Reminders on Resilience

Originally published on February 20, 2024.

I have written about resilience and related topics of trauma and post-traumatic growth before. And I'm back for another crack at the topic due to significantly trying circumstances. In the notes that follow, I will talk about lessons in resilience that have been reinforced for me over the past year and more. It's not my intent to give you a blow-by-blow account of the challenges I have been facing. In reality, the specifics don't matter as much as how I have been working to place adversity - and even trauma - in perspective, and use some tools I already had at my disposal to move forward. What I will disclose is that in January, I lost my mother and the last of my parents to a stroke/complications of the stroke. Mercifully, her journey in ill health lasted a very short time and was preceded by decades of good health. She lived a good life. Within the context of my own life, her passing has not been, however, the most significant negative reality I have been having to manage in the past year.

The events of the past many months have caused me to question a whole series of foundational elements that I had taken for granted in my life. I suspect - and can probably say that I even know - that all of you have been in similar places at least once, if not more often, in your own lives. All too often in these circumstances, our approach to these adverse events is to spin, overthink, isolate and catastrophize. As humans, we are driven to respond to perceived threats, seek to contain or mitigate against these threats, go into some form of fight or flight mode (and perhaps both at different points in time) and try to get back to a preferred path forward of our own choosing. The challenge is the preferred path is the one we were on and now is no longer feasible to maintain. Too much has changed. Too much was and is beyond our control. And perhaps the path we were on was never as concrete as we thought it was.  

Given all of that, what have I learned, or rather, what have I relearned that has helped me persevere through my own personal challenges? What has provided me a sense of direction and hope for a new - if different - future? Listed below are some of the lessons and tools I believe I have rediscovered and have been using to move forward.

Accept Reality. For far too long in the past year, I worked to recapture or reinvigorate a life I thought I had. Call this resistance to change. Call it denying reality. Resistance or denial didn't serve me well at all.  It wasn't helping me see things for what they were. It wasn't helping me recover, learn, grow, or feel better.  Paradoxically, the more I tried to invest in a reality or state that wasn't going to be possible, the more these efforts actually prolonged my pain and difficulties. There is real truth to the adage that what we resist persists.  

The path forward for me then - which took several months to arrive at - came from accepting the environment in which I was actually living. To be clear, acceptance does not equate to resignation or giving up.  But it does suggest that the tactics I was using to manage through my reality were often not the right tools for the job in front of me. Once I was able to change - and accept - what I was seeing, I was able to move forward more productively. Again, this change in perspective hasn't meant that the path since then has been easy, without pain, or not been characterized by grieving. All of this is operative, but at least I have a better chance at doing more of the right things at the right time in the right way than I did before.

Accept What You Control - And Don't Control.  Working with my Core Strengths© assessment results, I noted key strengths as a person/leader as being Supportive, Loyal, and Persevering. These strengths are operative when things are going well in my world.  When I am challenged or when things are not going so well, I unfortunately double down on those very same strengths and become Self-Sacrificing, Gullible, and Stubborn (or masochistically persevering). That latter set of skills did not serve me well as I tried to navigate my trials and tribulations. Working back to the challenge of Accepting Reality, I kept trying to double down on solutions that were no longer appropriate to circumstances. By remaining so committed to a "cause", I merely heightened and extended my pain.

The realization for me eventually was I had to stop trying so hard to maintain a past state of (artificial?) equilibrium. As I would seek to work with my coaching clients, I also had to follow some of my own coaching process and questioning. Metaphorically speaking, I had to accept that I couldn't control the weather. All I could do was wear the proper clothing to manage in and through things I couldn't control. 

Establish and Rediscover Your Network. In trying times, too many of us get too much inside our own heads and don't work with or create a network of people - friends, confidantes, coaches, even therapists - that can help us process the issues before us. As I have said before, when working with others, our mind is a dangerous neighborhood to go into alone. A natural threat response is to hunker down and go into our caves as it were. Aside from this typical deep-seated threat response, at various points we may find ourselves confused by what is happening around and to us. Therefore, it may be difficult to even determine how or what to respond to and how to communicate this with others.

However, as in a typical coaching engagement, the out loud processing of our reality is a critical step forward in understanding what we are actually dealing with. As we engage in this processing conversation, we have an ability to better understand what is real, what is imagined, and what the next logical steps forward might be for us.  What we might also come to appreciate is that we were never really as alone as we thought.

I honestly can't emphasize this need for developing or reengaging with a supportive network strongly enough. The ability to process my thoughts with others, getting help to "right size" my reality, evaluate next steps, and just have one or more people present with me through pain has provided me with immeasurable benefits. I recently told two of my friends that their willingness to walk with me in this journey is a debt that I don't believe I'll ever be able to repay.

Focus on Your Health. I've been all over the map on this one in the past many months. At times, I have been able to get into a routine of physical exercise while at other times, most notably at the time of my mother's stroke and through to her passing, that ability to maintain a schedule has fallen by the wayside. Where I have been able to focus on myself, the ability to maintain a fitness routine has had direct benefit to sleep patterns along with supporting mental and emotional benefit.  

The network noted above is also key here as well. In this case, you might be able to get support from others to maintain physical, mental, and emotional interactions so necessary to your sense of balance in a topsy turvy world. Even the simple act of a walk in the woods, while socializing with another compassionate human being, can reap benefits from being in the fresh air, exercising, and finding normal in a time of chaos.  

Beyond what I have already mentioned, I have been trying to re-engage in hobbies, support diversion and focus through meaningful work, and even resurrecting the act of writing this blog. All of those approaches are helpful. Others that have been suggested to me are meditation and journalling - things I have yet to try but I know work for others.  

Bottom line, there is no more important time to strengthen yourself, remind yourself of your positive qualities, and engage in positive activity than in a time of adversity. The alternative is a slow cycle downward where less energy and enthusiasm begets even less energy and enthusiasm. 

