Mike, Author at The Third Zone

Jan 31 2017

All Leadership Styles MAY Work. Some Might Just Be Better!

The past two weeks has brought a lot of focus on our country’s new leader and his ‘leadership style’. Regardless of what you think of what we are hearing or observing, there is no question that our overall collective desire is to see achievement of the goals that are important to us as a nation and individually. In organizations, the same desire holds true.

It makes little difference if one has a responsibility to lead an entire organization, a department, a full team or just one other person.

The challenge is that we find an approach to leadership that meets objectives common to most
all situations. These are the basics:

Achieving the goals of those we have established as desired and needed

Operating in ways that will instill trust in us as a leader … a key ingredient to gaining the respect of our reports

Creating an environment in which people are willing to follow our lead so that success will be realized at the highest possible level

To the extent we can agree that these basics are among the goals of most leaders, the style that one employs to achieve them varies greatly. The variance and how we choose to be a leader is influenced by several things that include our experience, the effectiveness of the models we have had and the personalities that we bring to the responsibility. Here are leader ‘types’ that I encounter with regularity:

The Teacher/Mentor
Teaches, demonstrates and guides reports with the intent that they learn and grow in their capabilities thus making them individually stronger and more valuable to the effort

The Ambassador
Democratic and one who strives to bring people together by providing all with a voice intent on building consensus. This approach often results in encouraging creative thinking by encouraging diversification of perspectives and approaches.
The Warrior/General
Driven by power, status, and certainty at the same time he/she comes off as entitled, arrogant, and authoritarian. Immediate compliance is required.. It is a style more associated with times past as consensus building is not the goal. Performance is.
The Servant
Viewed as being the ‘inspirational’ type. The approach puts team members first. In this humanistic style, the leader is seen as a listener and empathetic with reports demonstrating high morale and enthusiasm for the tasks at hand.

The Coach
Out to build a cooperative and high-functioning team. Although the personal style of coaching may vary, the goal of developing individual skills, maximizing the cooperative success of the group is one that drives this leader type.

Once any of us are put into a position of leadership it is often the style of leadership in a given culture that will clearly impact personal success as well as that of the organization, department, team or individual we lead. To me, this seems worthy of consideration and a conscious choice. Agree?
Mike Dorman

Jan 17 2017

Turning Your Performance Review Into Job Security

Word has it that we are currently in an employer’s job market meaning that many companies are more easily able to find prospective employees with the skills they want and need. That also means that if they find someone who they believe might be better (more motivated, greater work ethic, more flexible or more skilled) than you, they might well be inclined to replace you. In the least that’s interesting and at the most it’s simply concerning or just scary. So what can you do about it? There is something and given the beginning of the New Year, it’s timely.

In many companies, the New Year signals the annual review time. Whether it’s dreaded or positively anticipated has to do with a couple of things. The reviewer in terms of how much effort they put into it and importance they place on it. To the reviewee the review is impacted in terms of how seriously they hear and accept it. However, in today’s employer’s job market, your forthcoming review is your opportunity to minimize the risk of your boss being

open to finding your replacement. Here is a fairly straight forward to-do list for making your next review the cement that provides greater job security.

Your own personal attitude toward your review
1. What is the value you want and anticipate getting from it?
2. What are reasons that keep you from actually wanting to have a review and what can you do to rethink and alter your attitude?
3. How can your review help you to grow and improve in your work and thus, enhance your value to the organization?
4. How do you want to ‘be’ as a reviewee … how do you want to be perceived by your reviewer?
What are the things you have accomplished in the last i.e. year that have increased your value to the job?
1. Where have you seen growth and what can you point at that confirms this growth?
2. What accomplishments have you made that reflect the input you received from your previous review?
What are things that you have set as your personal growth goals for the coming year?
1. What is your devised plan for achieving these goals?
2. How can your company/boss help you to achieve them?
What do you need to do in order to make your review an interactive meeting as one who takes it as an opportunity to increase their value to the organization?
1. What is the level of interest and attitude that you want to convey to your reviewer?
2. How do you want your reviewer to perceive you in this meeting and what is that going to require on your part?

It is generally known and true that replacing a person is more costly than helping someone already there improve in ways that will enhance their value and benefit. That’s not going to change and yet, with today being the employer’s market it does make it tempting for some to ‘look around’.

Spending the time to consider and have answers to the above question will only help to make you a willing and interested participant in your review meeting. Showing your interest and really preparing for your review enables you to come across as the one to keep. You will be making the boss less interested in looking elsewhere at the same time you get what you want … your job and its’ potential! Seems like this is a winner from all sides AND it actually s inexpensive cement … just your time and attitude.

