The way of a fool seems right to him, but a wise man listens to advice (Proverbs 12:15).

Leadership is about influence, relationships, real change, shared purpose, and doing the right thing. I agree with Warren Bennis and Burt Nanus that an important part of leadership is a set of skills “that can be learned by anyone, taught to everyone, and denied to no one.” (p. 25)

Learning to develop leadership skills is your responsibility. The ability to self-reflect on your behavior and then to marshal the courage to self-authorize continual change and improvement is the foundation of assuming full responsibility for yourself. As Chris Argyris correctly asserts, there are a lot of “smart” people that are unaware of their unwillingness and inability to learn.

Henry Cloud wisely states that “the fool tries to adjust the truth so he does not have to adjust to it.” (p. 133). Fools often surround themselves with other fools, which renders them unable to recognize and close their integrity gaps. Many leaders deceive themselves into thinking they are wise because they seek the trusted advice of carefully vetted advisers. Unfortunately, advisers that formulate and confirm their advice only with each other can never offer wise counsel.

Fools are reactive listeners. They have “open door” policies and claim to be ever available to answer our questions and concerns. Their feel-good approach to listening rarely leads to substantive learning. We learn very quickly that the orifice of the oracle leader is actually a black hole instead of a source of light.

The wise are proactive listeners that initiate the process of listening with their own questions about what needs to change and how to make things better. The wise are proficient meta-learners, continually improving their ability to know what they know and their capacity to understand how to use knowledge to change their behavior.

Does your leadership development reflect foolishness or wisdom? How do you know? Please share your thoughts in the comment section below!

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There are plenty of reasons for weeping and gnashing of teeth over the scandal unfolding at Penn State University this week. The firing of legendary head football coach Joe Paterno and university president Graham Spanier does not merit any lamentation.

What Jerry Sandusky did was evil, and he will pay for it.

But good men also do bad things sometimes, and when they do, they too must be held accountable for their poor decisions and actions. Paterno, Spanier, and others at Penn State were intoxicated with power and hubris and contributed to a culture where silence and compliance were valued above justice and courage.

The truth is this is just as much a failure of followership as it is a failure of leadership. I predict we are going to learn that plenty of people knew enough to warrant sounding a louder alarm about Sandusky but failed to do so.

If you have knowledge of abuse in your organization (e.g. sexual harassment) you have a responsibility to report it. If you are a leader and someone has the courage to report abuse to you, you better look into it, especially if the person accused of abusing or harassing others is also in a position of leadership or basic supervision.

It’s your responsibility to protect those you’ve been given the privilege to lead. If you fail at that responsibility, you forfeit the moral authority to lead. You earned your punishment.

What do you think? Please share your thoughts in the comment section below! And please take the time to fill out my new survey!

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If you ask someone to make an exception for you, make sure it’s because you are delivering exceptional performance. If a policy, procedure, or rule is impeding your ability to perform, help team members succeed, or impress customers, then it’s your responsibility to suggest viable solutions and expect an exception.

photo credit: Fields of View

Never ask for or accept an exception for any reason other than exceptional performance. Reversion to the mean is the reward for those that believe they are entitled to exceptions.

The only reason people so routinely ask for exceptions is that they’ve learned either directly or vicariously that almost any personal inconvenience can be justified as an exceptional circumstance. A culture of exceptions is bad for the reputation and performance of your organization, and that’s bad for your career. It’s deceptively easy to become part of the mediocre mass of folks that put daily pressure on leaders to lower standards to their own lackluster levels of comfort.

I have tremendous respect for people that can say in a matter-of-fact way “I dropped the ball on that one, but it’s my bad, I know what I did wrong, and I’ll try very hard to keep it from happening again.” Falling short does not make the sincere quest for excellence any less virtuous. Setting high standards for yourself and refusing to make excuses when you struggle to meet those standards guarantees you will be exceptional, because the majority of your peers have compared themselves among themselves and would rather ask for exceptions than assume full personal responsibility when things don’t go exactly the way they want.

What do you think? Please share your thoughts in the comment section below!

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I’ve never lived in a world, or worked in an organization, that was void of rules. Rules can be a drag, but they can also serve as a very functional guide to productive behavior. Rules should always be purposeful, behavioral, very specific, and kept to an absolute minimum.

Rules should always represent minimum, reasonable standards of expected behavior, not stretch effort. For people with an internal locus of control that focus on group goals and hold themselves accountable to high standards of performance and conduct, rules are irrelevant. Good rules are only an issue for those that make bad choices.

Always stand behind, but never hide behind, your rules. Rules should be continually evaluated for their value and ability to serve the purpose. Eliminate or change a rule the moment it ceases to enable your people to work together more effectively. Rules are only as stupid as the people that use them as excuses to avoid improving systems.

