Category Archives: teams

Brain Gender: Different, Yet Equal?

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Is there really such a thing as brain gender?

In March 2019, researchers attempted to answer this question based on an MRI database of 490 men and 575 women. What they reported was relative to the structural differences between men and women:

“By using the designed 3D PCNN algorithm, we confirmed that the gender-related differences exist in the whole-brain FA images as well as in each specific brain regions. These gender-related brain structural differences might be related to gender differences in cognition, emotional control as well as neurological disorders.”

Their summary supports the theory that there are differences between a male and female brain, and that these differences determine our thinking, feeling, behavior, and psychological health. But, notice the keyword they used: “might.”

Unfortunately, they are not alone. For decades scientists have been pointing to similar findings and analysis, commonly accepted as fact. Consider the differences molecular biologist Dr. John Media describes in Brain Rules (Pear Press, 2008):

  • Men have a bigger amygdala, a structure that processes emotions.
  • The male brain produces serotonin (a neurotransmitter that regulates mood, learning and memory, among other functions) more rapidly than the female brain.
  • Women have larger connectors in the corpus callosum, which links the brain’s right and left hemispheres. (The left hemisphere is thought to be the primary source of neural information for routine tasks. The right deals with novelty and innovation, including experiences and data that are less structured. The right hemisphere is more image-based and operates in the realm of metaphors.)

Research is important: it influences the way we teach, work, and relate to one another. But there are big problems with brain gender theories and studies. They frequently support gender stereotypes, create barriers, and limit individuals from reaching their potential.

The Power of Brain Gender Stereotype

It has been widely accepted that men and women differ in how they manage people and give orders. Studies pointed to how women soften their demands and statements, whereas men are more direct and unapologetic. For example, women use phrases like:

  • “Don’t you think?” (after presenting an idea)
  • “If you don’t mind?” (following a demand)
  • “This may be a crazy idea, but…” (preceding a suggestion)

Is this nature, or nurture?

Many women are culturally conditioned to encourage harmony in relationships, as evidenced by softened demands, hedged statements, and a more tentative communication style. But tentative communication doesn’t mean a woman actually feels tentative or lacks confidence. Similarly, more direct communication, as seen with men and some women, doesn’t mean a person is arrogant, bossy, or feels superior. These are learned communication styles: a matter of nurture.

The amygdala governs many emotional responses, as well as our ability to remember them. After experiencing a traumatic event, the female amygdala communicates with the left brain hemisphere. The opposite occurs in men: their amygdala communicates with the right hemisphere.

It’s been widely reported that women remember the emotional details of an event, while men recall the ultimate outcome. Furthermore, women use both hemispheres when speaking and processing verbal information, while men primarily use one. These facts are broadly accepted as matters of nature.

But as Cordelia Fine, PhD writes, “Our intellects are not prisoners of our genders or our genes, and those who claim otherwise are merely coating old-fashioned stereotypes with a veneer of scientific credibility.”

Recognize Neurosexism

The term “neurosexism,” coined by Fine, refers to a flawed belief that results from the intersection of neuroscience and sexism. The belief is based on the assumption that gender differences perceived in character and behavior are caused by biological differences between male and female brains. We now have growing evidence and research that points to self-fulfilling prophecies.

Gina Rippon, PhD, and author of The Gendered Brain (Vintage Digital, 2019), has analyzed gender-related differences in the brain. What she has found is that when the differences in brain size are accounted for, differences in key structures disappear. As Rippon explains in an interview with theguardian.com:

“The brain is a rule scavenger and it picks up its rules from the outside world. The rules will change how the brain works and how someone behaves. The ‘gender gap’ becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.”

The Greater Power of Neuroplasticity

We now know that the brain continues to grow well into our later years through a process called “neuroplasticity.” Specifically, brain activity associated with a given function can be transferred to a different location, the proportion of grey matter can change, and synapses may strengthen or weaken over time. Neuroplasticity accommodates learning by producing new neurons, cells that help transfer information. 

“By the close of the 20th century, the brain had come to be envisaged as mutable across the whole of life, open to environmental influences, damaged by insults, and nourished and even reshaped by stimulation—in a word, plastic.”~ Sociologist Nikolas Rose and graduate student Joelle M. Abi-Rached, Neuro: The New Brain Sciences and the Management of the Mind(Princeton University Press, 2013)

Neuroplasticity demonstrates that brain cells can change in response to intrinsic and extrinsic factors. Not only is it possible to change our brain, we can change the way we look at brains, our nature, and our potential. Even as adults, our brains continually change by the work we do, the hobbies we have, our diet, exercise, thought patterns, and attitudes.

Research from Georgia State University suggests that society’s expectations about gender roles alter the human brain at the cellular level. And while our brain may want to quickly sift, sort, label, and file to conserve energy, humans aren’t that binary. We are misguided when we try to classify people into two distinct, many times opposite, and often disconnected forms of masculine and feminine.

The next time you hear someone make the argument that women are more emotional, consider this caution from Rippon, “A gendered world shapes everything, from educational policy and social hierarchies to relationships, self-identity, wellbeing and mental health.”

What’s most important is to recognize the stories we tell: to each other, and to ourselves. Are we building bridges for positive change? How are we encouraging each other, and ourselves, to grow, collaborate, and achieve, individually and together?

The Workplace Bully

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Despite what we have learned over the past two decades, the workplace bully remains a key problem for leaders and managers. The experts¾academics, management consultants, industrial psychologists¾all report an increase in bullying. And it’s not limited by demographics, tax brackets, or titles: bullying is increasing in cubicles, manufacturing plants, and even executive suites.

According to a 2017 National Survey, 61% of Americans are aware of abusive conduct in the workplace. This includes 19% of Americans who are bullied and another 19% who witness it, totaling an estimated 60.4 million Americans. Examples of the bullying are much more apparent via news outlets, social media, and the like.

For organizations and individuals, the costs are staggering. Some estimates exceed $150,000/bully/year. This costs employers and insurers $250 billion annually for direct employee health care expenses, turnover and re-training expenses, accidents related to stress-induced fatigue, litigation and settlements, and resistance to top-down change initiatives.

Traditionally, experts recommend that those bullied document the events, calculate the costs, and present these to the employer with a request to remove the bully. Unfortunately, the reported success rate for this approach is only 22.3%. The best approach for individuals and organizations is prevention: protect your employees with policies that enforce zero tolerance for workplace bullying and model the behavior.

Recognize Bullying, Harassment, and Aggression

In today’s culture, workplace bullying is defined as unwelcome behavior that occurs over a period of time and is meant to harm someone who feels powerless to respond.

According to the official website of the U.S. government, stopbullying.gov:

“Bullying is unwanted, aggressive behavior…that involves a real or perceived power imbalance. The behavior is repeated, or has the potential to be repeated, over time.

In order to be considered bullying, the behavior must be aggressive and include:

  • An Imbalance of Power: …such as physical strength, access to embarrassing information, or popularity—to control or harm others. Power imbalances can change over time and in different situations, even if they involve the same people.
  • Repetition: Bullying behaviors happen more than once or have the potential to happen more than once.

Bullying includes actions such as making threats, spreading rumors, attacking someone physically or verbally, and excluding someone from a group on purpose.”

Generally speaking, bullying in the workplace goes largely unrecognized by employers, but great leaders and managers watch and listen for the signs:

  • Changes in employee behavior (withdrawn, absent; agitated, frustrated)
  • Individual pitting or competition
  • Blaming, or taking undeserved credit
  • Gossip, mockery, jokes, or other forms of humiliation
  • Cliques, alliances, or teams, that are not inclusive and supportive that lead to shifts, or redistribution of responsibilities, tasks or assignments
  • Spying, interfering, obstructing, poaching, undermining, or sabotaging

Aggression may involve a single incident, while bullying involves repetition and patterns of behavior. It is often subtle and hard to put one’s finger on. Bottom line, workplace bullies undermine an individual’s right to dignity at work.

Understand the Risks

While workplace bullies are likely to target peers, bullying crosses all levels of organizations, from the top down and from the bottom up. A 2019 Study suggests that stressful situations increase the risk of exposure to workplace bullying.

According to the recent study, A Risk Factor for Exposure to Workplace Bullying,

“Employees reporting a higher degree of imbalance between efforts and rewards (i.e. who are under-rewarded in comparison to their efforts) have a higher likelihood to be a target of bullying. The perceived injustice may lead employees to engage in norm-breaking behavior and also signal low social standing to others, thereby potentially eliciting negative behaviors from others.”

Other risk factors include:

  • Major organizational changes (mergers, restructuring, new technology, or re-tooling)
  • Staff/resource shortages
  • Poor communication (silos, fragmentation, and one-way communication)
  • Lack of policies
  • Interpersonal conflicts
  • Increased goals/demands

Left unchecked, bullying can become status-quo for an organization, creating a bully culture and a spiral of abuse.

Bully Culture

A bully culture is created when bullying becomes accepted as part of the workplace culture. According to author Tim Field and founder of bullyonline.org, there are several different types of workplace bullies, and distinctions between corporate, organizational, and institutional bullying:

Organizational bullying: when an organization struggles to adapt to changing markets, reduced income, cuts in budgets, imposed expectations, and other external pressures. [short-term occurrences]

Corporate bullying: when an employer abuses employees with impunity especially where the law is weak and jobs are scarce. Examples include: coercing employees, unfair dismissal, denial of benefits, spying/monitoring, creating competition between employees, encouraging fabrication of colleague complaints, etc.