Mike Dorman

Dec 14 2016

Coaching as a Way to Create Your Own Success

Athletes in all areas of sport use coaches. They use them when first learning, when they get stuck behind some poor habit that becomes an obstacle and when they are flying high and simply what to do even better. In other words, for these people, coaching becomes an important part of their drive to success. For the many years during which I have been actively coaching within the business world the similarities are strikingly similar.

A large number of new clients have come from those in need. By this I mean those who …

Feel frustrated by their lack of the personal success they strive to have
Work for someone who values their skill, however, experiences certain traits that work against the person being successful in their current role
Feel like they have lost their way to the goals that have been set for them or by them

A person in these situations look to the coached approach as one that will help them move beyond the various obstacles that have gotten in their way. That is what we, as coach and client, work together to do … identify the specific situations, uncover approaches that are tailored to the individual or the team, and take actions that will

enable one to move beyond their current place of ‘stuck’ while resuming the climb to maximized success.

However viewing coaching as a tool to aid only those sensing or aware of a problem is to short change the person and the value that coaching can and does provide. Therein lies a myth about the process. It is not simply addressing things that we find challenging and limiting. In fact, its’ true power is derived when we focus on furthering the positives and amplifying them to help the forward movement of our goals and successes.

I recently was contacted by a former coaching client some 2½ years since we ended our successful working relationship. The reason for his reaching out again was based on 3 key reasons:

His position had changed from when we first worked together and he wanted to revisit various approaches he was using in order to explore some that might be more effective in this new role.
He wanted to scale his mountain to greater heights now that he could see that higher level of what success could be.
Having been successful to this point increased his appetite to heighten his position as a leader in his organization. He was confident that the use of coaching would significantly hasten the speed with which he could make his next leap.

The work we did during this ‘revisit’ allowed us to focus on some key elements of this client’s work life. We were able to …

Review and celebrate the things he had been doing that allowed his growth and related success. This is also an opportunity to recall some things that had slipped out of the routine that he felt he wanted to resurrect. In total it served to reawaken what had been achieved on our initial coaching endeavor.
Define his next set of goals that would translate to taking him further on his climb. Undoubtedly, his plan for his future had changed because of his achievement to date and thus, revamping and expanding the vision was so appropriate and needed.
Determine his personal plan for achieving his revamped intensions with valuable accountability built into his process.

There is no question that coaching is a valuable tool that helps individuals or leadership teams turn themselves around from a downward slide or just existing on flat terrain. And there is also no doubt that it can be extremely effective when used as such. However, when people use the coached approach to capitalize on the successes already realized to redefine that climb to their higher level they are taking advantage of an exciting and valuable aid to speeding up the process.

Being the end of 2016, I give you a challenge. Look at where you are today and as importantly, where you want to be in the next year or two. How might your use of coaching help you get ‘there’ sooner and more effectively? I hope you’ll agree that it’s worth serious thought and a conversation.

Mike Dorman

Dec 01 2016

How Age Works For or Against You In Today’s Workplace

There was a time when one’s seniority within an organization was a very real consideration when it came to getting a promotion into a management position. It made sense that length of time we had spent with the company would logically indicate that we understood the goals, we had worked in various positions that provided us with a good general knowledge of many aspects of the operation and we had ‘earned’ it. As a result, those leading the overall charge tended to be of an older generation. And that was then.

Today there is a trend that is markedly different. As Millennials have overtaken the number of Baby Boomers in the workplace, there are more and more situations wherein it is a younger person that is being promoted into positions of management which means there are many older employees now reporting to a younger boss. From where I sit and

although historically the situation has occurred for many years, the growth of working millennials has created a more prevalent problem with which companies are having to deal as the growing ‘norm’.

Jena McGregor of the Washington Post wrote an article relating the impact of a younger boss on job performance in which she addresses this challenge. McGregor points out that the impact of such a reporting hierarchy is multi-faceted. In addition to the negative feelings generated among older workers, they can spread throughout a company. Some older employees see this as their personal failure and lack of progress in that they have failed to keep pace.

In years past, when an older and longer-time employee found themselves reporting to a younger boss they saw themselves as having two choices. One was to recognize that the game had changed and they were flexible enough to accept the reporting structure as okay and the way it was. The second choice if they just couldn’t adapt was to make the decision to leave the organization. Today’s frequency of the potential of older reporting to younger can have real and detrimental impact on a company if this creates a larger scale departure and the resulting revolving door. It makes good sense that companies today recognize this as a problem waiting to happen and take proactive measures to address it … before it is a problem. Although not a simple situation, there are some basic ‘starter’ steps to address this. Doing so will serve to lessen the costly and negative impact of such a dichotomy and actually make it a positive.