Whatever you do, never bend the rules. If you make an exception to the rules for one person, you will send a discouraging message to the rest of your folks. If you bend a rule for one person, your standards and expectations will become ambiguous to everyone else. Bending a rule will teach people that you are willing to play favorites, unwilling to take the heat when the pressure is on, and unable to see the ethical gaps of your own behavior. If a rule no longer works for the group, change it.

Your behavior as a leader should teach people that “rule” is an innocuous four letter word. What do you think? Please share your thoughts in the comment section below!

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I’m off to day two of the Willow Creek Association Global Leadership Summit that I am attending via satellite broadcast at Grace Church in Reno. Day one set a high bar, with speakers like Seth Godin, Len Schlesinger, Brenda Salter McNeil, Steven Furtick, Bill Hybels and the amazing Cory Booker. I can honestly say its one of the best events I’ve ever attended and has far exceeded my expectations.

On my way in, I’m going to stop and buy a cup of Starbuck’s coffee because Bill Hybels asked everyone attending the conference to do so.  Howard Schultz, the CEO of Starbucks, was scheduled to speak at the conference today, but he canceled because of a petition signed by about 700 people protesting his decision to speak at this Christian church.  In his extremely gracious response, Bill Hybels said he was going to try to meet with the group protesting Schultz’s appearance so he could better understand their grievance, and he asked us all to buy a cup of Starbuck’s coffee and send Howard Schultz a note of encouragement.

Folks, that’s gracious leadership.

No one could ever accuse Howard Schultz of being a coward. His record speaks for itself; however, I do think he made the wrong decision in this case, one that reflects a lack of integrity, courage and foresight. But you know what, we all make decisions that others disagree with. When you are the CEO of a global company, it just comes with the turf. Good people sometimes make bad decisions.

I will keep drinking Starbuck’s coffee because I like it, I think they treat their people well, and their people usually treat me well when I visit. But I will think of both Bill Hybels and Howard Schultz differently from now on.

I’m also going to go buy one of Patrick Lencioni’s books this weekend, because he is stepping in at the last minute to replace Howard Schultz on the schedule today.

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Real Accountability

The topic of tonight’s #leadfromwithin chat on Twitter was foresight. The hour long discussion was led by Lolly Daskal and Greg Waddell, and hundreds participated.

I talk about foresight in my MBA classes on Organizational Behavior as part of our class discussion of leadership. I share with my students this quote about foresight from Robert K. Greenleaf’s 1977 book:

This is the central ethic of leadership.  The failure (or refusal) to foresee may be viewed as an ethical failure, because a serious ethical compromise today (when the usual judgment on ethical inadequacy is made) is sometimes the result of a failure to make the effort at an earlier date to foresee today’s events and take the right actions when there was freedom for initiative to act. The action we label unacceptable in the present moment is often really one of no choice. (Greenleaf, 1977, emphasis added)

Foresight is a learned habit, not a mystical gift that only a few oracles possess. Foresight is the discipline of systematically thinking through the unintended consequences of every decision you make. It requires the wisdom to purposefully surround yourself with people that you know won’t always see things the way you do and will have the courage to challenge you when they disagree. It requires the humility to admit publicly when you failed to foresee an unintended consequence of a decision and the grit to continually learn from your mistakes. Foresight demands real accountability and integrity.

Leaders that are more intent on telling than on listening care about themselves more than they care about you. I’ve learned from experience that foresight is not a high priority for leaders lost in the fog of their own hubris.

As the central ethic of leadership, leaders covet the development of foresight for the benefit of those they’ve been given the privilege to lead.  Leaders that fail to assume responsibility for developing the discipline of foresight will eventually forfeit the moral authority to lead.

What do you think? Please share your thoughts in the comment section below!

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Accountability is the binding strength of interdependence. The two primary principles of real accountability are that it always starts with you and that it always seeks productive solutions rather than blame when challenges occur at work.

We are accountable for keeping our promise to assume full responsibility for performing our jobs with distinction, trying to continuously improve our jobs as we master them, and caring about what we do. We are accountable for performing as autonomously as possible, but knowing when and how to ask for help when we need it.

We are accountable for knowing what’s expected of us and understanding how we need to behave in order to meet and exceed those expectations. We are also accountable for understanding that our expectations of others, even our leaders, are legitimate, and we must have the courage to share our expectations with others. We can’t expect people to help us excel until we ensure they know what we need.

We are accountable for helping others keep their promises by being enabling and encouraging, rather than disabling and discouraging. As we master our jobs, we try our best to help those around us master and improve their jobs. As purposeful performers, we are driven to find ways we can inspire others to enact their best selves at work.

We are accountable for not looking the other way when things go wrong or when people behave in unexpected or inappropriate ways. We are accountable for seeking solutions rather than laying blame; however, we understand that sometimes solutions require tough choices.

A team or organization that is void of real accountability is one that is incapable of delivering remarkable performance. Interdependence is the walk of excellence, a walk that requires intention, foresight, effort, introspection, discipline, patience, persistence, openness, integrity, respect, trust, compassion, courage, commitment, growth, gratitude, and grace.

