by Julia Felton | Jun 21, 2017
If you want to get the best from your team you need to learn to connect, engage and communicate with them. Even if this isn’t your natural bent, you can learn to do this. In fact, the reason I’m writing this post today is because one of my clients said to me this week “Julia, one of the things I appreciate about you is that you’re so good at asking questions. I’m not. That’s just not how I’m wired.”
To which I responded, “Thanks for the compliment, but I’m not wired that way either.” Learning to use questions to lead isn’t a natural ability for most of us, it’s an acquired skill. And it’s not that hard to do on a skill level, it’s only hard on an implementation level. So, here are a few ideas to help you get started on unleashing your inner questioner.
1. Learn to see yourself as a developer of talent, not the boss. At the end of the day, most of us like to be tellers because we see ourselves as “the boss.” When we own the boss hat, most of us like to be in the teller role (I hired you. I pay you. Do what I tell you to do). And as long as we own that mindset, we’ll struggle with asking questions. However, if you can make the mental shift from boss to talent developer, you’ll begin to see your role completely differently (which is key because talent developers create leverage, whereas bosses don’t).
2. Make questioning your first response. I know this may feel pedantic, but when someone asks you a question, ask them a question back. Refuse to just give the answer (something that most of us who are male will always struggle with :-). Instead, when someone asks, “So, what do you think I should do?” throw it back to them, “First, tell me what you think you should do?” If they say, “I asked you first.” Just respond, “Well, how do you think I’d respond?” Return question for question. As hard as this is, don’t give the first answer. This was something I was challenged with when working in my corporate role, but asking questions helps team members become more resourceful and ultimately take more responsibility for their actions. In today’s world of mobile communication it is just too easy for team members to abdicate any responsibility and just ask their boss. But this does not help us develop leaders of the future.
3. Open your team conversations with questions. Instead of saying, “Pete, we have a problem here. And here’s what I want you to do.” Open the conversation with a wide open question. “Pete, as you know, we have a problem here. What do you think is creating it?” Or, “What’s your best thinking about how to solve this?” Or, “Do you have any ideas about how we can eliminate this in the next 30 days?”
Yes, there is an art to asking good questions (for example, wide open questions are better for creating independent thinkers), but what’s more important is that you embrace the principle that being a questioner is a better leadership choice than being a teller. Once you do that, you’ll acquire the skill set over time through trial and error. But you’ll never get there if you don’t embrace this concept as a core leadership practice.
So do you? Do you really believe that being a leader who leads through questioning is better than being a leader who leads by telling? I hope so because the choice you make will have profound consequences for you and your company for years to come. So, choose wisely! Remember,
“If you want to get the most from your people, then you need to draw the best that is in them—out of them.”
By the way, if you’re thinking, “But asking questions sure takes a lot more time than telling,” then you probably don’t own the idea that a leader isn’t a boss, a leader is a talent developer who leverages the time, talent, treasures, resources, intellectual property and connections of their people to produce a result.
Oh, and one last thought. This principle and practice holds true whether you are leading a two person team or a two thousand person team.
Go forth and ask better questions so that you can connect, engage and communicate.
by Julia Felton | Jun 14, 2017
“There’s no such thing as a self-made millionaire. Only TEAM-made millionaires”
In last week’s Wednesday Wisdom we discussed the different leadership positions and the fact that in the herd leadership is shared. A horse herd operates as a team and to my mind teamwork is the most effective way in business to create success. Being in business is tough and there is simply no way that you can do everything by yourself. Each of us has own our brilliance and working with team members enables you to focus on your brilliance whilst letting others do theirs. The net effect is that everyone is in a state called flow, which is the state of least resistance. Then business becomes easy and fun.
But how do you get the best out of team members and inspire them to give of their best to help your business grow and be successful.? The answer is to ask better questions. So are you a teller or a questioner?
In other words, when you’re working with your team members (or outsourcers) do you tend to tell them what to do or do you engage them in a conversation by asking questions?
If you’re like most entrepreneurial leaders, chances are you’re the former. If that’s true, then my question to you is “How’s that working for you?”
My guess is it’s not working out as great as you’d like it to. In fact, I find that most entrepreneurial leaders are pretty frustrated with the people they’re “leading.” See if any of the following statements ring true for you
- “They never do what I tell them to do!”