Vision of a New Future. As hard as it often is, I also believe that what has helped me through adversity in the past and builds my resilience is crafting and imagining a new, positive future. Even if I start with the death of my mother - and how having the dubious distinction of being the oldest in my immediate family - it is clear that what was can no longer be. There will be no more daily calls between us. There will be no more care packages of handcrafted baking and foodstuffs lovingly made. There will be a new future ahead and I have a choice to create something that best suits the new facts as they are.  

This future will be built one step at a time. It won't be easy or clear on some days. It can be helped and nurtured along but not rushed into existence overnight. I suggest being patiently impatient in this regard.  Hope is not a strategy, but it is critical to helping us move forward beyond current circumstances. There will be forces trying to hold us back. Some of these forces will be external naysayers.  Other forces will be the voices in your own head. But create a vision, foster hope, dare to dream even if your dreams start small from those tiny seeds will a new glorious future sprout.

Resilience is a critical part of being a successful leader and a well-adjusted human-being. Reflect on past adversity. Draw lessons and strength from your past. Rely on your team. The storm will pass. See you on the other side.

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

What's Your Funhouse Mirror?

Originally published on February 12, 2024.

Executive coaches are often called on to support leaders and teams achieve a better understanding of themselves as individuals and/or support some form of appreciative inquiry on team performance and team dynamics. Often, we are called to be or hold up a mirror to our clients. This can be accomplished in a variety of ways: standard coaching session focused on goals and information presented by the coachee/team supported by insights obtained by the coaching process; a range of individual and/or team-based assessments, some of which have a 360 degree focus to them; and possibly traditional evaluative processes that fall into the realm of human resource tools and performance development initiatives that we are all familiar with.  

One of the most challenging aspects of this type of work is the degree of courage and honesty that any one individual or team approaches this introspective work with. In reality, all of us have a hard time getting a true image of ourselves by looking into the proverbial mirror - either through our own self-reflection, through an assessment tool, through feedback and even through coaching. What comes to mind for me as an executive coach, therefore, is the range of mirrors and the various distortions that are possible as we pass from one location to another in a funhouse.

The work that I do can see individuals being overly critical of themselves in their self-assessments, particularly when compared to any 360 feedback they may receive.  More challenging, I can also see  circumstances when one's own self-assessment presents an overinflated positive assessment of leadership skills and potential as compared to far less rosy results obtained from others. 

The risk in individuals having a more negative view of themselves is they may not be fully stepping into their strengths thereby diminishing their potential positive impact to their benefit and that of their teams. There is so much more that can be achieved with a bit more self-appreciation and courage. 

In the latter circumstance, when one's self-assessment is overinflated and doesn't match reality and results experienced by others, the challenge and risk can present in a number of ways. Will the potential blow to ego be too much for the individual to handle? Will the results be completely dismissed resulting in a lost opportunity to learn and grow? Will the results lead to a deterioration in relationships in the workplace or even beyond?

Leadership requires humility to be open to what reality is, but it takes courage to unleash the true power that comes from owning what is and what can be.

As with the funhouse mirror analogy noted, we can all make choices about what mirror we want to stand in front of and what reality we prefer.  

In either circumstance above, the assessments or evaluations are never THE answer, nor do they provide direction as to next steps to take.  This is where courage and honesty - supported by the coaching process - become instrumental in determining degree of action taken or success achieved.  

One of the more interesting opportunities I believe a point-in-time assessment provides is to open a door to deeper discussion with an individual client or team. The harsh reality we might be exposed to might become the catalyst for needed change if we can summon the humility and courage to change. How do the current results compare to other feedback and patterns that may be informative or supportive to past information received (but perhaps previously dismissed)? Is this really the first time we are getting "bad news" about how we are perceived and/or are actually showing up?

Aside from the potentially distorted image we have to work through, and perhaps expanding on the mirror metaphor, what windows into the past might we need to look through? How can we learn from, but not repeat the patterns of the past that are getting in the way of our personal or team success? This is a tremendously hard task for many, particularly if, from an individual perspective, we are operating from a belief system that holds us back from owning our "facts". Do we believe a leader must always and only show strength? Do we believe a leader must never own up to opportunities for growth?  Are we constantly plagued by self-doubt and, as a protection mechanism, must always blame others for our lack of advancement or success in our careers?  

As a coach, consultant, and leader I have seen the reality of - negative - repeating patterns often. Leaders who have moved from role to role (and even from personal relationship to personal relationship), never having accepted that the reason they have been moved on (involuntarily in many cases) or have always remain frustrated in their "status" in their careers, is they have never been truly prepared to change and grow. They almost inevitably deny the information they are receiving on how they could be the authors of their own challenges. Other people just don't get them. They may even go so far as always and consistently blaming everyone else for the lack of progress, success, and recognition in their careers.

Coaches, mentors, and even friends can only do so much in holding up the proverbial mirror for these leaders or teams.  As a coach, the adage that you can't work harder than your client parallels the well worn phrase that you can bring a horse to water but you can't make them drink. Experience also tells me that some leaders will never want to face their past and current reality as objectively or as courageously as they need to.

All we can do as coaches - if we are truly to be in service to others - is to continue to be courageous ourselves, hold up a mirror that is as distortion free as possible, help our clients use assessments or data as windows into their past patterns and current situation, and even be prepared to be discarded as coaches when humility and courage to change are not present in our clients.  

Objectivity, humility and courage. It's All About Leadership!

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

The Challenge - and Paradox - of Expectations

Originally published on September 25, 2023.

One of the key drivers of effective leadership revolves around the notion of expectations. What do I mean by expectations? within a leadership frame of reference?

First of all, you have expectations about being a leader, what that means in general terms, and what you believe or expect about yourself as a leader. Perhaps you have aspired to be in a leadership role since before you entered the formal workforce. Perhaps your expectations of what it means to be a leader come from formative experiences in school or sports. No doubt, you have also likely had your share of good and bad leaders, and those experiences have helped shape what you now expect of yourself as a leader.

Our formative experiences can lead us to believe that becoming a leader should result in a tremendous increase in power and privilege. Alternatively, we may enter into leadership roles with a great deal more humility and anxiety if we recognize that increased scope of responsibility comes with new obligations and challenges. 

