5 Ways to Prepare Your Leaders for Success

There is no doubt that applied knowledge and targeted experience is one of the keys to success. When employees gain the knowledge and experience they need for higher level roles before they get into the position, they are better positioned to lead into the future. Giving employees early leadership experiences and opportunities ensures the sustainability and future success of your business.

How can you prepare your leaders for more responsibility?

1.      Let them learn on the job. This means allowing them to make mistakes, recover and learn from them. It means expecting them to address issues directly and come up with creative, effective solutions. This helps them learn to think like an executive.

2.      Give them “fix-it” or “turnaround” jobs. A stretch assignment will force them to problem solve, communicate across organizational boundaries, overcome obstacles and build effective relationships. They will learn to become more persuasive, tough, and influential.

3.      Have them build something from scratch – start up a new project, build a new team. This will teach them resourcefulness, initiative, and tap into their creativity. If it’s a part of their current role, they will have to learn how to prioritize what is most important.

4.      Encourage ‘a day in the life’ where you have your leaders switch positions with a colleague in a very different role. Encourage them to go deeper in the organization to see firsthand the challenges your team faces with ineffective systems, poor handoffs, difficult people, dysfunctional communications, etc.. This exercise will expose them to your business in a very different way.

5.      Expose them to the financials so they understand how you make money, what are your most profitable products, who are your most profitable customers, where do you have losses. Help them understand the impact of decisions on the bottom line.

Giving employees and potential successors these kinds of experiences long before they need to step into an ownership or management position is an invaluable way to groom a successor. Giving up control can be difficult, but their transition to effective leadership will be much smoother with these kinds of experiences

Creating New Rituals and Habits in Retirement

Happy New Year! Many of us make resolutions for healthy habits this time of year, but really any time you make a life change – such as getting a new job, having a baby or retiring – is the perfect opportunity to reassess not just your daily routine, but also your regular habits and rituals.

What changes do you want to make in your life? What has worked well for you and what might you like to be different? Now is the time to decide: Do you want to sleep in until 7am? Do you want to cook healthy meals? Work out before lunch instead of 5:15am? Do you want to buy tickets to the theater for a Wednesday night because you don’t have to worry about the alarm clock waking you on Thursday morning? Do you want to take a class at the community college that meets from 2pm to 4pm on Mondays?  Or do you want to create a habit for reading, journaling, walking, biking, coffee with friends?

Decide what habits and rituals you want and then set up a place to do it. Ensure your tools of the trade are handy and then build the time into your schedule using a trigger that indicates when it’s time to do it. For instance, if you want to read your Bible every day, create a place to read, put your bible and any other tools in that space (reading glasses, a pointer, a coaster for your cup of coffee), and then build the trigger into your schedule. If you want to read right after you make your morning cup of joe, that’s your trigger. This year, as my schedule changed, I set a resolution to write in my journal every day. I created a space at a table in my home office, placed my journal, reading glasses and pen on the table, and my trigger alerts me to journal right before I head downstairs for breakfast. If you want to eat healthy meals, where will you find or create those meals? What tools do you need to do it well? What will trigger you to create or find those meals instead of the traditional fast food you’ve been relying upon?

You don’t need a life change to create healthy good habits. Pick something small and get started today.

Good luck!

Three Questions That Will Change the Way You Do Business

Three simple questions. In my work with leaders, helping them decide which of these three questions should guide their time and attention results in a tremendous impact on their business.

SHOULDA, COULDA, WOULDA…

What should I do? This is a question leaders need to ask themselves without shying away from the answer. Do you need to have a difficult conversation with a co-worker? (If so, I recommend Susan Scott’s excellent book, Fierce Conversations.) Do you need to shut down a manufacturing line that’s contaminated? Doing what you should do may not be what you want to do but it’s something that needs to be done for organizational and interpersonal dynamics or to avoid/contain a crisis situation.

What could I do? This is a powerful question for generating options. It expands our world and invites us to consider new possibilities. I recommend leaders set aside a portion of each day to think about the “coulds” alongside other key leaders. Working as a group to consider possibilities generates alignment, builds ownership in the business and establishes or solidifies stronger relationships.

What do I want to do? Asking this question can provide clarity on issues or opportunities that may be emotional or complex. Getting clear on preference doesn’t mean you must act on that preference, but it can guide how you act upon a “should” or “could.” For example, I might want to invest in a new piece of equipment to expand my manufacturing capacity rather than continuing to outsource. My analysis indicates that our contractor delivers excellent product quality at low cost. Logically, I should outsource it. Emotionally, I want to bring it in-house. Addressing all factors (instead of denying or avoiding them) facilitates better decision-making.

Should, could, want. Leaders ask themselves these three questions every day, but learning which situation dictates which question should be asked brings about a much higher level of awareness in decision-making.