- “It always takes her ten times longer to do what I asked her to do. If she’d just listen to me, she could get it done in one tenth of the time it’s currently taking!”
- “I can’t understand why it’s taking him so long to do what I asked him to do.”
- “I can’t figure out why she just can’t follow my directions.”
- “I didn’t hire him to think. I hired him to do what I tell him to do.”
Ouch! And I fully understand those sentiments. As an entrepreneurial leader myself I understand why you want people to do what you want them to do in the way you want them to do it (after all, you are the BOSS, right? And it is YOUR company. And you do pay THE BILLS. And they do work for YOU, right?).
Furthermore, I get the whole driven part of the entrepreneurial personality. According to my Talent Dynamics profile I have lots of dynamo energy so, by personality, I like being a teller. I like saying, as chances are you do, “Here’s what I want you to do. Now, just go do it. No questions. No debate. Just get it done EXACTLY how I told you to do it.”
But, as you well know, that approach doesn’t produce the best results
The Problem With Being a Teller
What I learned, and hopefully you are as well, is that being a teller is a counterproductive leadership approach. Why? For a number of reasons. I’ll give you three.
- Telling doesn’t create buy in. As you know, people own what they help create, which, by definition means they don’t own what they don’t help create. So, if you or I say, “Billy, I want you to do X in Y way,” how much does he own that? Virtually nil. And if someone doesn’t own a task or project or process/procedure or event or strategy or tactic, the chances of them producing the best result will always be lower than if Billy is involved in creating the solution. Telling doesn’t work because it doesn’t create buy in or ownership.
Note: We’re not talking about following systems here. We’re talking about solving problems or creating something new.
- Telling doesn’t produce the kind of people you want/need. In other words, if you’re a teller, you’re NOT developing your people to be their best (whether that’s to be a better leader or problem solver or innovator or coach or process person, etc.). Or to put it another way, if you or I are always in the telling position, then we’re not creating independent thinkers. And if we’re not creating independent thinkers, then we’ll have to keep doing all the thinking—which leads to the third reason why you don’t want to be a teller.
- Telling doesn’t create leverage. If you or I still have to do all the thinking, then we’re not creating leverage. We’re simply creating more work for ourselves. We become the bottleneck to growth. If our people don’t own the task, then we have to invest more time in managing and leading the task. If our people aren’t really excited about a task or project, then more conflict will occur, which means we’ll have to invest more time. Or, if the only people we’re happy with are people who will just do what they’re told, then we’ll always put a lid on the quality of the kind of employee we can hire (which, again, kills leverage).
Any way you add it up, being a teller, just isn’t the smartest leadership choice you or I can make if we want to grow a fast growing business or organisation.
The Better Option
The better option, if you want to get the best from your team is to learn to connect, engage and communicate with them. Even if this isn’t your natural bent, you can learn to do this.
Next week I’ll be sharing my best tips on how to connect through using questions.
by Julia Felton | Apr 5, 2017
“I’m sure you’ve all heard the adage “Teamwork makes the dream work”, but what exactly is a team and why is teamwork such an illusive quality that provides real competitive advantage?
Have you ever considered that one is a very small number for greatness.
Just think about it, every great enterprise has begun with at a team of at least two people. Bill Gates and Paul Allen founded Microsoft, Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak led to the founding of Apple, Five talented musicians led to the formation of The Beatles and the story goes on and on.
By channeling the efforts, talents and resources of ourselves and our team members not only can we succeed faster and easier but also, through leveraging our combined resources, we are able to operate as a high performance team, and achieve more.
When individuals and teams are in a peak performance state, they are in a state that is often called Flow, where they are Joined Up and aligned.
Put simply, Flow is the path of least resistance. When team members are in Flow, productivity rises, results increase, occurrences line up, team members have more fun and feel more connected to the organisation.
Flow is a state in which a person is fully immersed in an activity, caught in a feeling of energised focus and full involvement. It is focused motivation, where the emotions are not just contained and channelled but positively energised and aligned with the task at hand.
When people are immersed in Flow, they can experience a distortion of time as their internal clock doesn’t seem to match the external clock. You may have experience this yourself
When team members are feeling stressed, overwhelmed or anxious, it’s a fairly good indicator that they are out of Flow. The opposite is true when they are in Flow, they feel joy and even rapture whilst performing the task; they are fully engaged.