Our expectations of ourselves can be sources of motivation and inspiration, AND a source of frustration and disappointment. To succeed, progress, and move forward, there is value in setting aspirational and stretch goals. In this case, we are setting the bar high with the belief that with strong commitment, effort, learning, and development, we can meet the standard we have set for ourselves. We seek to inspire ourselves to a new level of performance.

The caution around these expectations is to ensure they are grounded in reality and don’t – due to any source of setback – become a source of punishment and demotivation. “Failure” in this case must be objectively assessed for the learning it might impart to us, allowing us to either right size expectations of ourselves or re-invest in the original goals.

Second, as you were placed into one or more leadership roles throughout your career, you also know that you and your organization or boss had some expectations of each other. If you are fortunate, these expectations were made crystal clear. However, if you are like most of us, it is more likely the case that you and your boss discovered – perhaps painfully – that there were unclear or even unstated expectations around performance, commitments, and obligations of your leadership position.

A final aspect of expectations in play comes from the team you are placed in charge of and the peers in leadership you will be working with. Each of these individuals has expectations of what you and your leadership should look like, what they expect you to deliver for them, and how they expect you to treat them. The greater the level of leadership responsibility you take on, the greater the number of eyes will be on you, and the greater number of expectations there will be to juggle.

With those people external to you, the diversity of their expectations will, in fact, be as different and as complex as the number of individuals you interact with. What each of your followers, stakeholders, and constituents deems of value or importance to them can range widely. For example, some will expect you to

• place greatest emphasis on doing what is right for the people of the organization (e.g., how can we grow and support their success and development?);

• focus on bottom line results (however that might be defined), seek to drive performance, and recognize those individuals who meet and exceed targets;

• set up best-in-class systems, processes and structures that ensure the right thing gets done, in the right way, on a consistent basis; and

• be an incredibly inclusive leader, driven to get input from all, believing that the best solutions are created through consensus.

I have only touched the surface of these externally driven expectations. Depending on how front-facing you are to your customers, clients, or stakeholders, a whole range of other perspectives come into play.

And let’s add one more variable into the mix. Expectations are never static; they are constantly changing and evolving. Just when you have think you have everything crystal clear and your engine is humming in perfect efficiency, a wrench is thrown into the system. For example:

• your external business environment changes leading to a need for change in priorities for your organization.

• your boss changes. Now you have to adjust to a new style of leadership and new goals to decipher and deliver on.

• your team changes over time – they grow and develop, perhaps move on to new roles, or the team expands and contracts. That means your team’s expectations about how they are led and what you need to do for them shifts.

• you yourself also grow and develop and look to have different personal and professional needs met. You might be looking for more or new challenges. Even your personal life circumstances might change and cause you to reconsider what your leadership path should now be.

Regardless of the reason for change, expectations will continuously shift over time. As a leader, you will have to evaluate and be attentive to the shifting sands of expectations from a variety of sources. 

Expectations can be motivating.  Expectations can be challenging.  Expectations are never static.  

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

It's All About You - Self-leadership

Originally published on June 12, 2023.

In past posts I have talked about quiet quitting and the great resignation. The perspective I've taken has focused on what organizations could do/might do to address the realities of the evolving job market and labor force. What I haven't done is look to advise individuals - leaders or staff - in why they might choose to leave an organization. Nor have I actively encouraged resignation or a change of scenery. Why change tactics now? Well, the topic resonates more in the past few weeks as several of my acquaintances have realized that their commitment to a current employer is not being reciprocated OR, in some cases, they have been shown the door after years of dedicated and quality service. While many organizations often tout a perspective that human resources are the organization's greatest asset, their actions often drown out stated commitments.

These recent experiences have also caused me to reflect back on my own re-introduction to the labour force back in 2012 (and the start of my coaching/consulting career). I've gained a lot of experience and perspective over the past dozen years, not the least of which is informed by my own Core Strengths Assessment results. What particularly resonates for me are my Overdone Strengths - things I do when things are not going well for me, perhaps when anxious or in some form of conflict, but efforts I engage in with the hope/expectation of still producing a positive outcome.  My top three Overdone Strengths seem to particularly resonate:

Self-Sacrificing: being so supportive that you give up your own interests and wishes for others

Blind: being so loyal that you overlook or ignore problems with plans or people

Stubborn: being so persevering that you justify your course of action despite others' views or preferences

I could go on, but the listing of the top three Overdone Strengths suggest to me (in retrospect) that I continued to invest far too much into a job and an organization when all objective evidence was suggesting that my efforts were in support of a losing battle. I failed to appreciate that my priorities were no longer (if they ever were) the organization's priorities.  

In the past I have suggested that - as individuals and leaders - we have to engage in appropriately selfish behaviour. The context for those previous posts related to the need to continuously invest in oneself and take time to recharge one's batteries. My advice in this post is perhaps more bold and assertive on YOUR BEHALF. Don't make the same mistakes that I did in assuming that your organization or your leader is as committed to your personal success or the same goals/values as you are. Be vigorously objective in always assessing whether your needs and priorities are really being met or stand a chance of being met. My specific advice - and thoughts to continuously review for yourself on a regular basis - is as follows:

One: Make Yourself and Your Needs a Priority. This first presumes that you have actually thought about and articulated/documented what is important to you and what your life/career priorities are. By doing this you can continually evaluate current and future fit with an employer. You may also find by this articulation that you draw new opportunities to yourself.

Two: Recognize When You Are Being Used (Rather than Valued). Objectively assess how often your needs and expectations are balanced against your leader's needs and expectations. If there is a decided imbalance at play and you continue to defer to the "big picture" at your expense, I suspect you will increasingly feel disengaged and de-energized.  

Three: Document Your Value. In many of my coaching engagements, one of the key approaches that helps an individual take on new challenges is owning their strengths and accomplishments. While we easily identify our perceived weaknesses, we rarely put as much emphasis on what we are skilled at. We might be tackling imposter syndrome here or just simply helping you own the possibilities beyond your current state of affairs.  If you don't see your strengths and possibilities being leveraged in the current state, it might be time to move on.