Institutional bullying: when bullying becomes entrenched and accepted as part of the culture. Examples include: people are moved, permanent roles are replaced by short-term contracts on less favorable terms with little alternative but to accept; workloads increase, schedules change, roles change, career progression paths are blocked or terminated, etc., all without consultation.

Threat Assessment

Violence in the workplace is not uncommon: in 2017, assaults resulted in 18,400 injuries and 458 fatalities, according to the National Safety Council. While healthcare workers, service providers, and education workers report more violence than other industries, it can happen anywhere. Training to recognize signs of a workplace bully can help. Many industries have also adopted a threat assessment process to prevent violence. The American National Standards Institute endorsed the use of such teams in colleges in 2010 and workplaces in 2011.

Threat Assessment Process

The threat assessment process involves three functions: identify, assess, and manage. Threat assessment is different from the more established practice of violence-risk assessment, which attempts to predict an individual’s capacity to generally react to situations violently. Instead, threat assessment aims to interrupt people on a pathway to commit violence.

Forensic clinical psychologist Dewey Cornell, Ph.D., describes threat assessment for American Psychological Association in public health terms: prevention, not prediction:

“Just as seatbelts and speed limits prevent injuries without predicting who will crash a car, and restrictions on cigarette sales reduce lung cancer deaths without pinpointing who will get the disease, threat assessments aim to prevent violence without profiling potential attackers. We don’t intervene because we predict someone is dangerous, we want to intervene because they’re troubled or there’s conflict or people are worried about them. Prevention becomes a bonus or a secondary gain from dealing with the underlying issue."

How it works:

  • Identify. Authorities identify threats. To do that, people need to know when, how and where to report concerns.
  • Assess. Gather and evaluate information from multiple sources to better understand if the person is planning violence. That could involve security professionals, supervisors, or human resources managers talking to the person of concern, his or her peers and supervisors, as well as looking to social media sites. Authorities may also analyze the subject’s current situation. They ask: Has the subject recently lost a job, gone through a divorce, or filed for bankruptcy? How has he or she handled adversity in the past? Investigators ascertain whether or not the person of concern has a motive, a target, and the organizational skills to carry out an attack. Can he or she get a weapon and use it?
  • Manage. More often than not, an assessment reveals a manageable underlying issue such as bullying, anxiety, or depression that mental health professionals are well trained to handle.

According to Cornell, "We found in case after case, with a systematic, careful approach focused on the problem that stimulated the threat, the threat can go away and the concern about violence diminishes. Every threat is really a symptom of a problem that someone can’t resolve."

It is imperative for leaders and managers to recognize the signs of a workplace bully and address issues before violence erupts.

Correct a Bully Problem

Psychologists have typically looked at violence from an individual perspective, such as who might be likely to commit violent acts, however, they need to dispel the myths and identify the organizational factors that may lead someone to bully in the workplace.

Dispel the Myths

  • Not at my work
  • It’s a fact of life (and we can’t stop it)

The truth is 80% of people studied in 2016 had experienced cyberbullying in the workplace, according to the University of Sheffield and Nottingham University. But there are things that individuals and organizations can do to correct a bully problem. The system, or the organization, is responsible for a psychologically healthy environment. Correct a bully problem by addressing organizational issues:

  • Train employees on how to respond to bullying, how to communicate with difficult people, and other interpersonal training programs.
  • Examine your corporate culture. Check with the human resources department for complaints of unfair treatment or stress and disability claims. Look for patterns within a department.
  • Evaluate your anti-bullying policies, procedures, and processes. Ensure there is an effective and supportive system in place for reporting difficult interpersonal issues.
  • Provide adequate coaching or counseling for victims and offenders. One of the most crucial aspects of creating a healthy workplace is what a company does when it finds a problem employee or manager. The instigator should be made aware that the behavior is inappropriate and not given further responsibility over others. To do so would be to institutionalize the inappropriate behavior.
  • Set clear examples and limits about appropriate behavior at work. Enforce standards and policies in a positive way, early on.
  • Mitigate stress. Certainly, managers do not have control over all the variables that may trigger stress and negativity, but when people perceive a fair workplace, they don’t act out. Provide a sense of employment security, a feeling that it is possible to move within the organization as change occurs. Employees also feel they are trusted, respected, treated with dignity, and given some control over their jobs.

Practicing respect in the workplace and eliminating bullying changes a whole company. Production and efficiency goes up, morale improves, and profits soar. Research indicates that even psychologically unhealthy people are much less likely to engage in violence in a healthy work organization.

Prevent Workplace Bullies

There is no federal anti-bullying legislation in the United States, however, 30 states have introduced workplace anti-bullying bills in recent years, and businesses in California are required to train supervisors on how to identify abusive conduct. But even without protection under federal or state law*, bully behavior can be prevented and prohibited with employer policies and practices.

Don Philpott, a former senior correspondent for Reuters and editor of International Homeland Security Journal suggests a five-step process for understanding and preventing workplace violence in The Workplace Violence Prevention Handbook, (Bernan Press, 2019). This approach can also be used to prevent workplace bullies from causing further harm to individuals and organizations:

  • Understand
  • Detect
  • Defuse and protect
  • Assess and contain
  • Prevent

Anti-bully Policies and Practices

What are your anti-bullying policies and practices? How do they prevent bullying? Ensure there is an effective and supportive system in place for reporting difficult interpersonal issues.

Attorney Jessica Westerman suggests that employers:

  • Create an inclusive culture: prioritize inclusivity.
  • Survey all employees (anonymously) to identify problems.
  • Tailor policies and procedures in response to survey findings.
  • Establish clear anti-bullying policies, and communicate via writing in all languages used in organization.
  • Conduct workplace civility training to promote respect for all.
  • Conduct bystander intervention training to empower co-workers to intervene and create a sense of collective responsibility.
  • Establish and implement clear and simple procedures to report incidents and maintain employee’s confidentiality.

Key to preventing workplace bullying is the knowledge and belief that such incidents can be promptly reported, heard, and investigated, and that workplace bullies will be held accountable. Therefore, it is imperative that leaders create and adopt policies and codes of conduct that address respect in the workplace and bullying.

* Bullying is actionable under federal law when the basis for it is tied to a protected category, such as color, national origin, race, religion, sex, age, disability and genetic information. If bullying amounts to some other civil or criminal wrong, such as assault or battery, it could amount to a claim under state law.

Great Leaders Conduct Great Meetings

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The mention of the word meeting will cause most people to groan. Experiences of wastefulness, boredom, confusion and frustration often prompt such a response. Most business experts agree that the vast majority of meetings fail to meet their objective: agreeing to workable decisions to meet established goals.

Top executives typically spend at least 50% of their time in meetings; somewhat less for middle management. As popular as the idea may be to some, absolving or avoiding meetings is not an option. Issues need to be discussed and resolved, and no leader can do this alone. Collective efforts are required to undertake complex challenges, where multiple points of view and a wide range of expertise are needed.

The key is to conduct meetings effectively and make productive use of the participants’ time. But, according to Elise Keith, author of Where the Action Is (Second Rise, 2018), less than one in four leaders are trained to run a meeting. On-the-job learning is rarely adequate. How a meeting is conducted reveals much about the leader heading it and may also be an indicator of how the company is run.

The most successful companies have the most fruitful meetings, where leaders have the skills to bring people together for productive discussions with meaningful outcomes, founded on building consensus. A few simple principles can be employed to boost meeting success and employee willingness to attend. An experienced executive coach can help leaders hone the personal skills needed to improve meeting facilitation.

Preparation is Paramount

Meetings are only as effective as the level of preparedness of the participants. Everyone’s time is waisted if meeting topics are a surprise. The preparation of the attenders is established by the preparedness of the meeting leader. Inviting people to a meeting is not enough. A clear agenda is needed, and it must be distributed to participants with enough time to allow them to be ready for the planned discussion. Leaders who provide their attenders with a realistic, clear agenda increase their success rates significantly.

Agenda items can’t be unfamiliar to attenders. As Amy Gallo suggests in a Harvard Business Review article, your people need to be familiar with the topics to understand what’s being discussed. If this isn’t the case, then they need to be informed prior, either via conversations, a preliminary meeting or their own research.

Make your agenda achievable within the meeting timeframe. People will dread attending if your meetings habitually run over, or insignificant enough to not warrant the meeting in the first place. Meetings should be called only when more personal forms of communication are inadequate.

Have necessary materials or documents available for your meetings. If your attendees need to see them ahead of time, distribute the information with enough time for review. Everyone at the meeting should know the materials in front of them. When in doubt, overcommunicate.

Plan your meeting with definitive start and stop times and stick to them. People have more confidence in a leader who manages time well. If you start your meeting on time, those who are late will avoid a repeat, and they will learn to be prompt.

Leaders who plan their meetings with anticipated concerns or questions from their people have a more effective dialogue and better results. Being proactive can avoid difficult or distracting moments and give people more confidence in your concern for them.

Efficiency is Essential

Busy employees try to make the most of their time, hating to waste it. They also appreciate leaders who value them enough not to have their time wasted. This is most noted when it comes to holding meetings. When meetings are loosely run, dragging on and getting little done, the time-wasting alarm goes off in every participant’s head.

