, support and trustful disclosure, further reinforcing practical application of new skills.          

For more information on applying these four practices, or questions about any other leadership oriented subjects, please contact me through my website: www.leadersmartconsulting.com.

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The Power of Leadership Empathy

Recently a colleague of mine was helping a group work through conflict when he heard a phrase I’d often heard before.  The phrase, “This is a business decision and you shouldn’t take it personally,” was stated to an executive who had just been directed to lay off 15% of his staff…one week before the Christmas holiday.  While the executive was passing through the expected stages of change after hearing such news, the only support she received from her employer was to “get over it.”  While organizational decisions such as these are difficult, this type of non-empathetic behavior generally increases the presence of unhealthy conflict, not lessens it.

Great leaders with exceptional business acumen lose their effectiveness when they struggle with the human aspects of leadership, such as empathy.  This is because, in my opinion, there is a significant correlation between non-empathetic leadership styles and subordinates who consistently lack innovation and creativity, struggle to take ownership of their assigned portfolios, and have difficulty working through conflict.  Certainly, there are other causes for these shortcomings but lacking empathy is one of the most common.     

The key to handling situations like this one is to increase one’s “empathetic response.”  Empathy, the ability to understand and reflect others feelings, allows others to feel understood and supported.  When we authentically allow ourselves to react to another’s feelings, we usually increase the quality of the relationship, therefore increasing understanding and support.  When we feel understood and supported we become more likely to trust and therefore, show a greater commitment toward the source of empathy.  Greater commitment of this type often results in improved focus, self-awareness, and overall effectiveness.  We can see why empathy is quickly becoming one of the most important competencies in the executive job-description.

So, how do we increase our empathetic response?  Why does limiting empathy seem so unnatural?  The video below provides neuroscientific research into our “Mirror-Neurons,” or the brain’s capacity for empathy.  This research provides a rich insight into empathy and empathetic behavior.   

Watch the full episode. See more NOVA scienceNOW.

 Watch the full episode. See more NOVA scienceNOW.

Leading with empathy is critical for today’s workforce to achieve the necessary increases in innovation, intellection, and self-motivation that the competitive global environment requires.

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Don't Legitimize Leaders To Quickly

Legitimate Power, or legitimate authority, is a critical attribute to any organized society.  Furthermore, as a citizenry we should be willing to assign certain rights and permissions to leaders who are so deserving.  That said, too often we grant authority to others based on their station or social status, only to find later they are not deserving of it.  Societal examples of this have become all too common, with a recent example being the fall of Hosni Mubarak.  With Mubarak, as with many cases of similar gravity, people grant power to a leader based almost completely on their station or social status, not based on their individual character.    

A leader doesn’t have to operate outside of the law for this power dynamic to exist.  Frequently I find myself discussing this topic of unwarranted power attribution while coaching leaders and executives.  These leaders, who often feel they work in a culture that is slightly paternalistic or intolerant of their opinion in general, find themselves feeling powerless and at a loss for how to change this dysfunctional dynamic.  

By making a few strategic and tactical changes to their normal method of operating, leaders cease operating within these power vacuums and begin feeling more powerful and fulfilled.  The following four suggestions can be quite helpful for increasing your own power while gaining strategic control over whom you’re granting authority to.

First, deepen your understanding for, and acceptance of, who you are and who you aren’t.  Effective leaders find themselves expressing their strengths in roles that fit them well, which increases their confidence and reputation.  Furthermore, they have established boundaries around areas of weakness, limiting expectations or preventing use of these areas altogether. 

Effective tools for increasing your self-awareness range from popular self-assessments, such as the SDI or MBTI, to 360 degree feedback instruments, such as the DLDS.  These validated and reliable assessments help leaders navigate blind spots and unknown characteristics by illuminating parts of themselves they were previously unaware of.  Additionally, it can be helpful to engage a certified leadership coach familiar with this process to help navigate this course of action.  

Second, know where you’re going.  What you stand for and what is important to you is vital in today’s knowledge-oriented workplace.  More organizations seek to hire bright people who select their next employer based on values and mission, not just the security of a paycheck.  Consequently, current leaders should have an understanding of their own values, how to express them in the workplace, and how to help their subordinates do the same.  Examples of assessment tools that can be helpful to understanding one’s values are the LVA and the Ethical Type Indicator.