Four: Invest Energy to Get Energy. Exhaustion at the end of the day should also be evaluated as a sign of the need to move on. If your exhaustion seems to arise out of feelings of being frustrated, disrespected, or defeated, then it's time to consider a move. If energy invested leaves you feeling exhausted from the effort but fulfilled and inspired, then hope remains. Pay attention to what your heart, mind, body, and soul are telling you. 

Five: Manage Nostalgia. It can be tough to move on, especially if there have been some good times and major accomplishments in your past. This experience directly relates to the feelings of loyalty and blindness that I noted for myself earlier. Our past experiences can cloud our judgement about the current and expected state of affairs. Challenge yourself to objectively test current reality. 

Six: Envision a Positive Future. The phrase "better the devil you know" comes to mind here as you consider a new future and possibilities. Paradoxically, I believe I was lucky in being involuntarily introduced to the marketplace. While my choice to move into consulting and then coaching was not certain, I'm pretty confident that I would have been far more hesitant to chart a dramatically different path if not pushed forward. Looking back it was clear that I lived in a lot of pain for several years and that my hesitancy to shift was based on lack of clarity of future success.  Upon reflection I can honestly say - Trust Yourself and Own your Strengths. You are capable of more and deserve the best. 

Seven: Remain Flexible and Seek Out Allies. Keep a vision in front of you and trust in better.  However, be prepared that its actual form and timing may not proceed in as linear a fashion as you might hope. In similar fashion, don't expect that yours can be or should be a solo journey. Be prepared to learn from others and be prepared to be helped by others - practice vulnerability and humility in the same way that you likely started your career so many years ago. 

Eight: Be Clear About What You Want. This tactic might be informed by previous suggestions, but I want to remind you that as you consider the next opportunities, don't be shy about being clear about what your are looking for or need from the next role. Don't settle. You don't have to. Look for the next thing that is truly your next best thing. Your prospective boss or organization certainly wants the best fit - you should apply the same lens to them.

Nine: Be Patiently Impatient. Success and change may take time. Prepare for that. Try to find a way to persevere through change. Develop and foster new networks and new opportunities. Don't be afraid to experiment. Keep moving forward while you evaluate. I have often noted that it took me at least a couple of years to find my stride in my new career and not a small amount of success came from dogged determination (and perhaps not a little masochistic behaviour!). Keep putting yourself out there on the foundations of your strengths, vision, and value. 

Ten: Be High Maintenance. What do I mean by that!? This might in fact be a summary of all that I have said before. Be clear about what you are looking for and keep holding others (leaders, organizations) to that standard. As already noted, you deserve the best. Don't settle. Be bold and be confident. Look for an opportunity that resonates with your strengths and values. Recognize that the contract you have entered into may change over time. If that becomes the case, make sure you rinse and repeat these 10 tactics.  

I recognize that these "10 commandments" may seem like a tall order. However, at the end of the day, I believe that application of this advice will support not just your career success, but also your level of fulfillment with your life as a whole.  

It's all about you.  It's About Leadership.  In this case, it's about self-leadership.

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

The Addictive Power of Work

Originally published on March 10, 2023.

For much of my leadership career (1986 to 2012), I devoted a significant amount of time, energy, and effort to being a good leader and on trying to go from being a good leader to a great leader.  The consequence of that commitment was there were far too many work days that started early and ended late, and far too many weekends where downtime equated to a bit of sleeping in (potentially) before getting back to work at home.  If I am honest with myself, the real consequences of that work addiction were poor physical and mental health along with not insignificant damage done to family's well-being. 

Why start to discuss this concept of work addiction when so much of the public discourse has been on quiet quitting and the great resignation?  I do believe, in fact, that these polar opposite responses stem from a similar desire to achieve some form of meaning in our lives.  Some people double down on work at the expense of all else, believing it will help them attain their brass ring.  Others choose a different path and a complete reset of life's priorities.  More recently, what brought this topic back to my attention was the news story of the Twitter executive (Esther Crawford) who was previously seen in a viral photo sleeping on the floor at headquarters as Elon Musk took over the company.  Ultimately, that commitment and loyalty (delusion?) was not enough to maintain her status in the company.  She was recently fired.  

Interestingly enough, Crawford's take on her termination wasn't cause for regret or immediate self-reflection on what had been sacrificed for this total commitment to career.  Rather she took to social media days after her termination to do battle with critics who had noted that she got the axe despite her loyalty to her boss and her job.  "The worst take you could have from watching me go all-in on Twitter 2.0 is that my optimism or hard work was a mistake," Crawford tweeted.  "Those who jeer & mock are necessarily on the sidelines and not in the arena," she said, referencing a famous quote by Theodore Roosevelt.

Time will tell whether Crawford has any change of heart.  She might not.  She could soon jump into the next business or entrepreneurial venture that feeds her.  For as many people that are looking for work-life balance, we still have a significant number that drive themselves forward relentlessly in business or career. I'm coaching some of those people now!  People who don't believe that "no" or "not now" is an appropriate answer.  People who believe that the current situation of overwork is temporary and with one more push, the work boulder can be pushed over the hill.  People who look around them and believe leadership and business success equals more time and more time and more time invested at the coal face of work (even at the expense of self and family).

What I have also observed over the past few years as well - not incidentally related to our COVID-19 reality and the hybrid work environment -  is technology (Zoom-based meetings, office technology readily available in the home) has significantly blurred the lines between work and private life.  We get up and we can immediately start work.  No need to commute.  We can "manage" back-to-back meetings without having to worry about walking from office space to meeting room.  We can extend our hours deep into the evenings... well... just because we can.  

However, what my clients are discovering, much like I discovered many years ago, is work is a relentless machine.  It will take all you give to it and it will still leave you feeling like there is so much more yet to be done.  You are never finished and never can finish.  