Alternatively, efficient meetings are greatly appreciated and often favorably anticipated. People who attend productive meetings feel benefitted and know they can do their jobs better. Their motivation, attitude and productivity rise. When meetings are boring and wasteful, people feel depleted, frustrated and farther from their goals. When leaders conduct efficient meetings, the enhancement of the culture is significant.

One of the most valuable aspects of an effective meeting is brevity. Keeping meetings short and sweet benefits your people in numerous ways. A lot of ground can be covered in thirty minutes when effective tactics are used. People can’t take much more than an hour without regretting the experience. A recent trend is the stand-up meeting. The idea is that standing can be endured for less time than sitting, so everyone is motivated to wrap things up promptly.

Small talk and rabbit trails are common, but your facilitating skills need to bring people back on track. This can be done kindly and considerately, while being firm enough to get the job done on time. Electronic devices also distract the group and should be set aside until the meeting is concluded. Of course, leading by example is the best way to convey these approaches.

Another efficiency-related strategy is to get as much participation from the group as possible. Keep your people engaged by asking questions and requesting individual responses. The more diverse the feedback, the more thorough the discussion, and the better the resulting decisions will be. Balancing discussion with brevity is a master-facilitator skill.

Follow-up is Foundational

Effective leaders recognize that what takes place after meetings can be just as important as what happens during them. Following up with your people ensures that what was assigned or decided has a greater chance of succeeding. Summarize your meeting discussions before the meeting concludes, and make sure everyone is on the same page and understands what you expect of them. This is best facilitated by assigning names and dates to action items, not hoping someone picks up the ball.

Credit people with good ideas as you wrap up. This encourages more participation and yet more ideas. Following their activities afterwards keeps these ideas fresh and likely to bear fruit. When you empower your people to run with their ideas and prove themselves, they will reflect the benefits of your meeting discussions.

A valuable asset resulting from a meeting is a written record of what was discussed and decided. Leaders who make sure minutes are taken make their meetings more effective by giving all participants a copy. Things left to memory are often lost. Develop the collective mindset that the minutes are the roadmap everyone is held accountable to.

As action items are pursued, successful leaders request reports and updates to keep the group informed and moving forward. With this continuous flow of information, team members are able to perform at their best. Everyone reaps the rewards when leaders run effective meetings.

An often-overlooked aspect of meeting follow-up is the celebration of progress on the items previously planned and discussed. Letting your people know they’re appreciated, valued and contributing to the success of the organization builds their confidence and self-worth. Your meetings will get progressively more effective when your people are motivated to shine and support you. Following these basic principles develops a culture where meetings undergird the quality of progress you and your people make.

Raising Your Leadership Bar

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In today’s breakneck corporate culture, many leaders have redefined their success. Merely keeping up with the chaos has become an acceptable goal. The trend in organizational management is to focus on staying afloat and ponder the future if time allows. The common theme is do more with less.

Unfortunately, this attempt to enhance the profit picture as much as possible has created unprecedented levels of stress, dysfunction and disappointment for leaders. The time leaders can afford to spend on their leadership skills and personal growth, as critical as these areas are, seems to shrink every year. Leaders are under increasing pressure to make their companies all they can be, with little time taken to making themselves all they can be.

The most successful leaders use sound approaches to assess their work and determine what they can do to improve what they do. They understand that their company will prosper if they personally prosper as an effective leader with the best approach, ability, mindset and stability. How they go about raising their personal bar is the key.

What’s Your Perspective?

If chaos is the norm for you, have you ever contemplated how you can change that? Perhaps a more basic question is: do you recognize the detrimental effects that chaos has on you? The most effective leaders have learned to step back, even if only briefly at first, to assess their leadership situation: their career, influence, personal growth and satisfaction. They ask themselves important questions and try to find answers:

  • What are the things in my role that I should continue doing?
  • What are the things in my role that I should change?

These are prominent concerns all leaders should address, according to leadership expert and author Peter Bregman in, Leading with Emotional Courage: How to Have Hard Conversations, Create Accountability, and Inspire Action on Your Most Important Work (Wiley, 2018). These areas are foundational in developing the character, skills and desires to lead well.

Other related thoughts:

  • What would it look like if you became all you could be?
  • What’s keeping you from getting there?
  • How best can you alter the things that are holding you back?
  • What character traits are worth developing in this endeavor?

Leaders who deliberately find time to explore these areas are richly rewarded. They grow in their abilities and value, make more use of the skills they have and enter new avenues of opportunity and success. Find a way to schedule more time for these kinds of thoughts. A seasoned executive coach is an excellent resource to guide you through this process. Few leaders see things objectively enough when dealing with their inner workings. A second set of eyes spots things you can’t.

Leaders make the most progress in self-development by cutting through the clutter, looking at the big picture and making basic, yet profound adjustments. This may require courage, patience and determination.

Bregman suggests four fundamental categories that leaders can examine to enhance their mindset, value and purpose:

  • Clarity
  • Focus
  • Intentionality
  • Balance

Find a Clear Theme

Clarity is the ability to see things as they are with an accurate perception and understanding. It’s a freedom from uncertainty or confusion. It’s the skill to grasp fundamental truths and distinguish false alternatives. Clarity of mind stands as a basic framework to hang other usable skills, and successful leaders learn how to find it.

According to Bregman, one of the most distinguishing character traits successful leaders possess is clarity. This encompasses not only reaching a state of clarity, but continuing to embody it. In other words, providing clarity to others is just as vital as establishing it within yourself. After all, what is the point of a leader being clear if no one else benefits from it?

In the effort to be all you can be as a leader and determine how to move forward, you need to assess your recent performance and frame your effectiveness. Ask yourself what things went well. Just as important, ask what kinds of things did not go well. Putting together an historical picture helps to reveal patterns. The next step is to discern common causes for the things that did not go well. The goal is to find a personal theme behind it all, as Bregman suggests.

You may find your theme to be similar to these:

  • Emotions get in the way of clear thinking and reasonable responses. When I have calm responses rather than emotional reactions, outcomes are much better.
  • Overthinking makes things more complicated. When I break things down into simple compartments, solutions are more effective and longer lasting.
  • Rushing to conclusions with impatience takes me down terrible paths. Taking a more deliberate approach, dealing with one step at a time, yields a better understanding and thus better decisions.

Your theme determines the corrective action needed to reverse the affects you don’t want to see.  Make it your ‘theme for clarity”. Let it be simple, doable and easy to remember. Make it your focus every day. For example, if your theme is to slow down, practice slowing down. A deliberate awareness will become an automatic state of mind. Be all you can be by finding your best self-improvement theme.

Sharpen Your Focus

In a fast-paced environment, it’s difficult to think about the future and where you want to go. Understanding what your future looks like and how to reach your full potential requires dedicated, undistracted thought. It requires a sharper focus on the things that matter down the road.

Preparing for the future should be a thoughtful and optimistic matter. Time must be dedicated to evaluating the possibilities and potential. This means that you’ll need to split your time between current tasks and potential or future tasks. This doesn’t necessarily mean an equal split, but some kind of proportionate division, dependent on the circumstances. It comes down to deciding what to let go of in order to focus on the future.

Bregman is keen to point out that this is difficult for many executives, not because of time constraints as much as the common paradigm that non-essential tasks are not productive and have no apparent return. The culture has us convinced that only the tasks that provide a quantifiable return (and quickly) are worth pursuing. Leaders who’ve become all they can be know this to be untrue.

Future goals are gradually achieved by working in ways that, on the surface, have no short-term rewards, but in principle have great long-term payback. This includes networking and building relationships, daily writing or journaling, learning new personal skills and reading. The key is to continuously improve yourself and your prospects while understanding that these activities may not support your immediate role. It requires a renewed focus and dedication.

Be More Intentional

Leaders are busier than ever and have no energy to spare. Bregman reminds leaders who want to be all they can be that they need to be strategic about their time and energy. They must be productive, and that requires optimal focus and effectiveness. Being fatigued makes this much more difficult. Leaders can’t be busy just to be busy. Their time must count.

An intentional approach focuses on the most beneficial areas, and thinking can be one of them. You find what matters most by recognizing that the things bringing you the most joy are just as important as the things bringing the organization the most benefit. The intention is to pursue both.

Joy is important to grow and refresh. It permits you to apply yourself and have a positive perspective in your role. A significant aspect of finding joy is to let go of the things that annoy, frustrate or drain you. Many leaders find doses of refreshment by letting emails go for a while. Take a step back from time to time and let go of worries.

Many leaders get worn down by wasting their time. Ineffective meetings, reports or trips take their toll. Make note of how you spend your effort, and you’ll see how much of it could be more fruitful. Make an intentional decision to change this as much as you can by revising your routine, commitments and habits. How can you reduce frustration and increase joy?

Do you spend too much unproductive time on the internet? Are all the meetings you attend necessary? Eliminate time wasters, but don’t obsess over it. If you want to reach your maximum potential, you must be intentional about your goals and the methods you’ll employ to achieve them.

Balancing Work and Life

Our culture has brainwashed us into believing that our occupations determine our identities and our productivity indicates our value. Breaking this unfortunate mindset is a struggle for most leaders.

Technology facilitates this myth. Leaders can be accessed virtually everywhere, whether they are on company property or not. As Bergman rightly observes, the workplace is now everywhere. We can’t escape the demands and expectations put on us. The boundaries between work and personal life are gone. Leaders battle this boundary invasion, and their debased sense of value bleeds over into home life, where none of the work-related demands should be.