In the work place, Flow can be seen where an individual’s challenges and skills are equally matched, thereby creating a harmonious environment.
When team members are in Flow the following occurs:
- Complete involvement in what they are doing – focused and concentrating
- A sense of ecstasy – a sense of being outside everyday reality
- Greater inner clarity – knowing what needs to be done, and knowing how well they are doing
- Knowing that the activity is doable – that their skills are adequate to the task
- A sense of serenity – no worries about oneself, and a feeling of growing beyond the boundaries of the ego
- Timelessness – thoroughly focused on the present, hours seem to pass by in minutes
- Intrinsic motivation – whatever produces Flow becomes its own reward
As difficult as teamwork is to measure and achieve, its power cannot be denied. When people come together and set aside individual needs for the good of the whole, they can achieve more than would appear possible on paper.
When teams are aligned behind a purpose that everyone resonates with, then office politics and confusion are eliminated. Team members gain a sense of connection and belonging by being part of something and this increases team engagement levels and satisfaction levels.
If you’d like to better understand how to leverage your talents and time, get into flow and discover the roles where you can add most value to a team, you could invest in a Talent Dynamics Assessment. You can purchase it here.
Wishing you a flow filled week.
by Julia Felton | Oct 12, 2016
My motto for last week as I was transported back into time and rode through France as a Musketeer was “All for One and One For All”. Before I decided to attend this Musketeer Academy I have to confess to not really knowing about the stories of the three musketeers and the important role they had in serving the French King and protecting him. And I certainly never really gave any consideration to their motto “All for One and One For All”, and yet the more time I spent as a Musketeer, the more I experienced how this philosophy was critical for their success and how it’s essence is fundamental to business success too.
To me the phrase “All for One and One For All” embodies the real need that we have in business right now for collaboration and co-operation. No longer can an individual be successful by themselves, but rather success comes from being part of a team. It comes from the collective actions of everyone rather then the results of one individual.
I often talk about Shared Leadership and how in today’s fast paced environment there is simply too much going on for just one leader to pay attention too. This is why the leadership role needs sharing, and it is what the horses do so well. They act seamlessly together to collectively ensure the safety of the herd – and if any herd member is not playing their part, they are quickly reprimanded and if necessary expelled from the herd. The herd act as one and understand that value of “All for One and One For All”, after all their very life depends on it.
I experienced the importance if “All for One and One For All” whilst learning fencing too. As our troop of Musketeers stormed the castles it was imperative that we all worked together if we were to overcome our adversaries. After all in battle your odds of success are considerably stacked in your favour if you’re fighting two on one, rather than one on one!!. But this is only possible if you have a clear focus and everyone knows the direction and the goal you are aiming for.
So this weeks Wednesday Wisdom thought is how can you collaborate and connect with others, how can you share your dreams and vision and in the words of Jim Collins “get the right people on the bus” so that you have a team working alongside you that are all focused on the end goal, rather than their own personal agenda and ego and who live the adage “All for One and One For All”
As always I’d love you to share in the Facebook group about what you are doing to create your own team of Musketeers who embody the values of “All for One and One For All”
by Julia Felton | Sep 21, 2016
During the last few years I have never ceased to be amazed by the power of the collective to achieve amazing results. It is one of the reasons that I always encourage my clients to find a team of people to support them as they grow their business.
All too often when we start off in business we fail to engage the support of others as often we feel it is too expensive and the business can’t afford it. The real truth is that you can’t afford not to have a team around you. Each team member provides a different perspective and these different opinions can help elevate the business to a different level than the business owner can achieve by themselves.
Yesterday I spent a day with three colleagues preparing for an international event we are delivering for a global client in early October. We are achieving a first as we are delivering a UK version of the Teaching Horse programme simultaneously in Amsterdam and North Carolina, USA.
There are some unique features of the Teaching Horse methodology so we decided to to have a practice day to ensure that we were all on the same page. What was amazing was that each of us brought our unique interpretation to the approach, but by discussing and collectively practicing the exercises we were able to create a streamlined approach that flowed much better than each of us could achieve individually.