But there are many like Esther Crawford who will not or cannot slow the pace.  They may actually be suffering from an addiction to work.  Workaholics is a term that has been around forever, but in days past we might not even have called it that.  Excess work was just seen as the normal part of career advancement. But what drives this behavior?  What makes this type of pace an addiction?  I offer a few thoughts below.

Expectations of Self/Others.  Some of us are very goal driven.  I include myself in this category.  Whether as part of our upbringing or based on our earliest experiences of work, we have developed an expectation of self that success requires drive and sacrifice to get ahead.  We have a goal in mind, an end to be achieved.  We also often wrap up achievement of career or business goals with our worth or value as a human being.  How joyous and rewarding to call myself CEO, or COO or VP.  We crave to introduce ourselves to others with these titles.  I know I took great pride in those titles.  In some cases this drive for self-worth is wrapped up in what we see others achieving, assessing ourselves against them (e.g., "hey at age 35 they are here, I'm falling behind, better get moving"), and looking to catch up or speed ahead.  We strive on the competition and the win.

Don't Let the Team Down.  In other cases, and certainly something I have heard recently from more than one of my coaching clients, is an intense desire to not let one's team down.  This can operate when an individual is a member of a team or as a team lead.  My clients often express a desire to protect their teams from overwork, they look to shelter them from challenging situations, and so forth.  But this all comes at a personal cost.  The spirit of altruism results in the individual team member or leader carrying a load that is not sustainable long term.

I've Got Something to Prove!  At first blush this might seem to be directly related back to the expectations noted up above.  And to some extent it is.  However, whereas the former examples are driven a bit more from a positive intent (e.g., I believe I can make it if I work hard enough), what I am talking about here is a drive to diminish or eliminate any sense of inadequacy one might feel about work or leadership capabilities.  This is the chip on the shoulder mentality.  If you believe others have counted you out or have considered you unworthy, your work drive is intended - come hell or high water - to prove the bastards wrong! I too have had some of this as my motivating force for overwork. 

Being Part of the Inner Circle.  What could be more enticing than to "arrive" and get an opportunity to socialize and partner with a variety of other prestigious leaders and business people!  Each of us, in our own way, wants to be part of a tribe, and wouldn't it be great to be in the biggest and best tribe in whatever way we define it.  We can then further justify our work addiction, attendance at more functions, attendance at more meetings and networking functions from a standpoint that networks build career and business opportunities, advance the interests of our teams, and help build up prestige for our organization.  We are altruistic leaders, working on behalf of the masses, coupled with a healthy (or unhealthy?) dose of self-advancement. 

Pure Adrenaline. The final thought I will put to this is work addiction is like any other addiction.  Tolerance is a reality.  When our careers first start, we have youthful energy and enthusiasm.  We are learning the ropes.  We take on more responsibility and workload.  And if you do well at your tasks, your reward is to typically get more responsibility and more workload.  And the cycle continues.  Over time, like a drug addiction, our brain and body grow accustomed to a certain level of stimulation and we find we can do more and - more importantly - we need more of that stimulation to remain engaged and alive.  The biggest flag in this regard is we have a hard time disconnecting from work.  We feel much guilt if we knock off from work at a normal time or feel more than a bit twitchy when going on vacation.

How do you know if you have a work addiction?  You could look at some of the notes above to conduct some form of self-diagnosis.  Am I actually working more than a regular workday/week on a regular basis?  Am I often doing work or responding to emails at all hours of the day or evening?  Do I believe that one more hour, or one more day, or one more week at a relentless pace will get me over the hump - only to see the next mountain rise up before me?  

More recently I discovered an interesting assessment tool that directly focuses on work addiction.  The Bergen Work Addiction Scale uses seven basic criteria to identify work addiction, where all items are scored on the following scale: (1) Never, (2) Rarely, (3) Sometimes, (4) Often, (5) Always:

• You think of how you can free up more time to work

• You spend much more time working than initially intended

• You work in order reduce feelings of guilt, anxiety, helplessness or depression

• You have been told by others to cut down on work without listening to them

• You become stressed if you are prohibited from working

• You place less emphasis or priority on hobbies, leisure activities, exercise and family/relationships because of your work

• You work so much that it has negatively influenced your health. 

Scoring "often" or "always" on at least four of the seven items may suggest you have a work addiction.  The additional trick as it relates to the self-assessment is the degree of honesty you can muster to complete the evaluation.  You might also find it interesting to compare and contrast your self-assessment results with others as part of a 360 process. 

A weighty topic to be sure and likely not one with any easy answers for many of us.  We can choose different paths.  We can be different leaders.  I just ask you to choose wisely and consciously.  Every path has risks and rewards.  It's all about leadership!  And it might also be about your personal well-being. 

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

The Power of Appreciation

Originally published on March 6, 2023.

In the past several years, as COVID-19 has cut its swath through our lives, as technological advances have made jobs and tasks redundant, and as expectations for performance have increased (in terms of expectations from customers and employers), the phenomena of quiet quitting and the great resignation have gained momentum.  In many ways, however, the challenge of building up, maintaining, and sustaining employee commitment and engagement has been with us since well before 2020.  Individuals like Simon Sinek have made their mark for over 10 years talking about leadership and how to engage followers. The concept of employee engagement is now big business, but it has been so for many years, if not decades.  Companies like Gallup charge big fees for helping organizations evaluate employee engagement.  Ideally, these same companies help translate this data into strategies to change the lived experience of staff.

Why, with all this background, knowledge, and effort, are we still failing so miserably, in not only growing engagement with our people but, in very many circumstances, continuing to lose ground on employee loyalty and commitment?  Why do we continue to see so much movement and searching on the part of employees for something more and better?  What are people looking for?