Include awareness and sensitivity training to the one being promoted into management. Having them understand what they will likely encounter and preparing them for the most positive and effective ways to anticipate and respond to it is extremely worthwhile and can avoid so many of the unplanned consequences.
Make certain that the forthcoming ‘new’ boss sees and understands the value that the older employee adds to their personal success and that of the organizations.
Educate the ‘Boomer’ as to what they have the ability to contribute that the new boss needs in order to be successful … personally and on behalf of the company … and how this enhances rather than diminishes their value.
Offer the older employees training sessions on the use of new technology that is second nature to the younger person. It is often the comfort level with advancing technology that has worked to create division between generations at work … and the resentment.

Not too long ago there was a movie entitled “The Intern”. It dealt with just this issue of generational divide in a company. Of course it was Hollywood, yet it showed what can be the result when people can come to value and respect the different viewpoints reflected by generational divides. The sooner an organization accepts this as a real and potential ‘bump’ in what they desire to have in a smooth operating machine, the more likely they are to avoid the unintended negatives that this changing work environment can create.

Mike Dorman

Nov 09 2016

Taming Our Assumptions in the Workplace As A Prelude to the Success We Want

Regardless of type or size of an organization, one challenge that permeates most, at all levels, is the tendency and willingness of people to move forward on a project, in their overall job or simply general conversation based on what they understood. We often just assume that we ‘get it’ and don’t need to or feel we have the freedom to question … whether it comes from a boss or co-worker. Unfortunately how we interpret what we heard or saw doesn’t make it correct. It’s our assumption rather than knowing it to be fact and that’s when problems arise … problems that often prove to be costly, cause frustration and ultimately, a general unrest within the team.

I hasten to say that this situation is far from rare. In fact, it lays at the foundation of many issues that rear their head within any company … how to have good, clear, basic and effective communication. Whose job is it to get clarification that aligns all behind the same understanding? The answer is simple. It’s everyone’s job. The organization’s ultimate desire and goal is to operate with the maximum level of efficiency and the minimum amount of rework. The employee wants to be successful in their work and be appreciated for their contribution. The starting point for this happening comes through an across-the-board effort of having clear communication and arriving on the same page of shared understanding.

Mara Vizzuitti penned an article entitled “The Poser in Checking Out Your Assumptions”th at addressed this issue. She said that “As long as we’re in relationships with others, be it in the workplace or in our personal lives, we are only going to have communication glitches. We would do well to expect them. One of the reasons for this is our propensity for making assumptions about people and events that occur around us. Most of the time, our assumptions are just plain wrong.

In other words, we’re pretty good at deciding what that ‘look’ means or what that ‘email’ means. We even assume we know what people are thinking. It is natural to make judgments, as our brains are constantly processing information. However, we make up stories about the “way he or she is” potentially creating issues with others that don’t exist. It is likely that 80 percent of conflict is based in fantasy.”

We have all experience this scenario. We see someone make a face at something we may have said and immediately we tend to make up what that means. Like … they don’t like the idea … it’s a silly one … they don’t think we know what we’re talking about … or they just disagree with us. All of this because of someone else’s look or action. And … unless we are willing to question what we saw we will not ever know that our assumptions are, in fact, true or just an erroneous assumptions.

What is very important is that we be become curious and enter a communication wanting to truly ‘hear’ the response regardless of what it may be. Here are some simple ways to check out our assumptions as identified by Vizzutti:

Ask Permission:
Can I check something out with you?
Describe the behavior:
Yesterday, I noticed you made a face while I was presenting my suggestions for moving forward …
State your Assumption:
“I assumed you were upset with what I had said …”
Ask an open-ended question: “Is this true? What were you thinking?

In making your inquiry as you seek to determine the validity of your ‘made-up’ conclusions you are going to find out one of two things: Either …

you will find that your assumptions were just wrong and nowhere near the truth.
or …
you will determine that your interpretation is correct and you can then have open conversation to understand the other person(s) better and create how you can avoid such unintended consequences or at least minimize this in the future.

Regardless of what you discover you will then know how you should and need to proceed. Perhaps nothing other than to work to tame your imagination. Or perhaps you will need to have more conversation to understand the other person’s point of view. Just remaining satisfied that your original assumption is right will eventually impact the relationship negatively resulting in withdrawal from the other person(s). That in turn can clearly impact both the organization’s success and one’s personal satisfaction and enjoyment of his/her jobs.

Think about it. All it takes is talk … something we do pretty easily!

Mike Dorman

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