That is the power of the collective intelligence and why I am also an advocate of Mastermind groups and working in teams. You can read about the power of Mastermind groups here.
Interestingly, in nature lots of activities occur in collective groups. Just take a herd of horses. They live as a collective as this helps keep everyone safe. Geese fly in formation, lions hunt as a team. There are examples every where how of the power of collective achieves disproportional results. Definitely a case of 1+1=3.
So how can you leverage the power of the collective to achieve amazing results? I’d love to hear from you about what you going to do.
by Julia Felton | Jul 29, 2016
A few years ago the guru’s at Google set out to determine what makes a high performing team. Now we all know how great Google is at finding patterns in data series but the reality is that after years of research and analyzing 150 teams they came to the conclusion that simply there was no pattern. Initially they had believed that putting the best people on a project would get the best results but this simply was not true.
So what ensures that a team is high performing?
The Google executives frustrated with the lack of patterns in the data they collected, the researchers delved further into reviewing past academic studies on how teams work. In the literature, they discovered that psychological and sociological research kept using the term “group norms” when describing successful groups. Norms are the traditions, behavioral standards and unwritten rules that govern how we function when we gather. It was becoming clear that the most effective teams had ‘group norms’ that added to their success.
The challenge that the Google researchers now had was figuring out which ‘group norms’ were the most valuable. With further research, the group norm that emerged as one of the most powerful was ‘psychological safety’.
‘Psychological safety’ has been described by Harvard Business School professor Amy Edmondson as a ‘‘shared belief held by members of a team that the team is safe for interpersonal risk-taking.’’ “A sense of confidence that the team will not embarrass, reject or punish someone for speaking up,’’ Edmondson wrote in a study published in 1999
How to create Psychological Safety
Creating a psychologically safe environment for a team needs to be spearheaded by the leadership in the developing stages of a team. This is the reason that leaders play a more significant role in creating effective teams than the people who make up the team. I certainly know this to be true from my own experience. Some of the best teams I have been part of have been led by inspiring and compelling leaders. People who have been really inclusive and have led by example. People who have created an environment in which we have all felt valued, included and safe to share. A place where we can be authentic and be ourselves. A place were we don’t have to worry about putting on a our game face but rather can show up as our true self, devoid of any masks.
Leaders need to allow for the creation of an emotional safety net to develop within their teams. One way to create this environment is to carve out time for people to actually share their feelings and not just updates on the latest reports or budget numbers.
Leaders can take the time at weekly meetings to start by asking how people are feeling and why. The first few times these conversations happen, it will be beneficial if the leader shares first to set an example of the level and type of information to be shared. In one example from Google at an offsite retreat with a newer team, the leader started off the conversation telling his team that he had cancer and the effects it was having on his life. This opened the doors for in-depth sharing from the rest of the team.
As a leader showing up as authentic and vulnerable can really set the tone for the group and encourage others to open up and so have courageous conversations without fear of reprisals. (You can learn about the 6 C’s to Courageous Communication here). Being vulnerable goes a long way in developing strong trust bonds and trust is the basic building block of teams.
by Julia Felton | Jun 25, 2016
Having led and worked in teams for more than 30 years, I thought I’d share a few key ideas that I have learnt that will you get a team of people to work more cohesively and effectively together. It is particularly effective to do some of these with a new team or group that about to embark on a project together. It can really pay dividends in the smooth running of the project.
1. Enable Them To Build trust
In my book The Alchemy of Change I reveal how trust is the glue that holds a business together. It is that unseen factor in business that makes all the difference. In his book on the five dysfunctions of a team Patrick Lencioni explains i it is really important for a team to develop ‘vulnerability-based’ trust. This means that they need to share things and understand more about each other. Personally I love using Talent Dynamics which is an assessment tool which helps team members learn more about themselves and their other team members in a non-threatening way. And of course when you understand the drivers of your other team members communication can be enhanced. Also by every team member focusing on their strengths the group collective is enable to achieve greater productivity and profitability than the sum of the individuals. This is the power of collective teamwork.
Another way to help team members build trust is by allowing them to share stories with each other about when they were younger. Here is a format that I got from Larry Reynolds, which I have used many times to great effect.