Let's start by looking at the Gallup 12 questions that form the heart of their engagement assessment.  A variety of other tools and questions could serve just as well as a starting point, but the Gallup questions have some degree of familiarity in the marketplace and are simple to understand and apply:

1. Do you know what is expected of you at work? 

2. Do you have the materials and equipment to do your work right? 

3. At work, do you have the opportunity to do what you do best every day? 

4. In the last seven days, have you received recognition or praise for doing good work? 

5. Does your supervisor, or someone at work, seem to care about you as a person? 

6. Is there someone at work who encourages your development? 

7. At work, do your opinions seem to count? 

8. Does the mission/purpose of your company make you feel your job is important? 

9. Are your associates (fellow employees) committed to doing quality work? 

10. Do you have a best friend at work? 

11. In the last six months, has someone at work talked to you about your progress? 

12. In the last year, have you had opportunities to learn and grow?

I have purposely highlighted a few of the questions, particularly since they have resonance with my work and how I have been impacted by the power of appreciation.  Most relevant in this case are questions 4, 5 and 7.  Now, certainly the type of work I do - executive coach and management consultant - is very different than working within an intact team or large organization.  Often, by the very nature of the work, I am a team of one acting both as boss and staff.  But in other ways, as I seek to bring value to those I work with, I often develop a level of attachment and commitment to their goals that starts to mimic being a member of a team. 

In the past few weeks, several events had significant - and unexpected - impact on me to the extent that I had strong, and sometimes an uncontrollable, emotional response.  

Situation 1: As I was facilitating a workshop on governance, one of the participants marveled at my "...phenomenal ability to synthesize diverse perspectives and set foundations for teams to deliver maximum impact."  This was from a very accomplished and experienced leader in their own right who I had essentially just met.  They had no reason to artificially inflate my ego.  They had seen good and bad consultants and facilitators throughout their careers.

Situation 2: In this very same session, and out of the blue, one of my consultant colleagues texted me this simple message, "Have a good day.  Thank you for all your support and guidance." This was a message that came early on a Saturday morning, without context and completely unsolicited. 

Situation 3: Over the past number of weeks I have been acting as practicum lead coach to a team of five coaches as they explored the concept of team coaching.  At the end of each learning session, individual team members had a chance to lead a team coaching scenario.  My role was to support them in their learning and give them feedback in the moment and post-session.  At the end of the last session, the team engaged in an appreciation shower (as they called it).  Again, not something I was expecting but what I heard moved me to tears - generous, no-nonsense, highly observant, role model, brought ease to the work, constructive not critical.  There was even reflection back to one individual's experience with me from my leadership career which ended in February 2012!

Why do I highlight these experiences?  Because it had powerful impact.  It highlighted how important non-monetary factors were in encouraging ongoing effort, loyalty and commitment.  Would I come back and work with these people again?  Most assuredly.  

What made these comments so impactful?  What can we glean from my experience that you might copy in your leadership roles?  How could you practice effective appreciation, reward and recognition to promote employee retention?  Here is what I think mattered to me and might matter to others.

Don't script your appreciation.  Don't look to fulfill a quota of thank yous, appreciation or reward, and recognition. Don't make appreciation a check-box exercise.  Without a doubt, the appreciation and validation shown to me from the examples above was made more powerful because it was so unexpected.  

Make it genuine and authentic.  As I alluded to above, all of the comments and praise given to me came across as highly genuine and authentic.  I can't capture the tone of what I heard from people through their verbalization of what it was like to work with me.  All I can say was the appreciation for the work I had done with them oozed throughout the conversation. 

Make it specific.  The comments and feedback given to me were very specific.  There were no generalized thank yous.  There were no clichéd statements you might typically get in other circumstances. The comments received were very specific and directly related to the work I was doing.

Make it timely.  The compliments I received were very immediate.  In my role as coach for several organizations, I may not get feedback on my coaching engagements until months after a coaching engagement has concluded.  In the consulting world, some of the only ways you know you have hit the mark is if a client organization decides to invite you back for a repeat performance - but that may only come several months later. 

Understand your recipient.  This is probably a harder one to capture and translate into other circumstances.  What I can say is the comments from my clients and colleagues left me feeling validated and that my opinions, perspectives and guidance were valued.  What I was trying to do with my clients was actually seen in action by my clients and valued!  They saw me and they appreciated me.

Those are my takeaways for how you might approach employee reward and recognition efforts in your leadership and in your organization.  None of what I note above is about compensation.  In fact, in two of the three examples, there was little to no compensation involved.  The third circumstance was from work with a not-for profit entity (so no private jets, concierge service, or purple M&M's for my turn down service). 

I hope you will find value from these personal insights and reflections and I hope you can tailor your future work with your staff guided by some of these perspectives.  Without a team there is no leadership and part of leadership has to be about genuine appreciation and recognition.

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

Cultivating a Strategic Mindset - Part 2

Originally published on February 28, 2023.

In part three of this blog series (which I never intended to become a series!), we will continue to explore, at a high level, a variety of tools that you can begin to apply immediately in the pursuit of a strategic mindset skillset. You will find some of the tools relatively easy to apply while others may present a greater challenge.  Like everything else in leadership, you are encouraged to step out of your comfort zone, be compassionate with yourself as you learn, and try, try again. 

Give Yourself Some Tools and Models

One of the challenges that we may be facing when we try to develop our strategic mindset is that we could be working with a blank slate – where do we start?  This is where having awareness of one or more models or frames for strategic thinking might be helpful to you. 

A variety of models and tools do exist to kickstart your thinking.  The idea behind introducing these models is not as some of endorsement or to indicate that any of them are best-in-class or without their own limitations.  Rather, we want to start to expand you frame of reference and push your thinking to a new level. Some of these models include:

• The Iceberg Model

• Six Thinking Hats

• SWOT model

• PESTLE/PESTEL analysis

• ADKAR or other Change Management model

• Stakeholder Analysis

• Porter’s Five Forces that looks at an organization’s environment through five forces of Competitors, Buyers, Suppliers, New Entrants and Substitutes

• The BCG Model, a matrix model that looked at the world through two lenses of (current) market share and (potential) market growth to assess whether given products were dogs, cash cows, problem children or stars

• The Good to Great Model from Jim Collins, which is comprised of six elements of (1) Level 5 Leadership, (2) First Who/Then What, (3) Confront the Brutal Facts, (4) Hedgehog Concept, (5) Culture of Discipline, and (6) Technology Accelerators.