Leaders who’ve become all they can be have decided that their role at work is important, but not all-defining. They’ve learned to sense self-worth in all aspects of their lives: with family, friends, activities and personal growth. Their resulting joy and satisfaction help them to engage in all that they do with optimism and effectiveness. The key is not necessarily dividing their lives into work and non-work time, but finding a way to balance them such that they complement each other. 

Time management techniques at work can reduce the in-office demand and open up more non-work time. Establish a routine that helps you cover more bases in less time using the resources and staff available to you. Think ahead, anticipate demands and plan for multiple situations. This can reduce your stress and let you be fresher for the office and at home.

Similarly, more joy at home allows you to be more positive and fruitful at work. The most well-rounded leaders have found ways to enrich their relationships and activities at home, bringing more pleasure to life. Your family deserves more from you than what’s left over from what your employer takes. Many leaders have found that a richer work life is built on a foundation of a richer personal life.

Save your sanity and energy and bring a fresh approach to each day. If you balance the aspects of your life, you’ll have a more fulfilling identity and a richer purpose. These are the best paths to becoming all you can be as a leader.

The Behaviors That Lead Change

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A well-known paradox states that the only thing that remains the same is change. Most leaders agree. Businesses are, and always have been, subjected to the influences of technology, economies, politics, competition and the culture. Change is unavoidable. The most successful companies are led by people who recognize the need for change and manage it well. Alternatively, those who cannot will subject their organizations to the risks of failure.

Implementing change is a significant aspect of leading organizations, in some ways more critical than many traditional areas. Some necessary changes are minor, while others are major. Mergers or acquisitions rank in the major-change category, as does rebranding or downsizing.

The way that change is managed can ruin the most passionate dreams of accomplishing it. Studies show that a vast majority of projects involving change don’t succeed. The estimates vary between 60 and 80 percent. Failures in the change process result in large wastes of capital and time, and may send a company backwards from the position it started in.

Evaluations of corporate change reveal something else: the major factor in successful change management is internal to the company, not an influence from the outside. This applies to the organization, as well as the top leader. According to a Harvard Business Review article by organizational change expert Edith Onderick-Harvey, the leader’s behavior is the most critical distinguishing element determining success or failure.

Communication is Critical

Surveys and studies confirm that the most important aspect of organizational change is keeping everyone involved and informed. That requires meaningful and continuous communication. Leaders who want to achieve successful change must have strong communication skills. They must be people oriented.

Employees who comment on their organization’s inability to implement change point to how they were not properly informed, directed or trained regarding the change process. Their leaders attempted to implement change from behind the scenes, hoping everyone would fall in line. This doesn’t happen naturally.

Most people like a predictable and reliable environment, where personal comfort and familiarity provide a sense of safety. For many, change presents risks that take them out of their comfort zones. Risks threaten positions of influence, authority, competency or rewards. Change poses a potential for failure, or the possibility of being worse off than before. That’s why change is resisted.

Staff needs thorough connectedness with leadership to overcome fear of change. Leaders must reach out to their people to convey the need for change with rationale and reasons. They need to set the vision, tout the benefits and lay out the course in a way that compels people to buy into the program. Leaders who effectively implement change are focused on their people as much as the change itself.

Effective change agents understand the perceptions and impacts of change. They care about people and engage them from beginning to end, involving them in every step. This includes the following, all calling for communicative behavior:

  • Introduction with compelling presentations that lay out the need for change and how it will be accomplished
  • Assurance that the needs of the employees are vitally important, and their roles will be enhanced or improved
  • Continuous updates on how things are going and what the timeline looks like
  • Encouragement for people to stay positive and enthused
  • Requests for feedback and opportunities to answer questions, address concerns and revise the plan if needed
  • Empowerment of others to engage in and contribute to the process

Be a Beacon of Light

Successful change agents know their people need encouragement through the process, remembering that many people resist or distrust change. They need an extra measure of positivity and support.

This calls for the leader to have an optimistic outlook and, as Onderick-Harvey describes, view change as an opportunity. If the leader doubts the process, how can their people have confidence in it? A positive mindset at the upper management level is most powerful when it is spread throughout the organization. Leaders who behave confidently with the courage to take on the challenges that come with change have the greatest influence on success.

As the leader, it is imperative that you embrace change rather than fear it, as Inc. Magazine writer Robbie Abed suggests. It is, after all, your program, authorized by you, so fear needs to be eliminated from your behavior from the outset. Your courage must be contagious, especially when setbacks occur. A committed and confident leader calms everyone’s nerves and keeps them forging ahead.

The optimistic leader keeps negative emotions in check. While undergoing change, people need a steady rock, a beacon of light to feel safe and secure. Let them see you in that role.

Part of this approach is a character that believes in people and lets them know it. Empower others to contribute input and ideas. They are, after all, the experts in the detailed operations within your organization. Solicit engagement in crafting solutions and revisions to the plan. Demonstrate that they are trusted, valued and a critical part of implementing the change, which boosts optimism and buy in.

Another way optimism is conveyed is the rejection of the status quo. The old ways of doing things cannot continue and better ways are coming. Better ways will benefit everyone. Yes, it will be hard work to implement change, and there will be struggles. But your people are worth it! Let your people know that they deserve better than “good-enough”.

The Power of Authenticity

As change is announced and implemented, people want the straight story—the truthful picture of what’s happening. If the leader has a secret agenda, hidden motives or suppressed information, people lose trust and won’t provide much-needed buy-in. Behind-the-scenes issues eventually become exposed, so it’s simply best to convey everything up-front with your employees.

This is especially true if the project hits snags. Being open and truthful is the best way to unify the workforce and keep them engaged. People can often handle bad news as long as they’re valued enough to be informed properly and given the chance to respond. As the saying goes, honesty is always the best policy.

This often takes an extra measure of leadership humility, suggests change expert Bill Hogg. A leader who can admit mistakes, see a need for corrections to the plan and lay this out for their people gains the highest trust and participation in staying the course. Your authenticity diminishes their fear of change. An even more powerful approach allows your people to offer their expertise to derive solutions or improvements. Providing opportunities to fully invest in the change process yields the greatest chances for success.

Leaders should be willing and able to handle failures along the way, knowing some will pop up. This is a realistic approach, and by preparing your staff for this, their collective mindset provides the most thoughtful and insightful responses. Change is difficult enough. Being prepared to step in when needed provides a teamwork that can’t be achieved any other way.

A leader’s authenticity in facing adversity, having difficult conversations, conveying their concern for their people and recognizing what needs to be improved makes the change process as rewarding as possible. Your people will grow and have the confidence to take on further changes down the road.

Is Your Workplace Healthy?