- Think of a time when you faced some kind of challenge. It can be a challenge big or small, and it can be something that happened recently or many years ago. Challenges you faced as a child or young adult can make especially powerful stories. The only proviso is that things worked out alright in the end, and that you are happy to share this experience with others.
- How did you feel when you encountered this challenge? It’s probably something on the spectrum between concerned and terrified.
- What unexpected help came your way? Maybe you drew on some inner resources, or maybe someone else helped you.
- How did things work out in the end?
- What did you learn from this experience?
- What does that say about your values and beliefs as a person now
2. Help Them Get Comfortable With Disagreeing
It’s really important, if a team are to make great decisions that they are comfortable with a level of conflict and disagreement in the team. Give them some tasks to do that involve disagreement and negotiation. Set a task where a decision needs to make and carefully facilitate a discussion where when a person states a point of view or puts forward an idea, at least two people must say specifically what they like or agree with and then at least two people must point out potential issues, flaws or reasons that they disagree. When a team can get comfortable separating the ideas and concepts from the person, they will be able to make better decisions. Also if issues are discussed properly, teams are able to commit to decisions that they don’t necessarily fully agree with if they can understand the rationale behind the decision and they feel that they have been fully heard.
3. Help Them Get Comfortable Giving And Receiving Feedback
Giving and receiving feedback effectively will enable the team to grow and develop faster and will also enable them to hold each other accountable for behaviours and results. Enable them to practise giving real face-to-face feedback by doing an activity such as ‘warm seat’:
A ‘warm seat’ is a little bit like a hot seat but cooler! Group members prepare questions to ask the rest of the group about themselves. These questions can be positive e.g. what is great about working with me? Neutral e.g. what is it like working with me? Or negative e.g. in what ways do I sometimes annoy you? Group members take it in turns to sit in the warm seat for a pre-arranged amount of time e.g. five minutes and ask their questions. Group members answer the questions (which can be general or specific) as specifically as possible with examples. They can only answer questions posed and at any time the person is free to vacate the warm seat if they’ve had enough.
4. Set Up A Team Charter
Another practical thing that a team can do is to set up a team charter, which includes agreements about ways of working. Get clarity first on the team’s vision, purpose and values. Then get clear about people’s different roles within the team by defining individual responsibilities and goals through referencing their strengths using Talent Dynamics. They can then get into identifying appropriate behaviours for team members, communication and decision-making processes and agreements about the use of resources. Encourage the team to put forward ‘rules’ that they can all sign up to, for example, ‘we get back to e-mails from each other within 24 hours’ or ‘when we disagree, we express this calmly and openly’ etc. Once this charter is established, team members can be encouraged to hold each other accountable for both behaving in line with what has been agreed and for their responsibility areas. This should happen as part of every team meeting.
5. Practice Being A Real Team By Giving Them A Challenge To Complete
Overcoming obstacles to achieve a goal is something that we typically get all teams engage in during my leadership with horses workshop. In this exercise the team members set the goal they wish to achieve and then build obstacles that could represent things that could prevent them from meet the goal. They then get introduced to a new team member (a horse) and have to all work together to get over the obstacles and achieve the goals. The team get all kinds of insights into how to communicate effectively, the different positions of leadership and how to co-operate and collaborate together to achieve success. The celebrations that occur when the team is successful are incredible and every team has always gone back to the workplace with more confidence and certainty about their capabilities.
Since the team has had an embodied experience of how to work successfully together this physical or ‘muscle’ memory stays with them and also make them want to achieve that feeling of working in harmony and being jointly accountable again!. Once people feel what it’s like to truly work as a team and achieve positive results, they usually want to do it again!
To learn about how to develop your high performance team please connect with me for a complimentary conversation and lets explore what’s possible.
by Julia Felton | Feb 11, 2016
The adage goes that “a picture is worth a thousand words”, so therefore I’m curious to know what you think about this picture. What message do you think I was being sent when it arrived in my inbox? And how do you think I reacted?
We often totally under-estimate the power of non-verbal communication in our society and yet non-verbal communication is an essential component of everyday life. We can convey a simple or complex message very succinctly with how we show up.
If we are feeling bored and unenthusiastic at work our body posture will probably express this with folded arms, rounded shoulders and generally looking glum and sad. Contrast this with a team member who is happy and in flow enjoying their job. They probably have a spring in their step, are literally walking on air and have a happy countenance.