• Mind Mapping - a diagram used to visually organize information into a hierarchy, showing relationships among pieces of the whole.

• Decision Tree - a decision support tool that uses a tree-like model of decisions and their possible consequences (if àthen), including chance event outcomes, resource costs, and utility. 

There are many more models and tools that are available to you.  Use those that are easiest for you to apply or make most sense to you.  Alternatively, research what your own organization might be using to support development of its strategic thinking.  Your informational interview and mentors (mentioned in the previous blog post) might be other sources of information as well.

Think in Scenarios & Contingencies

When we discussed the core elements of a strategic mindset, we identified the concepts of hypothesis testing and intelligent opportunism.  How can we put that into practice, even in a small way, in our day-to-day work? The answer is to consciously try to develop scenarios and contingencies.

This is a proven method of expanding one’s perspective and testing assumptions/ options when applied to issues both tactical and strategic. The process sees an individual or team develop plausible options about what could happen in a changing environment for an organization. 

Depending on the opportunity or issue in play for you, the variables you might change to test the impact on your plans could be informed by any of the tools or models that we have already described:

• What would the impact be on my initiative should a key stakeholder in my organization change?  What level of support could I expect going forward?

• What happens if my budget projections change by 5%, positive or negative?  10%?  What corrective actions might I need to take to get back to balanced budget?

• What would happen if anticipated volumes of service delivery didn’t materialize?  What if my projections were off by 5%, 10% or higher (positive or negative)?

The intent through this work is not to come up impossible scenarios (although something like COVID-19 seemed implausible until it happened) but to help you anticipate changes and be prepared to pivot to new plans as required.  Through this process you not only start to understand and explore the factors at play, thus enhancing your ability to think strategically, but you also position yourself proactively and confidently to make changes in a moment of potential crisis. 

Create Your Own Tools & Supports

This tactic for developing your strategic mindset may at first seem nonsensical – how can I develop a tool to help me become strategic when I might be starting from a point of not knowing what a strategic mindset means? There is method to this proposed madness!

In this case, we suggest two very basic – but powerful – things that you can do for yourself.  First, if nothing similar currently exists in your organization, create a decision-making template or checklist that allows you to apply a strategic lens to any of your key operational decisions.  This checklist or framework need not be pages and pages in length but would allow you to deliberately evaluate a decision against the “bigger picture” for yourself and the organization. 

The types of questions you might consider as part of your decision framework could include:

• Is this action or initiative aligned with and supportive to my/our mission?

• Is this action or initiative aligned with my/our organizational values?

• Which one of our current strategic directions or priorities does this action/ initiative currently support?

• Is this action/initiative a good use of my time/resources or that of my team based on my other assigned priorities?

• What stakeholders – internal or external – would be impacted by what I am about to do?

• What do my stakeholders expect of me prior to me taking action?  Do they wish to be consulted with, partnered with, or simply informed?

• If I make adjustments in my assumptions will that make my decision easier or harder to implement (back to scenario building and contingency planning)?

Ideally, the power of this checklist approach comes in the form of its simplicity, its ease of use, and its immediate availability for use in your workspace.  Create and post this in your line of sight so that you may readily ask yourself, “Is this an opportunity to further develop my strategic thinking skills?”

The second tool that you can give yourself is the space and time to focus on being strategic.  Everything we have discussed comes with an investment of time, energy and intellectual capacity.  Again, as with any new skill or habit, we have to determine that this time, energy and effort is worthwhile and will in fact deliver a return on investment.  It is equally true that we will get back in return from the effort exactly or in direct proportion to what we put into developing our new skill.  

While there might be those times where we can try to be strategically mindful at a moment in time, it is more beneficial to consider setting aside some dedicated in our calendars on a regular basis to support thoughtful consideration and debrief.  This structured debrief time can allow us to reflect on what has been working or not working, what we can anticipate in the future, and how we might do things differently with the benefit of hindsight. 

I hope I have given you much food for thought.  Cultivating a Strategic Mindset - It's All About Leadership!

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

Cultivating a Strategic Mindset - Part 1

Originally published on February 21, 2023.

In the last blog post we dissected the components of what made up a strategic mindset.  Great! Theoretically, you now have an understanding of what the concept is and what the elements of such are.  But, what can you do to actively cultivate what we have described as an essential leadership skill?

In part one of this two part blog series, we will explore, at a high level, a variety of tools that you can begin to apply immediately in this development quest. You will find some of the tools relatively easy to apply while others may present a greater challenge.  Like everything else in leadership, you are encouraged to step out of your comfort zone, be compassionate with yourself as you learn, and try, try again. 

Reading? Yes, Reading!

Developing (and sustaining) a strategic mindset is hard work.  You probably have already felt some of that through your existing or initial developmental efforts in this regard. However, if you want to continue to progress in the development of this skillset then some targeted, self-directed research is in order.  This area of exploration takes on a few different forms. [note: in the modern era reading can also stand in for podcasts, vlogs, videos, and other similar forms of learning].

1.     Information about/from your own organization.

As a leader there is no easier and no more accessible way to start developing a bigger picture view for yourself than reading your own organization’s strategic plans, annual reports or other publications.  Reading through them may help direct you to other documents that the organization has produced in the past or otherwise have informed their assessment of the organization and the environment in which it operates. 

2.     Information more specifically relevant to your profession or career.

Some of us have professional bodies or associations that we belong to.  These organizations can be another source of information as to what is important for them, how they see the profession or sectors developing over time, and deliver this information through magazines, white papers, websites and similar sources. 

3.     Information about your sector and/or your competitors as relevant.

Depending on the sector you are in, you may also be able to access resources and materials that are put out by other organizations similar to or in competition to you. This is certainly sector dependent.  For companies or organizations that are publicly-traded or highly regulated there can be a significant reporting requirements that are readily available to anyone interested in reading them. For those companies or enterprises that are privately held or who might be less sophisticated or resourced to produce informative material the challenge might be more daunting. 