Effective leaders know the power of connection; therefore, the third suggestion is to be engaged in a community of practice to help inform and support you.  This is not a group of people who think, act and look the same way that you do.  These are people with a wide range of beliefs and cultural attributes from a variety of settings, both within your organization and outside of it.  Effective leaders know this to be a best practice for opening hearts and minds, for sharing knowledge and connection, and for their own self-edification and long-term growth. 

Furthermore, the higher your leadership status, the more important this practice is. Abraham Lincoln, having a deep appreciation for alternative viewpoints, assembled a cabinet comprised of his greatest rivals, including William Seward and Salmon Chase.  As he labored to consider their contrary opinions and beliefs, he actually grew closer in relationship to some of these advisors, such as Seward, over the term of his presidency.

Since Lincoln’s day, Mark Zuckerberg, among others, have simplified the task of forming a community of practice by linking the world through Facebook and other social networking platforms.  With a cursory understanding of Facebook, Twitter, and Linkedin, one can connect with other professionals in their backyard or in Bangladesh, and most places in between.

Lastly, think critically and seek opportunities to open-mindedly engage in the discourse of the day.  Realizing that there are very few black and white answers in our sea of framing and perception, our job as leaders is to logically analyze events and issues based on multiple points of view.  Our awareness of logic fallacies and the assumptions undergirding most arguments will help us engage both workplace and world from a more informed perspective.  As mentioned in the previous suggestion, being connected to a diverse population of opinion using various social networking platforms will be immensely helpful here.   

Legitimate power can rise to an abusive level when one feels the scarcity of information, of connection, or of personal agency.  These suggestions help leaders to increase all of these, and therefore, make better decisions about whom they’re intentionally granting authority to.

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The Importance of Leadership Presence

From newly promoted leaders, to the Mark Zuckerburgs of the world, to established executives like President George W. Bush, leaders consistently seem to struggle with…well, that presence thing.  You know what I mean, at the intersection of cachet, empathy and gravitas resides a persona that every leader needs to embrace.  Once embraced, these character traits become indispensible to their newly found leadership identity.  However, leadership presence can be both elusive and complex and, if not fully embraced, could result in role ineffectiveness, career limitations, and a long-term prescription of Zoloft. 

So what is this thing called leadership presence?  Why is it important?  More specifically, what are the most common pitfalls leaders struggle with when trying to attain it?  Answers to these questions could, and have, filled volumes of business and leadership literature over the years. Based on my understanding of the research as well as my experience coaching leaders at all levels, three specific aspects of leadership presence seem to be most challenging to many leaders: Practicing authentic inspiring composure, showing personal empathy, and establishing a genuine and competent style of communication. President Bill Clinton provides a living example of these characteristics in the embedded videos below.  

Developing an Authentic Inspiring Composure.  Contrary to popular belief, this is not solely charisma.  Leaders who possess this quality combine both a presence and an authenticity packaged in a quiet, confident, and charismatic demeanor.  They appear to be fully engaged in the trials and tribulations of the day without being distracted or becoming exceedingly emotional.  This composure is not a group of plagiarized behaviors from others as much as a genuine depiction of the leader, honed and developed to be appropriate for his or her role.  When viewing the videos of President Clinton below, take specific note of his physical stature, his eye contact, and the object of his focus as he demonstrates this aspect of presence.  

 

Expressing Personal Empathy.  This is a deeper sense of understanding that effective leaders have for others.  Not just what’s important in the life of the other, but why these matters are important from the perspective of one’s values.  Leaders having a command of empathy treat their subject’s personal and professional lives as one holistic persona that warrants positive attention.  To show this positive attention in dialogue, the leader sets an ethos of safety and humility while preventing their own interests from becoming the priority.  Watch the video above as Bill Clinton creates a humbling interchange while trying to focus on the most important and revelatory aspects of David Letterman’s personal life. 

Establishing a genuine and competent style of communication.  There is more to discuss on this topic than appropriate for this one blog post, so let me focus on two important aspects.  First, there should be a pace or a cadence to a leaders style of speech that communicates not just the message, but both confidence and calm.  Certainly, this style can and will be adapted, depending on the situation.  However, the style should be somewhat consistent, as an effective leader will build a brand around their chosen dialect.  Bill Clinton, as well as other leaders, know the importance of this and do it well.