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Businesses face challenges from numerous angles, and leaders are tasked with understanding and addressing them. Many resources and case studies have helped leaders learn how to deal with things like competitive analysis, gaining market share, employee engagement, cost reduction, and manufacturing efficiencies. But a hidden challenge has made itself more prominent in recent years, and much of it goes unacknowledged by management: the mental illness of employees.
Data continues to show that the mental health of an organization’s staff is critical in determining how well an organization functions. Weakened mental health is a silent enemy, and it takes a keen understanding of its nature, causes, and solutions to address it effectively. According to the Johns Hopkins Mental Health in the Workplace Summit, mental illness is the leading cause of disability for U.S adults under the age of 44.
Many leaders unknowingly run organizations hampered by employee disability due to mental illness. Some leaders don’t see it, others don’t want to. It is a very real issue that inhibits organizations, yet many in leadership fail to address. But with the proper approach, leaders can effectively help their people recover and maintain their mental health.
The Cost of Mental Illness
Studies show that people are greatly affected by their work environment. Their experiences, pressures, and failures take a toll, often chipping away at their mental health. As technology accelerates the speed of commerce—and as a result, its demands and shortcomings—a greater percentage of the workforce is squeezed in the vice we call progress. It has become a chronic problem.
The World Health Organization posted in a recent publication that worker mental illness, in its various forms, costs the global economy over $1 trillion each year. Employee absenteeism is more heavily caused by mental illness than physical illness or injury according to the Mental Health in the Workplace summit. One in five adults in the U.S. experience a form of mental illness and less than half are getting treated. A survey of office employees conducted by workplace consultants Peldon Rose reveal that three out of four employees would like their employer to oversee mental health initiatives, with workable plans and treatment opportunities. Ninety-five percent claim that their work environment is an important factor in their state of wellbeing and mental health.
Many leaders have a bigger issue on their hands than they realize: their workplace can cause their people great distress in ways that don’t surface to the passing eye. This, in turn, causes diminished effectiveness and organizational output. Attitudes suffer, and the cycle perpetuates. Mental distress causes abnormal behavior and responses. Anger, impatience, apathy, silence, and disengagement are observed responses by those experiencing mental illness.
The mental illnesses of concern aren’t degenerative clinical disorders. The most common problems involve depression, anxiety, and fear. These are no longer dismissed as emotional phases or passing stages. Experts have come to regard extended seasons of these as ailments, due to their lasting impacts, debilitating effects, and the need for treatment.
With mental illness in the workforce, organizations experience abnormal turnover, communication breakdown, dissatisfied customers, and shrinking profits. It benefits every leader to understand this growing issue and learn how to meet the mental health needs of their people.
The Causes of Workplace Related Mental Illness
People consider their jobs to be a significant part of their lives, and not just for the obvious income-providing reason. Naturally, their lifestyles depend on a reliable source of funds. But the study of human behavior indicates that people need their employment for more than income, whether they consciously recognized it or not.
Our jobs provide us with purpose through opportunities of accomplishment. Employment, when experienced in a positive environment, offers the all-important sense of value. Working people look to their jobs to find self-esteem and satisfaction by being needed and accepted as competent. These are fundamental needs, and when they aren’t met, the spirit suffers. Prolonged periods of emotional neediness inflict significant damage, where the mind responds unfavorably with numerous effects.
The human spirit reacts to its surroundings. When the workplace treats people poorly (or they have the impression they are being treated poorly), they respond negatively. The mind jumps to their defense and justifies an altered line of behavior.
Employees sense poor treatment when they are disrespected. This can involve being ignored, ridiculed, subjectively judged, or discriminated against. An employee’s emotions manifest as anger, resentment, or rejection. Worse than disrespect is abuse. A person who is reprimanded needlessly, insulted, antagonized, or threatened will develop a sense of inferiority or hopelessness. They may feel targeted, worthless, insecure, or fearful.
Poor treatment, and the pressures of a dynamic and demanding environment, cause some to wonder if they can cope. Survival mode is a desperate place to be, causing people to worry about losing their job and life-sustaining income. This weight also impacts their families. People experiencing these kinds of emotions can’t work at peak productiveness. Mental illness debilitates cognition, memory, and responses. It demotivates, destabilizes, and may be manifested as anxiety if relief isn’t found.
Depression can also set in. Experts understand depression to be a prevalent issue in the workplace. They know this from surveys, since it is by and large an unspoken subject at the employee level. This is due to the difficulty of self-diagnosis and the unwillingness to be open about personal problems. The subject is still difficult to raise in many workplaces.
Mental illness affects much more than a person’s work. It negatively affects their physical, family, and social health. This often worsens the mental health spiral.  Leaders who recognize the importance of mental health create an environment that supports it.
Addressing Mental Health
The primary step in treating or minimizing mental health issues within your staff is awareness. Leaders who understand the problem and know how to spot the telltale signs have a great advantage in creating an environment that can effectively address mental health.
Reactionary measures rely on leaders being observant. When an employee negatively changes their behavior, there are definite reasons why. Look for indications of depression, nervousness, or unusual emotional expression. For example, explore why normally out-going people become withdrawn. Attitude adjustments like apathy, disinterest, or unwillingness are red flags. Of course, it helps for the leader to get to know their people well enough to spot such changes in behavior or attitude.
Due to the prevalence of mental health issues in the workplace, it is wise for companies to establish employee assistance resources, either on-site or nearby. Give people the consideration they need when facing problems, and offer professional help. Corporate mental health policies add another layer of consideration by treating troubled employees with respect and support. A Fortune article by health and wellness expert Alan Krohll suggests reviewing and improving internal policies, and including all employees in the training. People are taught how to come alongside distressed coworkers and show them they are cared for.
Preventative measures revolve around leaders creating an enjoyable culture. Do you trust your people? Or do you micromanage and keep them under your control? Giving people the autonomy and freedom to make decisions prevents a controlled and powerless feeling. It gives their efforts meaning and assigns value to them. People sense themselves growing and enjoy being part of a group effort that appreciates their contributions.
A culture that supports employees—that offers direction, communication, and the resources needed to successfully accomplish tasks—gives people peace of mind. They know they are prioritized as valuable assets. This diminishes stress and worry, and forges positive attitudes, mindsets, and feelings. Leaders who respond to the project needs of their people provide assurances that their environment is safe. Safety offers stability and confidence, resulting in satisfaction rather than anxiety.
A qualified executive coach can offer beneficial counsel on maintaining a healthy culture. Give your people your best, and they’ll give you their best. Their mental health is worth protecting.

Building a Strong Culture

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Some companies prosper and draw the business world’s attention. They continuously grow, innovate and impress. In contrast, others struggle, never breaking through to reach their desired success. The latter must deal with downsizing, financial shortfalls, market-share losses and tarnished reputations.

The disparities are glaring. While leaders of prosperous companies garner industry admiration, those who head besieged organizations wonder where they went wrong. They search for explanations as to why their operations haven’t fulfilled their potential.

Research in social science and organizational behavior points to a critical quality, one that most directs every company’s future: culture. A strong culture consistently leads to robust performance, while a weak culture suffers ongoing failures.

Leaders who discount the importance of culture are apt to bear predictable consequences. They must define, assess and strengthen their organizational culture to thrive.

Culture’s Impact

Culture is to an organization as personality is to a person. Personality describes how we think, act and respond to the circumstances we face.

Similarly, an organization’s culture determines how people act or work, what they believe or stand for and how they respond to pressures and challenges. Every company, without exception, has a culture.

Leaders unfamiliar with the concept of corporate culture or organizational behavior are out of touch with the daily workings within their walls. They fail to realize that culture drives:

  • How well (or how poorly) teams function
  • Whether customers’ needs are being met
  • Whether employees’ needs are fulfilled
  • Company health and well-being
  • Future outlook

Leadership expert John Coleman describes Six Components of a Great Corporate Culture (Harvard Business Review, May 6, 2013):

  • A unifying vision or mission that fashions one’s purpose and plans
  • A code of values that influences behavior and mindsets
  • Practices that support and enhance people
  • A recruiting process that matches people to the desired culture
  • A celebrated heritage that tells the company’s story and what it stands for
  • A beneficial working environment to optimize synergy

A trained observer, like an executive coach, can quickly assess whether one’s culture embodies these characteristics.

A strong culture can increase net income by more than 700% in an 11-year span, according to a 2012 study published in the Interdisciplinary Journal of Contemporary Research in Business.Other research confirms culture as a significant factor in determining success or failure.

Essential Skill Sets

Creating and sustaining a strong group culture is one of the most misunderstood and elusive aspects of leadership in today’s business climate. Some leaders are disinterested in their culture, with no desire to delve into an area that, for them, is mysterious and superfluous. Others recognize culture’s importance but are too intimidated to tackle it. Still others attempt to craft a culture, but their unfamiliarity prevents them from taking prudent steps—and they may even make matters worse.

A strong company culture doesn’t happen in a vacuum. It’s based on constructive relationships and interactions. But humans, by nature, fail to engage each other constructively. Selfish impulses and habits get in the way. Fears, stubborn beliefs, prejudices and pride also inhibit healthy group dynamics.

It takes focused and deliberate leaders to establish, nurture and grow a strong culture.
Leadership expert Daniel Coyle identifies three foundational skill sets or proficiencies in The Culture Code (Bantam Books, 2018). The principles are simple, but following them requires wisdom and empathy:

  • Define the organization’s purpose. Values and goals must be shared so everyone is on the same page. A strong culture begins with unity and a common purpose.
  • Foster mutual trust. Establishing a culture where people trust each other and their leader takes time, but it empowers people to excel.
  • Create a sense of safety. People instinctively yearn for safety, security, a sense of belonging and a personal identity. Employees who feel safe engage wholeheartedly, without fear of reprisal or condemnation. Leaders must provide a consistently safe environment.

Post Your Purpose

Without a fundamental purpose, organizations cannot steer efforts in any general direction. Employees need a reason to serve, shared goals, a common cause and focus. They need to know what their organization stands for so they can embrace its stance.

Leaders are charged with creating a vision of the company’s future. They’re required to disseminate and promote it so others can fall in line. Purpose or mission statements are noble callings to serve, respond to and meet the public’s needs.

A purpose can tell a story, hinge on a legacy or chase a dream. Each unites people as they endeavor to achieve something together. Culture is enhanced by accomplishing something that’s possible only when everyone shares the same purpose.

Effective leaders know that hitting people over the head with mission statements causes more harm than good. People respond best to small, frequent, unobtrusive reminders of their purpose. Offer frequent encouragement and feedback.

Leaders can work with a qualified executive coach to hone the following vital skills:

  • Clearly state individual and collective priorities. People want to know what’s expected of them.
  • Overstate priorities to ensure everyone is in sync. There’s no need to be forceful or indignant. Aim for supportive and motivational.
  • Provide high-feedback training, as Coyle calls it. This allows people to fail and find ways to improve. Culture blooms when people are empowered to learn and grow. Be sure to celebrate small victories.

Train to Trust

A strong culture depends on an environment of trust, where people can count on each other, take risks together and benefit from the resulting successes. Leaders who inspire authenticity entice people to step out of their comfort zones and enjoy the spirit of cooperation.

Leaders enhance trust when they’re transparent and humble. Display humility by expressing a need for help. People are drawn to leaders who are willing to exhibit fallibility. Admitting weaknesses and setting aside insecurities reveal a real person who can be trusted.

Trust builds teamwork, which inspires cooperation and a vital interconnectedness. Trust is founded on relationships—and the stronger the relationships, the healthier the culture. Once again, leaders can benefit from the assistance of an experienced executive coach to optimize their people skills and relational intelligence.

Great leaders are comfortable dealing with subordinates when problems arise. They approach difficult situations and challenging employees face to face, with care and honor. They’re firm but fair. Trusted leaders prioritize relationships and make sure employees feel appreciated.

Leaders gain employees’ trust through active listening. When you thoughtfully address people’s situations and allow them to speak freely, you cultivate greater trust.