How we BE at work and in life shapes how people interact with us and therefore the experiences we have. Sure words are important, but only up to a point as research shows that our body language and tonality have a much greater impact on the impression we make than anything else.
So how do you think I responded when I received this. Well of course I laughed and immediately saw the funny side of how my actions were stopping one of my colleagues getting on with her work. What might have become a heated conversation – her chasing me for something I hadn’t completed – got deflected with with one simple image.
So how can you use non-verbal communication to convey your message in a fun and innovative way?. I’d love to hear what you are doing.
And of course if you want to learn non-verbal communication from horses, who are masters at this, then look out for my Art of Communication workshop that up soon. You can find all the details here.
Have an inspired rest of the week.
by Julia Felton | Jan 9, 2016
Success is a team sport and it is imperative that you have the right team members alongside you to create a winning team. Now I know when you are starting out in business having a team might seem like a luxury, but trust me it is the best investment you can make.
Having a team helps you feel supported and no longer alone. The curse of the business owner is feeling like they have to do it all themselves, whilst the opposite is in fact true. Surround yourself with team members who excel at the activities you don’t. It will make your life so much easier and allow you to spend time doing the things that you love and that add real value to the business.
And if you’ve ever like to add me to your team then let me know and we can schedule a complimentary strategy session to see if we would be a good fit for each other.
Just like any successful sports team, your team members must gel together if you are to really leverage the full benefits of teamwork.
by Julia Felton | Nov 27, 2015
Just because you have the title of leader doesn’t make you are a leader. And just because you don’t have the title of leader doesn’t mean you aren’t a leader. To my mind everyone in the organisation is a leader which is why in my new book The Alchemy Of Change: The Key To the Future Lies In The Past I explore the concept of Shared Leadership.
So what is Shared Leadership?
Shared Leadership is the concept that, given the rapidity of change, there is no way one person can know about everything in the business. For a business to be successful, leadership and decision making needs to be shared.
The old paradigm of command and control leadership simply won’t serve us in this The Big data era, where collaboration is a necessity. There is simply too much going on for one leader to be able to manage it all. This in itself creates blind spots for businesses, which is why a more flatter, more collaborative style of leadership, which is more responsive is required.
When Shared Leadership is adopted within the organisation then everyone looks out for the needs of the businesses, not in a self-serving ego way, but from a place of contribution to the community. Everyone is focused on the goal and works as a team to achieve this. It always surprises me that business has not taken a leaf from the world of sport. In a sports team there is no place for individual performance. Success only comes from the collective performance of the team.
The famous basketball player Michael Jordan knew this when he said: “Talent wins games but teamwork and intelligence wins championships”. Michael understood the power of collaboration and how only by all team members working together could the team win the game.
Interestingly, herds of wild horses also understand the power of Shared Leadership. The herd is structured with two leaders – the lead mare and the stallion – and they work in collaboration to keep the herd safe. They seek out food, water and shelter for the herd but the herd members do not solely rely on the leaders to keep them safe. Every herd member has a responsibility to maintain the safety of the herd and so contribute to its survival.
The herd has a shared purpose and focus, which quite simply is to stay alive. As a prey animal the horses main challenge is how to avoid being someone else’s dinner! It is this shared purpose and vision which enables the herd to become self regulating. There is no space in the herd for self-serving members and in fact they are driven out of the herd. This is the worst punishment ever because being evicted from the herd means that you are all alone, and this is not a safe place to be because its challenging to protect yourself when you are isolated from others.
So when is business going to wake up to the need for Shared Leadership? I wonder how much more productive and profitable an organisation could be if everyone was working from the same page towards the same goals and where the result of the team was more important than that of the individual.
The 2010 Burston-Marsteller?IMD Corporate Purpose Study revealed that organisations that focused on having a strong well communicated corporate purpose that everyone in the business got behind delivered a 17% improvement in financial performance compared to those organisations that didn’t. Wow, what a load of resources are being wasted in business simply because of the self serving stance that many people are taking.
Imagine the possibilities if everyone in business worked more effectively together as a high performing team. I wonder what we all could achieve.
If you’d like to learn more about the principles of creating a high performance business with Shared Leadership then please connect with me for a complimentary consultation.