Secondly, leaders who understand leadership presence know that their bodies communicate as much as their words and tone.  Body language and verbal speech should work together to strategically support one central message rather than causing confusion or inadvertently sending a different message altogether.  Competing messages over time not only cause confusion, they lead to increased criticism and distrust of the leader.  Eventually, the increasing distrust erodes the leader’s ability to perform essential of their role, such as delegation and performance management.  Notice Bill Clinton's cadence and physical communication style during both his discussion with David Letterman and during his conversation with the larger group.

 

As an essential feature of a leader’s development, leadership presence should be both proper and genuine.  As a leader’s presence evolves, these three traits become stylistically interwoven in the natural form and function befitting each individual leader.  Leaders then use their leadership presence in increasingly challenging situations, further developing these characteristics and increasing their overall effectiveness. 

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Building Power in a Society of Influence

In the movie "Twelve Angry Men," Henry Fonda plays the role of an informal jury leader who flawlessly practices the art of building power between a group and himself.  As the movie unfolds with the jury deliberating over a murder trial, eleven jurors all voting "guilty" quickly gang up on Fonda and his single vote of "innocent."  The remainder of the movie is a textbook case of Fonda using both facilitative leadership and empowerment skills to build his power and influence within the group, eventually achieving a unanimous vote of innocent for the once condemned defendant.  Watching Fonda's ability to increase his power within this group is a great case study and example for leaders to learn from.  However, although building power can be simple to understand from case studies, it is usually more challenging for leaders to put into practice in the real world.  In this blog post I will explain two practical methods essential to a leader's ability to build power.   

The first of these skills is the practice of facilitative leadership.  Not difficult to understand theoretically, facilitative leadership can be challenging to practice without an over-arching management model to guide one's behaviors.  One such model is the theory of Appreciative Inquiry, which is more commonly referred to as AI.  AI, which can be applied to a number of core management practices such as strategic planning or performance management, empowers a new inter-organizational dialogue that is centered around building on what works as opposed to fixing what doesn't.  As this dialogue evolves, the creative element within an organization, which often is oppressed by the command-and-control model, is enlivened and empowered, therefore enhancing the individual's and/or organization's capacity for collaboration and change.  Over time, many organizations realize increased innovation and focus by implementing the AI platform.     

The second of these skills is learning to lead one's staff from the bottom up.  In the simplest of terms, this means motivating your people with empowerment and getting them to think for themselves.  Again, this is not a difficult body of theory to understand but can be challenging to practice without a few overarching models to guide one's behaviors.  One of these models that should be considered is the entire body of research commonly referred to as "Personal Strength Theory".  After identifying our strengths and our weaknesses, modern strength theory compels us to place the majority of our effort toward developing our strengths, therefore, debunking the past notion of "well-rounded" development for all.  Once we focus more fully on our strengths we continue to gain confidence, fulfillment and inner motivation as we move toward a more natural state of being, commonly referred to as "Flow."  Once establishing our strengths and unique intelligence, the last resource helps us to place this knowledge into our natural personality style.   

Another model to enliven one's empowerment and motivational strategy is the use of psychometric assessments, particularly the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI).  The MBTI allows us to plumb the depths of established personality theory further identifying who we are via one of sixteen personalities.  Once claiming one of the validated personality styles, we learn what behavioral and attitudinal tendencies are central to that personality and how best to express this central persona in our work and life.  This practice allows us to express our most skillful tendencies in most work-related and personal situations, therefore allowing us to reach a heightened state of self-confidence and individual accomplishment. 

Today's leaders will be more successful, as will the organizations they lead, if they are empowered to achieve the agendas they are charged with.  These skills and models are just a few of the many available to help a leader increase their power and achieve their goals. 

Got something to share? Send me an e-mail, follow me on Twitter or join me on LinkedIn. 

 

Increasing Your Effectiveness by Balancing Inquiry with Advocacy

As a group facilitator I occasionally reflect on the functions I’ve led and am grateful for my ability to manage group dynamics.  It takes a great deal of effort and skill to help a group to operate effectively.  It’s not that the seeds of discord aren’t there to sow.  To the contrary, from my usual vantage point at the front of the room, I witness the full range of communication skills, from the pleasant to the developing to the, well, developing.  But as a skilled facilitator I help my groups to become deeply connected, and normally, this allows them to accomplish far more than if they had slipped into disharmony.  So what is the facilitator’s secret?  One of the facilitator’s secrets is to create a culture of “Inquiry” within the group…and you can do this for yourself by understanding your sixth sense.  

