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Are there elephants in the room? Is anything undiscussable?

Is there an undiscussable topic that is preventing your team from working well together or is causing you to avoid working on the things that matter most?  Then you may have an elephant in the room.

undiscussable

An elephant in the room is an obvious truth or condition that is being ignored or not addressed, or a risk nobody wants to discuss. Everyone knows these elephants exist – but we try to avoid them or refer to them obliquely.  They are often discussed privately either before or after meetings.  Our fear is that if we talk about these elephants, they will come to life and trample us.  The problem is that unless and until we are free to identify and discuss these sensitive topics openly, they never go away.

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Do you balance optimism with realism?

 

“Whether you think you can, or whether you think you can’t, you’re right.”

– Henry Ford

Optimism

Do you consider yourself an optimist, a realist, or a pessimist?  Many experts have opined on this topic as it relates to leadership.

Dr. Martin Seligman, a prominent researcher in the field of optimism, claims that optimism or pessimism lies in the way you explain the events that happen to you. Our thoughts can cause us to assess events inaccurately.  They can also cause us to jump to erroneous conclusions.

Strong leaders are seldom characterized as pessimistic. By definition, if someone in a leadership role sees mostly negative outcome, it will be nearly impossible to rally the masses to meet a difficult challenge.

On the other hand, it is uncommon for dynamic leaders to see themselves as pure optimists.  Someone with this view could be seen as a Pollyanna – a person who doesn’t have a grip on reality and believes that everything will eventually work out, regardless of evidence to the contrary.

Rather, the consensus view is that the most effective leaders are those who lean toward optimism.

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Why fewer choices can provide higher profits

How many variations of products or services does your company offer?  A few?  A dozen?  A hundred? More?  Are all of these products really required to meet customer demand?  Does it make sense to provide all these choices to your customers?

choiceMany companies have embarked on a journey of product proliferation.  In an effort to capture more market share, we have seen an explosion of customization and niche marketing.  A trip to your local grocery or large retail store confirms this. For example, 352 distinct types of toothpaste were sold in 2010. There are entire aisles dedicated to cereal, dog food, and toilet paper. Have these companies enjoyed increased profits by offering all these new products?  Not necessarily…

In this post, we will briefly discuss the implications of having too many products (choices) on both (1) revenue and (2) costs.

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Three Ways to “Manage Up”

Manage UpWhat words would describe the relationship with your manager or supervisor?  Would you use words like subservient, directed, chain-of-command, or authoritative? If so, it is unlikely that you are providing the greatest value to either your boss or the organization as a whole.  It could be that you don’t know how to effectively manage up.

In their recent book Influencing Up, David Bradford and Allan Cohen advocate that employees have greater capacity to influence their boss than they might believe.  Their contention is that powerful people need powerful direct reports.  More specifically, leaders need people who take initiative and get things done.  They also contend that leaders need direct reports who are willing to speak truth-to-power in a way that is respectful. So how can direct reports manage up more effectively?  It starts with understanding how to be more influential with their manager.

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Is it OK to be foolish?

Innovation, Risk, Creativity, InnovativeWhen was the last time that you or someone on your team proposed a crazy, unique, absurd, outlandish, or otherwise unconventional idea?  Has this ever happened?  What kind of reception did the innovative idea (and the person who proposed it) receive?

William Barnett, Professor of Business Leadership, Strategy, and Organizations at Stanford, discussed this topic as part of a recent webinar.  He described a “thought experiment” that helps us to consider what happens when someone comes up with a novel idea.  This concept aligns with the notion of how the fear of failure can influence whether innovative ideas are surfaced.

Barnett asked the hypothetical question, “When you have a good idea, does everybody have to agree with that idea for it to be correct?”  (Most people would say, “No”).

Barnett then asked, “When we have an innovative idea, what is often the first thing we do?  We ask others, ‘What do you think?’  “If the people we ask don’t like our innovative idea, what do we do then?  We often ask someone else.  Basically, we are looking for affirmation that the idea that we have is a good one.”

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Why bad habits are hard to break

Habits.  We all develop them.  Good habits can be helpful in our daily lives, while poor habits can result in unintended consequences which may not be known for a long time. This discussion will briefly review how habits can influence risk-taking, as well as the basic neuroscience of habit formation. habitLet’s start with a definition. A habit can be defined as something that a person does often in a regular and repeated way so that it becomes involuntary. Examples of some common habits include brushing your teeth, answering the phone when it rings, stopping at a favorite coffee shop each morning, or washing your hands after using the restroom (although this is not a habit for a surprisingly large proportion of the American population). We also develop habits in the way that we do work.  Most times, these work habits are beneficial, as it frees our mind for activities that require more conscious thought. However, there are situations where a habit can have negative outcomes.  Examples include the long-term habit of smoking or perhaps eating a high calorie dessert after every meal.

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