Giving honest feedback to employees further raises the trust bar. Be candid, sincere and helpful. As Coyle suggests, provide “targeted” or specific feedback. People want to contribute the best they have to offer and be valued resources. They need detailed critiques and a chance to earn your approval. Avoid judgmental comments so you can nurture their self-esteem.

High self-esteem allows employees to show initiative and avoid the need for continuous oversight. The best cultures feature self-directed teams whose leaders interject only when necessary. Employees become more invested and engaged in their work, which makes for a strong culture.

Provide Safety

All humans want to feel safe. They need to feel they belong, are cared for and valued at work. Leaders who provide purpose and a trusting environment are in the best position to offer a sense of safety.

People feel safe when they can trust their relationships without concerns over politics, personalities and resentments. They want to know their relationships will last and grow stronger. Employees who feel safe invest in the team dynamic and perform better.

Leaders build a strong culture when they emphasize relationships and set an example. Show interest in your people, and emphasize that everything done within your organization is built on relationships.

Leaders who foster a sense of belonging build strong cultures. Coyle provides the following helpful strategies:

  • Receive people’s ideas and proposals with an open mind. Make them feel glad for contributing, not regretful. Let their voice be heard, and remind them that you need their ideas because their perspectives have value.
  • Express thanks, which affirms the importance of relationships and provides motivation. If everyone’s efforts are important, a healthy codependency and unity develop.
  • Accept bad news, and don’t shoot messengers. People who face threats for being truthful will learn to be silent. This kills a culture.
  • Roll up your sleeves and get dirty. Leaders who place themselves above ordinary tasks erect barriers. When everyone is equally willing to contribute, teamwork expands and a sense of safety prevails.
  • Don’t pad bad news with good. Beating around the bush or hedging your delivery signals disingenuousness, which spells danger. Say it like it is, but do so sincerely and considerately. Being truthful tells people you have their best interests at heart.

Arrogance in Leadership

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For decades, experts have touted the advantages of humble leadership. Humility draws people to trust, follow and perform in ways no other leadership trait can. The executive world has been given so many case studies and success stories to make it virtually impossible to refute the power of humility in leadership.

Yet more than ever, employees raise complaints about the chronic levels of arrogance in their leaders. Studies show growing trends of employee dissatisfaction, disengagement and turnover due to leadership arrogance. Arrogance at top corporate levels is statistically responsible for startlingly high failure rates in teamwork, efficiency, goal achievement and profitability. One of the top, most disdained leadership traits reported in surveys is arrogance, indicating the prevalence of the problem.

Somewhere lies a disconnect between theory (which is generally accepted) and practice. Human nature plays a key role in this disconnect, but it doesn’t have to be this way. Fortunately, there are ways for leaders to recognize arrogant tendencies and do away with them. Failure to do so typically spells the failure of a career.

The Nature of Arrogance

As with many personality shortcomings, arrogance can be expressed in subtle or blatant ways, and everything in between. Some behavior takes time to assess to see if it is attributed to arrogance. Other behavior screams arrogance from the outset, leaving no doubt about the nature of the leader’s style.

Lesser forms of arrogance come disguised as rudeness, inconsideration, disrespect or coldness. Employees subject to subtle arrogance experience having their ideas or requests ignored, being left out of conversations or having their work redone by someone else. These slights signal to the employee that they are not considered acceptable or good enough. The leader may be trying to put them in their place or indicate that they need to get on the bandwagon (or perhaps out the door).

Subtle arrogance can be general and not directed at anyone in particular. Small inconsiderations by a leader demonstrate a lack of appreciation—or even acknowledgement—in the value of others. Interrupting people as they’re speaking, not returning a greeting or communicating personal information through technology rather than in person are all ways leaders arrogantly devalue their people.

Most employees can tolerate subtle arrogance, especially if it is directed at everyone. Though they don’t like it, people often learn to adapt to it, accept it as one of the unfavorable aspects of their job and keep going. Recognizing subtle arrogance in others and depersonalizing makes it tolerable. However, blatant arrogance is another matter. This goes beyond rudeness to reach harsh and unbearable levels. Blatantly arrogant leaders yell and insult people. They flaunt their power and don’t consider the wreckage they leave behind. Their pressing need is to unleash their frustration or anger, where other people are merely objects of vented abuse.

Blatantly arrogant leaders don’t just simply devalue their people, they hurt them. Temper, anger, audacity, egotism and disloyalty are weapons in the blatantly arrogant leader’s arsenal. They are self-focused on what their position of privilege allows them to do. Their high-handedness breaks the rules of conduct to get things done their way and in their time. Such contemptuousness wreaks fear, resentment and outrage.

Unlike subtle arrogance, the blatant form is intolerable for all employees save for those who are trapped and have nowhere else to go. Don’t think the blatantly arrogant leader doesn’t know who these people are. These unfortunate souls are typically targets who receive “special” treatment. People do not stand for blatant arrogance, and if Human Resources cannot address the problem satisfactorily, they are gone in short order. Life is too short to endure blatant arrogance in a leader.

Some leaders recognize their problem, and some don’t. Neither have an excuse for continuing an arrogant treatment of their people. Due to the nature of arrogance, employees generally have little hope of addressing it with their leader. However, an experienced executive coach can aid a leader in discovering and dealing with arrogant tendencies.

What Fuels Arrogance

Our culture has a large role in the development and encouragement of leadership arrogance. Human tendencies to desire power, prestige, perks and privilege are fueled by a culture that values these things. We are trained from an early age to focus on what we can take from life rather than what we can give. This encourages the quest for the highest level of power to be in the best position to be takers.

Whether it is in business, politics or social life, history shows that egotists are rewarded more than humble leaders, at least from an observable standpoint. Prideful, forceful, outgoing and brash behavior seem to permit greater levels of advancement than humility. Leaders with these traits are seen as more admired, revered and feared due to their ability to take charge and get things done. The fallout behind the scenes, where people pay a high price, is generally overlooked. The big accomplishments drown out the detriments.

Arrogance is born from these influences, where leaders feel privileged and free to do as they wish. Because of their positions and accomplishments, they go unchallenged and unquestioned. A mindset develops that they operate under a different set of rules and can take liberties others cannot. Their behavior, especially with how they treat others, is often granted an exceptional status, where the ends justify the means.

The culture also admires ego and the ability to control the world around you. Those who have command are regarded as impressive and important. As described in the HBR article by Rasmus Hougaard and Jacqueline Carter, Ego is the Enemy of Good Leadership, importance feeds on itself, magnifying the effect in an upward spiral. Young aspiring professionals are being taught and trained, both in school and on the job, to reach the highest level of importance possible in order to be able to tell others what to do: to be “in charge”.  Arrogance is the natural outcome from someone who believes they deserve to be in charge. This is seen as a fulfilling purpose and everything else is simply less important.

Another cultural influence on the prevalence of leadership arrogance is the competitive nature of business. It is commonly believed that to survive on today’s battleground for market share and profits the leader must be tough, aggressive and ruthless. Boldness, notoriety and arrogance are the tactics used to gain the upper hand and be victorious. Most business settings have come to expect this, allow for it and endure it within the ranks.

An HBR article by Bill Taylor on leadership arrogance points out that many view life in business as competitive by nature, requiring an aggressive approach not only with the outside world but within the company walls. Everyone is in the trenches together, and arrogance becomes a “useful” tool to keep the internal machinery running.

Softness doesn’t seem to get it done, at least not in the minds of many leaders today. Humility is viewed as weakness. It draws images of inferiority and being subservient. Today’s talent is raised with these notions, a carry-over from generations past. Unfortunately, this is tragically misguided. A qualified executive coach can help sort through leadership myths and get to the truth about how people are successfully managed.

Breaking the Arrogance Mold

Overcoming arrogance is a matter of overcoming powerful paradigms in corporate culture. Leaders generally cannot sort through this themselves. Engrained for too long, arrogance has become second nature. Their environment supports old-school thinking, and blind spots keep certain realities hidden. Help comes from another pair of eyes that can see what’s happening: the eyes of a trained executive coach.

A leader who’s ready to address interpersonal difficulties in their role can turn to a trusted coach to get a sense of what the issues are. This is the most critical step for an arrogant personality. Taylor writes that arrogance typically rejects the notion of interdependence and the reliance on others for assistance or wisdom. However, leaders benefit greatly by breaking one the most powerful paradigms: the belief that strength is best portrayed by personal independence, to be smart enough and capable enough not to need guidance from anyone else.

This is a false strength, where a facade hides an insecurity of self-image and the fear of what others think, based on the premise that needing help shows weakness or unworthiness. History has shown that the most successful, most admired leaders are the ones who admit they need assistance and get it. This is true strength founded on a confidence and positive outlook that overcomes insecurity and public opinion.

Getting help is a leadership strategy that makes the best use of available resources to achieve the best results. It’s smart, tactical, courageous and bold. Humility, contrary to cultural views, is the strongest position to lead from. A qualified coach can instill these concepts and encourage arrogant leaders to break their crippling pattern.

Another paradigm needing to be overturned pertains to how employees respond to leadership behavior. The old-school mentality of power and control is outdated and damaging. People no longer tolerate those conditions and use their feet to escape them. A telltale sign of arrogant leadership is the rate of employee turnover.