Everyone has a sixth sense, known as intuition, which allows us to feel drawn to or put off by others.  Operating quickly, our intuition distinguishes between pleasing personal characteristics and abhorrent ones, favoring the former.  One of the more pleasing characteristics to draw people to you is inquiry, or a genuine curiosity toward others.  Why is this characteristic so pleasing?  Because people genuinely want to be heard by someone, known by many, and taken seriously when they speak…especially if asked for their opinion.  And the secret is, you can do this yourself…if you understand what inquiry is and what it is not.

Inquiry isn’t a shallow curiosity where one learns only enough to incorporate their story, turning the conversation into a one-sided monologue. Nor is it a manipulative curiosity, i.e. “politicking,” where one’s interest is shown in the hope of some political or material gain.  This is curiosity where one fully focuses on another, channeling all internal attention and outer behavior toward the other and their chosen topic.

I am not saying that one should never advocate, or tell our own story; to the contrary, inquiry and advocacy should be balanced based on the situation.  Certain situations call one to advocate more than to inquire, and it’s our job to know the difference.  Two good rules of thumb to remember when effectively balancing inquiry with advocacy are: A) in important conversations hear beyond the words to discover how the person is feeling about what they’re saying and why it is important to them, and B) make sure that you practice good rules of dialogue in the appropriate situations.  

When understood and applied, inquiry causes entire organizations to vibrate at a higher-level of productivity and effectiveness.  This is largely due to staff enjoying their roles, feeling more fulfilled and relying on higher-order conduct such as improved communication, healthy conflict and increased trust.  Organizational leaders familiar with inquiry know that this conduct translates into reduced employee turnover, improved team performance and increased personal productivity, as well as other core business metrics. 

Occupation is a vital part of human fulfillment and humans are a vital part of organizational success.  Effective inquiry practices can provide the vital energy and effectiveness for both organizations and people.   

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Leaders: Conflict is Coming

Leaders must realize that conflict in the workplace is on the rise.  As power and decision-making continue migrating to the front-line of contemporary organizations, leaders have increased opportunities to prevent and mediate unhealthy conflict between newly empowered co-workers and overly-competitive teams.  But this is certainly not an opportunity that is sought after, considering the tendency for most organizational leaders within the United States to eschew conflict, leaving employees disconnected and disgruntled.  Leaders who continue to adopt a "conflict averse" persona, developing the conflict resolution skills neither within themselves nor their subordinates, become wholly destructive barriers to increased communication, innovation, and teamwork within their respective organizations.  The first of two leadership development tactics for improving conflict resolutions skill is understanding the common approaches toward conflict.   

The Thomas-Kilman Conflict Mode Instrument has long established the five foundational approaches toward conflict that we see in organizations today.  The approaches are: Competing (assertive, uncooperative), Avoiding (unassertive, uncooperative), Accommodating (unassertive, uncooperative), Collaborating (assertive, cooperative), and Compromising (intermediate assertiveness and cooperativeness).  Leaders first start their development by understanding their preferred approach toward conflict in the workplace and their preferred approach out of the workplace.  Once this understanding is in place, the leader will know which approach they are drawn to and which approach is their least preferred.  With this realization in place, they can then turn their attention toward others with the same understanding and increased empathy.  As these approaches all have situational utility, the last leadership development tactic is to increase one's ability to behaviorally shift into each style as appropriate and proactively attend to conflict when it arises.

Learning to shift into each conflict approach is based on development in two areas: situational understanding and behavioral practice.  Situational understanding is the strategic awareness and accurate choice of applying the correct style to the correct situation in an organizational context.  For instance, a team working through the process of making a series of quick decisions in rapid succession that were of moderate importance to the future of their organization would be out of line choosing the time and energy intensive collaborative approach toward conflict when the compromise approach would certainly do.  Furthermore, behavioral practice comes from a deeper understanding of the central behaviors and characteristics for each approach (such as direct communication style and sarcasm being appropriate behaviors for the competing approach).  Further development in this area can be had by reading the book, "The Conflict Resolution Toolbox" by Gary Furlong and by seeking out the assistance of a certified and experienced coach.  

As leaders we must embrace conflict as a necessary facet of our increasingly effective culture, not a barrier that we need to turn away from in fear.              

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