That’s what we are accountable for.

Did I miss anything? Please share your thoughts in the comment section below!

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I taught three different classes last semester, one at the undergraduate level and two at the MBA level, including one I delivered for the first time. It’s a lot of work teaching three different subjects to three different audiences. I got my evaluations back today from all three classes and many students thought I did a very good job, most thought I did an acceptable job, and a few thought I should have been fired yesterday.

If you are going to have high expectations of yourself and others, there is no way you can make everyone happy. High expectations by definition means you have to take risks and try some things you’ve never done before, or make changes to established methods in search of continual improvement. When you take risks, some things are not going to work as well as you thought they might, and from time to time, they might even suck.

When you challenge adults to accept full responsibility for their own learning, you accept the risk that many will not embrace that challenge. Some will lead their entire lives never even understanding the importance of that challenge. Even though I know their self-imposed mediocrity won’t be my fault, it still means I have to continuously improve how I deliver that challenge and how I live up to it myself.

A student said to me this semester “I’m waiting for you to teach me something.” I just about came out of my skin. The prison of that paradigm awaits everyone that surrenders to it’s normative expedience.

Freedom of thought and expression is a wage of accountability, never a privilege of mere participation. Self-doubt, dissonance, and rejection come with the territory of high expectations.  If you are not willing to embrace the messy parts of who you are, how you do your job, and what others might think of you, then you can never invite and encourage others to do the same.

If you are willing to seek the edge of chaos, you will soon learn that some of the most amazing people you will ever have the honor to meet were there long before you arrived.

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In Samuel Culbert’s book “Beyond Bullsh*t: Straight-Talk at Work,” I learned that mokita is a New Guinean word that means “the truth everyone knows but no one speaks” (p. 126). The Wikipedia definition is slightly different – “the truth we all know but agree not to talk about.”

Why do we often all agree to not talk straight about the truth at work? It would seem that many reach the conclusion that the truth is not worth talking about either because it takes too much effort or it’s too risky.

I’d love to tell you that real leaders need to always speak the truth they know and encourage others to do the same, but the truth is if you speak the real truth too often you won’t have a bright future in leadership. Those that speak the truth about what others have agreed to bury will never be trusted by those that have something they want to remain buried.

Loyalty is safer than brutal honesty. According to Culbert:

People need loyalty in the form of support, cooperation, and encouragement, contributions that can actually help them to perform more effectively. They need loyalty in the form of delivering what you promise, noticing and valuing their positive qualities, acknowledging their contributions, and sharing your opinions forthrightly, as openly and honestly as circumstances allow. (p. 129)

That works for me. My ultimate goal is to do my job more effectively, so I can hold my tongue about mokita as long as I feel purposefully supported. But I personally feel no loyalty to mokita as long as reasonable loyalty eludes me at work.

Our responsibility as leaders is to provide others reasonable loyalty even when it’s not provided to us. Life isn’t fair, neither is the workplace, but it’s up to us to try to make it better.

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In his amazing little book, “On Bullshit,” Harry Frankfurt tells us that bullshit is a greater enemy of the truth than lies are.

It is impossible for someone to lie unless he thinks he knows the truth. Producing bullshit requires no such conviction. A person who lies is thereby responding to the truth, and he is to that extent respectful of it. When an honest man speaks, he says only what he believes to be true; and for the liar, it is correspondingly indispensible that he considers his statements to be false. For the bullshitter, however, all these bets are off: he is neither on the side of the truth or the false. His eye is not on the facts at all, as the eyes of the honest man and the liar are, except insofar as they may be pertinent to his interest in getting away with what he says. He does not care whether the thing he says describes reality correctly. He just picks them out, or makes them up, to suit his purpose. (55-56)

The liar has to recognize the authority of the truth before he willingly rejects it. The bullshitter does not reject the authority of the truth; rather, he pays no attention to it at all. The truth is simply not that important.

The fog of bullshit is dangerous to leadership because it entices us to abandon the pursuit of what is true and correct versus what is false and incorrect. Many of our differences, we are told, are merely a matter of perception; consequently, sincerity trumps objective reality.

Rather than seeking primarily to arrive at accurate representations of a common world, the individual turns toward trying to provide honest representations of himself. Convinced that reality has no inherent nature, which he might hope to identify as the truth about things, he devotes himself to being true to his own nature. It is as though he decides that since it makes no sense to try to be true to the facts, he must therefore try instead to be true to himself. (66-67)

Leadership’s quest for the “right thing to do” is based not only on the belief that there is a correct course of action that merits impassioned pursuit, but also that there is a wrong way that may seem right but must be vigorously opposed. Leadership must be as alert to and intolerant of bullshit as it is of lies.

We can all “just get along”, but not until every one of us agrees to never allow any one of us to force the rest of us to ignore or deny a lie. There is no way we can look each other in the eyes and trust each other when we all know we are standing knee deep in bullshit.

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