People want several key things from their leader: consideration, support, encouragement and security. Arrogance subverts each of those. People engage their duties when they are cared for and valued, when their efforts are purposeful and appreciated. The leader and the entire organization benefit from an engaged, willing and healthy staff, who can rise above any challenge as a team when nurtured properly. Executive coaches know there is no better incentive to reverse an arrogant leadership personality than that.

Visionary Vulnerabilities

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We live in an age of remarkable products and services from inventive thinkers with lofty ideas. These visionary leaders, who don’t think or work like anyone else, have started businesses based on novel concepts, and those whose achievements greatly impact society are afforded special status.

Employees often flock to these visionaries’ companies, hoping the future will offer prosperity within a corporate culture that promotes free thought, excitement and cutting-edge innovations. But some visionary leaders can be difficult bosses whose brainstorming and idealistic tendencies frustrate employees and create career obstacles.

As the term implies, “visionary” leaders like to walk among the clouds, devoting themselves to the future, the impossible and the things that could be. Unfortunately, businesses must be run with both a widescreen view and in-the-trenches focus, so pure visionaries with only big-picture mindsets are vulnerable to losing track of their enterprises.

While everyone admires visionary thinking, too much of it creates a dangerous imbalance. Fortunately, visionaries can learn effective ways to keep their companies healthy and productive.

Forwardly Focused

Visionary leaders are bent on taking things to the next level, solving the unsolvable problem, and developing something unprecedented or revolutionary. They passionately blaze uncharted trails. While such ambition is worthy, pure visionaries tend to be interested only in conceptualizing business ideas, and they often fail to involve themselves in the execution stages. Their brains are fast-thinking, idea-generating machines, with each concept analogous to a sheet of paper quickly torn from a thick pad.

Is your mind camped on the “what ifs?” of your business, while other issues are pushed aside? Do you wish you could devote all your time to brainstorming activities while someone else handles the other major responsibilities on your plate?

If you’re a visionary leader, you have many ideas racing through your mind at the same time, each in a different stage of incompletion. One idea may progress to a certain point, only to be superseded by another. Some ideas will be abandoned after a few primary thoughts, while others will morph into concrete descriptions for your staff to pursue.

Visionary leaders are the conceptualizers. They rely on their tactical thinkers—the ones with practical know-how of processes, procedures, policies and planning—to turn ideas into reality. Can you relate to this scenario?

Noted psychotherapist and leadership consultant Dr. Beatrice Chestnut describes visionary leaders’ idealistic tendencies in The 9 Types of Leadership: Mastering the Art of People in the 21st Century Workplace (Post Hill Press, 2017). Visionaries enjoy thinking about what might be and how companies can improve. They’re excited by new ideas—primarily those that come from their own mind so they can maintain control.

Visionaries are strictly future oriented. The present isn’t interesting unless there’s room for improvement. They find their optimism and hope in the next chapter, and they see their role as enhancing lives by creating new possibilities. They love to think outside the box and push the envelope of what’s considered feasible.

Visionary leaders view circumstances through a cup-half-full filter, where negative thoughts are avoided and only positive outlooks are permitted. This helps feed their creative juices and blocks negative emotions that hinder them. Negativity deters the creativity visionaries need to feel purposeful and happy.

If you recognize some of these tendencies in yourself, you may be a visionary leader. And while you may greatly benefit your organization, your focus on future possibilities may distract you from critical responsibilities. This jeopardizes your operation and makes life harder for your staff because you’re likely neglecting the tactical aspects of business. A qualified leadership coach can help you assess your visionary tendencies and guide you toward a more balanced, healthy leadership style. The goal is not to quash your visionary approach, but to bring it into balance with your other responsibilities.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Visionary leaders have a positive impact on their organizations because they:

  • Dream optimistically, encouraging and supporting their people’s inventive activities.
  • Are always working on “the next big thing,” as Dr. Chestnut puts it. They want their organization to be a leader in its field, setting the pace for others to try and catch.
  • Develop great brainstorming skills that overcome challenges most leaders would deem infeasible.
  • Turn negatives into positives. More is always accomplished with a can-do approach, which lifts morale and feeds the visionary culture.
  • Give people the benefit of the doubt, looking toward a positive outcome.
  • Are often sought after to create solutions, bringing notoriety and opportunity to their organization.

From a negative standpoint, visionary leaders can be overly idealistic and creative. Their focus on the future draws them away from important tasks. They:

  • Have too many ideas going at one time to properly prioritize, manage or execute.
  • Brush off negative concerns from their staff, avoid problematic issues and overlook warning signs or mistakes.
  • Find ways around roadblocks that impede their visionary process, often breaking the rules. Employees may then feel resentful and frustrated.
  • Lose interest in non-creative tasks and duties. They ignore everyday responsibilities when their ideas seem more compelling.
  • Prioritize activities based on what’s most fun for them.
  • Have blind spots that lead them away from the actions required to understand and address serious issues.
  • Are so unfocused that they fail to grasp current trends or the business climate, thereby hurting the company.
  • Have vague conceptual ideas that management cannot understand or appreciate.
  • Aren’t detail oriented and have difficulty performing accurate work, meeting commitments or completing assignments.
  • Think and speak so rapidly, caught up in their own little world, that they stop listening to others.
  • Have such a strong emotional need to dream that they take their company in the wrong direction. They unconsciously feed their personal needs more than those of the company.
  • Seek quick wins and disassociate from anyone who slows their creative process (with facts).
  • Fail to address problems they deem insignificant.

Strong visionary tendencies can render leaders inefficient and cause pain to those around them. While companies certainly need visionary thinkers, everyone must maintain the proper balance. The best leaders successfully juggle the present and future, focusing on the organization’s urgent needs and prioritizing them over tempting pie-in-the-sky ideas.

What Makes a Visionary Tick?

Understanding the visionary personality helps us forge productive business relationships.

The visionary’s mind runs far and fast. Ideas come naturally; the more unique, the better. The most active visionaries fashion ideas that interconnect and form a clever master plan.

Visionary leaders find joy in dreaming big. They’re drawn to considerable challenges, huge potential and foreseeable payoffs. They have “bright shiny object” syndrome, as Dr. Chestnut explains, and are distracted by the latest, greatest idea to come along. (More mundane ideas are shoved aside.) They become curators of unfinished ideas and plans.

Visionaries love learning and the freedom to use acquired knowledge. Corporate systems, procedures and processes that slow them down or interfere with their creativity are regarded as roadblocks. Visionary leaders resist limiting forces like rules, management decisions or protocol because creativity “requires” boundless autonomy. They see brainstorming as an imperative privilege, one that outweighs all others. It gives them a strong sense of fulfillment and purpose.

Visionaries require positivity to foster creativity. They actively avoid difficult or unpleasant experiences, sometimes at any cost. Past problems are overlooked or put behind them to maintain a rosy future picture. Current problems may never reach their radar screen. To the visionary, creation is the primary good that eclipses most corporate problems.

Leaders with visionary tendencies enjoy living in their imagination, where they can vividly see their dreams while remaining sheltered from the hardships of daily issues. They choose to see a world that reflects their hopes without real-world disappointments intruding.

Visionaries typically disrespect members of the management team who raise problems. Negative feelings make it difficult to cope on a daily basis, and they may feel ganged up on when management presses issues that require tough decisions. Tactical decisions, especially in tense situations, are not a visionary’s strong suit.

The idea phase is much more desirable than the processing phase, where resources are assigned, schedules and deadlines are issued, and implementation tasks are identified, Dr. Chestnut explains. Visionaries want to start the ball rolling and have others take it from there. Implementation plans are grueling for them, as the freedom to think and create seems stifled. The visionary feels imprisoned under these conditions.

Colleagues and executive coaches who understand visionary leaders’ propensities can help them recognize the difficulties they cause and work with them to adjust behavioral patterns. Healthy doses of perspective, concern and determination are vital.

Coaching Promotes Balance

Visionaries can inspire an entire organization to new heights and compel people to accomplish the seemingly impossible. But when taken to extremes, the negatives overshadow the positives. When too little attention is paid to daily business needs, all the bright ideas in the world cannot keep the ship from sinking. Executive coaches, supervisors and mentors must emphasize the consequences in ways that preserve enthusiasm.

Qualified executive coaches will help visionaries forge a healthier balance between creating and leading. Visionaries must come face to face with their blind spots and recognize how their obsession with envisioning is impeding organizational performance.

Time management is one of the primary areas requiring adjustment. Visionaries must understand that tactical leadership skills are equally as important as their visionary abilities. Coaching teaches them how to partition time and effort. Successful visionary leaders learn to ration dream time so other responsibilities are met. Limited time assigned to visionary work can be sufficiently rewarding.

Visionaries must also learn that others may not think as quickly as they do, Dr. Chestnut explains. Slowing the pace to accommodate others is an adjustment worth making. Creative ideas should be prioritized before investing staff time. Asking people to tackle multiple brainstorms is too overwhelming. Only selective ideas—not all—will be processed. Direct reports with tactical expertise can determine which ideas can be implemented; leaders should accept their reasoning.

Living up in the clouds robs visionaries of life experiences and rewards on the ground, Dr. Chestnut adds. They miss out on the relationships and adventures involved in running the company. True, tactical leadership can be painful, frustrating and wearisome. But instead of avoiding these feelings, out of fear or insecurity, visionary leaders should face them, grow professionally, and build character, skill and confidence. Great leaders are forged out of adversity, not pure pleasure. Ideas are implemented through relationships and engagement.

How to Work for a Visionary Leader

Visionaries are often distant and disconnected, so employees may wonder if their boss knows what’s going on. Employees should reach out and find ways to make a connection.

Employees who speak positively and confidently will find it easier to gain a visionary leader’s respect. Instead of citing problems, describe opportunities with solutions. Visionaries shun critical personalities. Consistently bringing problems to your boss will worsen conditions.

Showing appreciation for the visionary’s brainstorming skills builds trust. Leaders will respond with mutual appreciation and a willingness to listen to helpful ideas. Trusted employees can help visionary leaders see the things they need to see. Support leaders’ efforts to handle tactical duties.

Engaging leaders about their ideas further enhances the relationship. Express interest in the vision and help explain it in ways the staff can follow. Ask questions about specifics, applications and how the idea supports company activities. Visionaries will be better able to distinguish the more promising ideas from the mediocre. Help visionaries pick their battles.

Offer to assist with research, setting up meetings, or introductions to other experts. Stay close to brainstorming sessions to monitor excessiveness, and divert leaders to the tactical side, when needed.

Help visionary leaders form new habits relating to time management, operational skills and relationship-building. A well-rounded leader takes care of the business while dreaming about the future.

The Need for Authentic Leadership

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Companies can no longer be impersonal buildings where employees show up each day, carry out their duties and shut off their brains before going home each night. People aren’t satisfied with simply following procedures and checking boxes. They seek professional fulfillment through engagement, passion and long-term value.

The most successful leaders know that employees want a rewarding work life—an environment that cares for them, values their contributions and gives them a chance to grow. Research consistently confirms that organizational health directly depends on employee satisfaction. When people are unhappy, the company suffers in myriad ways; when employees thrive, the company flourishes. There seem to be no exceptions.

Employees follow leaders who engage and inspire them, relate to them and instill trust. Leaders must be authentic, avoiding deception, contradiction, hidden agendas and ulterior motives.

Leadership experts like Bill George, a senior fellow at Harvard Business School, have studied how authenticity impacts organizations—and how a lack of it destroys them. Old-school thinking of power-based management, which keeps employees controlled and compliant, has failed. Distant, deceptive and insincere leadership repels people, causing multiple dysfunctions. Only legitimate authenticity works.

Unfortunately, many leaders have yet to grasp what authenticity necessitates and consequently fail to implement it. While authenticity’s facets are broad, its general principles are relatively uncomplicated and well worth the effort to learn and practice.

Branding and leadership expert Anna Crowe outlines four of its key attributes in Get Real: The Power of Genuine Leadership, a Transparent Culture, and an Authentic You (Lioncrest Publishing, 2019):

  • Adaptability
  • Direct communication
  • Putting values into action
  • Leading with passion

Be Adaptable

Employees want their leaders to be reliable sources of guidance and support, able to handle an ever-evolving environment with a variety of inputs, viewpoints and choices. They need leaders to adapt to the diversity of their surroundings and, as Crowe puts it, adjust to people’s unique situations.

Being adaptable requires a confident and, ironically, consistent character. Adaptability doesn’t mean being fickle, constantly changing course or bending under pressure. It calls for sticking to principles and plans with consideration, reasonable flexibility and understanding. Being consistent in how you display these traits allows your people to count on you. They know what they’re getting and what to anticipate. Consistent adaptability provides comfort and support, two important ingredients of fulfillment.

Leaders should assess their personalities to gauge their flexibility. A stubborn, prideful spirit clearly isn’t geared for authenticity. A trusted colleague or qualified executive coach can help you objectively determine how adaptive you are. Coaches are trained to guide you through adaptability’s nuances and steer your personality toward this critical mindset.

An adaptable approach fosters trust in challenging times and allows you to be true to yourself. People will know where they stand with you. When leaders put on airs, hide their intentions or contradict themselves, authenticity and trust are compromised. Leaders who remain calm, collected, insightful, understanding and willing to try new ideas demonstrate the trust-building power of adaptability.

Adaptable leaders know how to build unity within their teams. They avoid power games, politics or favoritism. They understand how to pull people into a common effort, pick their battles, make appropriate exceptions, meet urgent needs and make effective changes when necessary. Leaders who maintain the status quo, rigidly cling to rules and fear new approaches show a lack of authenticity, causing employees to hold back their best.

Leaders also gain respect and trust when they adapt to others’ input. Most teams include people with diverse backgrounds, personalities and perspectives, which encourage a wide range of ideas and solutions. Authentically considering what people offer and appreciating their contributions affirm them and add to their sense of fulfillment.

Communicate Directly

Inauthentic communication is the best way to lose employees’ respect and trust. Dishonesty, mixed messages, inconsistency and unreliability are serious communication weaknesses. They’re noticed quickly and are impossible to hide.

Employees trust leaders who speak clearly and directly. Authentic communication cannot be muddled, confusing or timid. When leaders communicate with purpose, logic, intention and emphasis, people detect authenticity. They trust leaders who cogently convey ideas and account for their audience, which maximizes connection. Speaking as directly as possible delivers the most trustworthy message. People think a leader who hedges or beats around the bush has something to hide and write off communication as inauthentic.

When leaders consistently communicate complete and timely information, people can rely on its authenticity. They know leaders are attempting to benefit everyone. When leaders hold back information for personal or political motives, employees usually discover the deception and develop distrust. Leaders solve communication problems when they recognize that people notice them and form opinions that are difficult to overturn. Seeing yourself from another person’s perspective will motivate you to enhance your approach.

Authentic communication is forged from honesty. Airs and pretenses must be cast aside. Leaders become transparent when they admit to being fallible or poorly informed on a specific topic. Such authenticity is attractive, especially when leaders ask for help. Admitting mistakes reveals a vulnerability that draws people’s admiration and appreciation. As Crowe points out, a leader’s mask severs the connections needed for collaboration and unity.

Leaders who hold themselves accountable to their people earn respect. Making commitments means you must deliver on them. If you’re open to feedback, willing to ask people about their needs, seek ideas for improvement and genuinely listen to feedback, you demonstrate authenticity. Taking action based on this input convinces people you’re authentically interested in their welfare and growth.

Put Your Values into Practice

Successful leaders know that key values set the direction of their organizations. They continuously come back to the fundamental principles that optimize human activity and fulfill their people. Values mean nothing to people unless they’re backed up with action, Crowe emphasizes.

People’s worth is the value most responsible for organizational success. Great leaders regard relationships as their organizations’ lifeblood. People work effectively only when they authentically relate to each other in a culture that promotes relationships. People-centered leaders purposefully relate to their colleagues, superiors and direct reports, thereby setting an example for their teams.

A relationship-oriented culture welcomes workplace diversity, recognizing the advantages of multicultural backgrounds and distinct abilities. Relational leaders put these differences to use, providing employee fulfillment by making sure everyone is included and valued. They respect people for who they are—not only for their technical skills, but for the relationships they cultivate.

Teamwork is critical to maintaining relationships and productivity. We accomplish more when working with blended resources. We are the sum of our parts. Teamwork-centered employees experience greater engagement and fulfillment. If you authentically promote teamwork, you’ll be surprised at the levels to which people can rise.

If you set high goals for your teams, be prepared to provide a commensurate level of assistance. Give of yourself, and clear the way for people to succeed. Demonstrate that you’re willing to sacrifice your own needs to further the team’s goals and accomplishments. Put your people’s needs ahead of self-interest. Employees will do almost anything to please leaders who go out of their way to help them succeed.

Professionalism is yet another value that sets the pace for your workforce. You can have fun and enjoy what you’re doing, but treat situations in mature and intentional ways. Your moral code should reflect authenticity and excellence. Banish negativity and inappropriate behavior, and exemplify a commitment to giving your best. Authentic leaders embody professionalism by walking the walk and not just talking the talk.

Make Passion Contagious

Employees who are passionate about their jobs find fulfillment. Great leaders seek ways to inspire passion in their people. Leaders who make genuine efforts to enhance their employees’ experiences are rewarded with a staff of motivated, productive achievers.

Conversely, inflicting a smothering system of red tape, indecisiveness and apathy kills employees’ interest and efficiency. People are more invested in their jobs if you offer them as much authority as they can manage. Empower your people to make decisions, take action and put ideas in motion. The less your people need to rely on you to make decisions, the more fulfilled they’ll become.

Challenge your people to accomplish what they didn’t think possible. Provide real opportunities that push them. People find passion when they’re free to be all they can be. Create a culture that aims high and demands excellence. Your people can raise the bar on their own endeavors, as you continue to reward their successes and offer positive feedback.

Of course, challenges carry opportunities for failure. Allow for mistakes when people are trying their best. Letting people fail can be positive if you continue to support them and send them back out there with new challenges. People need to learn from their mistakes and often find success in ways that wouldn’t be possible without having failed. A culture that forgives failure reduces fear and hesitancy, two significant roadblocks to fulfillment. Leaders who offer authentic encouragement and confidence boost their people’s passion.

Your most effective way to inspire passion is to live it. Passion cannot be forced or faked (too easy to detect). Leading authentically draws followers, so don’t be afraid to show vulnerability. Not everyone will agree with your visions and ideas. Every time you put yourself out there, you risk rejection or pushback. Confidence and determination help balance vulnerability (displaying strength through weakness, as Crowe puts it).

Authentic feelings, responses and behaviors engage people, affording you respect and trust. Trusting employees are more likely to be fulfilled.