4.     Information about the broader environment in which you and your organization lives and operates.

Likely the biggest and most challenging task in developing one’s strategic mindset is looking out to the broader environment in which you or your organization operates.  This starts to delve into areas that many of us might be less interested in or versed in – political, economic, and social trends for example.  While this takes greater time and effort, it affords an individual leader with the opportunity to truly expand your frame of reference.  This effort truly bears fruit if we can start to question how issues and trends in other sectors might end up impacting us and our work.

Informational Interviews

The self-directed learning noted above can only go so far in expanding your perspective on strategy and strategic thinking.  In the absence of other learning or experience that learning may be somewhat random or misdirected.  This is where the concept of informational interviews comes into play.

An informational interview is a targeted, face-to-face or virtual meeting that is intended to gather information about your sector, another sector, the broader environment in which your organization operates, or any element that advances your knowledge or skill in strategic thinking.

When you are curious about a particular industry, role, or approach to work, an informational interview can be a valuable tool for gaining insights that cannot be found in everyday research. Put simply, it is a conversation that can help inform your strategic mindset.

Informational interviews can be a gateway to information and someone else’s lived experience that you would not usually have access to. Identifying the people you want to talk to can be as simple as asking someone else for a warm introduction or reaching out through business sites such as LinkedIn.

Most of have a fear of seeking out these kinds of opportunities.  However, people are usually willing to respond to such requests when they are asked in a professional manner and are identified for the purpose of learning and development. All you have to do is approach these conversations in a spirit of humility, genuine curiosity and a desire to learn.

Mentorship

A mentor can be transformational for the development of your strategic insights and thinking.  Accessing one or more mentors (yes, you can have more than one mentor) allows you to tap into the learning and experience of someone who is more senior in their role or profession or who is in a position to offer unique insights otherwise unavailable to you.

In contrast to the informational interview noted above, it would be expected that a mentoring relationship would continue beyond a single conversation.  It should be noted, however, that an informational interview could be the gateway to identifying a mentor for yourself.

Mentoring relationships can be both formal and informal and vary in intensity of effort.  Some mentoring relationships can last as little as a year, while others can become life-long professional partnerships.  

Your mentor(s) can come from a variety of sources both internal and external to your organization.  Internal mentors benefit from understanding your organization but may lack in new and different perspectives.  The reverse can be true from those external to your organization – less versed in your particular business issues, but more able to give you new and different perspectives on strategic thinking.

Questions, Questions, Questions!

Closely tied to the techniques of informational interviews and mentorship is the need to continue to develop and ask questions.  This may come across as a highly simplistic tool to offer up in terms of developing your strategic mindset, but we suggest that far too often we don’t develop a variety of skills because we fail to ask questions. 

This happens for a variety of reasons not the least of which is our own fear of coming across as somehow inferior (e.g., I don’t want to look dumb, or everyone probably already knows that so why shouldn’t I?).  In many ways, we make up a variety of scenarios in our own minds as to how our question might be perceived or what we think others might think of us for asking such a question.  This mirrors the concept of “imposter syndrome” where we have somehow convinced ourselves that we are not as qualified or skilled as others and we don’t want to formally confirm that assumption with others.

What we often fail to realize is others are far more likely to treat our question with the same level of compassion and empathy as would if the tables were turned.  This is particularly true when we position the question as a learning and development opportunity for us.

More to come!  While we have covered some decent ground here, there is more to offer in a sequel to this post.  And best practice in learning might also be don't overwhelm the learner through a firehose approach!  Part II coming soon…

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

What is a Strategic Mindset?

Originally published on February 9, 2023.

As leaders grow and evolve from their first supervisory role and look to progress through more responsible and demanding positions, inevitably the question arises as to how they can become more strategic.  But like a variety of leadership concepts, not nearly enough is said, nor is enough support provided to aspiring leaders, as to what strategic actually is or means.  Lacking in a clear understanding of the concept means that individual leaders can be left to figure that reality out on their own and engage in a variety of activities that may or may not enhance their strategic thinking.

What then makes up a strategic mindset?  I suggest that there are several key components that comprise this overarching concept, and by breaking the idea down to these elements we can promote understanding and engage in more targeted and purposeful efforts to enhance our strategic thinking - at both a personal and organizational level.

Interrogating Reality

When setting the stage for future plans and or trying to vision the future, too many managers, leaders and organizations solutions jump. By that I mean that they immediately think about where they would like to be in the future and fail to appreciate what position of strength or weakness they are starting from.  Their future plans – either as an individual or as an organization – are not grounded in current reality.  Jim Collins in “Good to Great” describes this process as confronting the brutal facts.  He noted that the most successful companies – those that moved from good to great and sustained that level of performance year-over-year – were honest and diligent in determining the truth of a situation.  This effort alone, in his estimation, helped leaders and companies identify the right path forward based on decisions that became self-evident. 

A Systems Perspective

A strategic mindset calls upon an individual leader and/or organization to consider a broad range of factors, forces and components that are at play both within the individual organization but also within that organization’s broader sector and environment. In this move from a focus on individual resources/goals and an elevation from unit-specific or department level goals, an effective leader changes their perspective to a higher vantage point.  Certainly we can appreciate that this ability to think at a broader system level for any one individual can be a function of stage of career or level within an organization.  However, to be as effective as possible in a leadership role and provide better direction and rationale for decisions for one’s team, the benefits in understanding how day-to-day tasks fit into the bigger picture can support more effective engagement and execution of job duties.

Intent Focused – The Vision

Earlier we talked about the ability to strongly interrogate the reality facing a leader or an organization.  This relates to both the internal and external factors at play – what are our strengths and weaknesses, and what are the threats and opportunities outside of us.  We suggested that anyone involved in setting a strategic direction forward had to be grounded in the same reality.  What makes this assessment far more effective is also knowing to what end we are directing this investigative effort.  Strategic intent provides a focus that allows individuals within a team or organization to leverage their energy, thinking and capacity to a common cause.  BreakPoint Solutions mirrors this approach by asking our clients to begin with the end in mind or convey to us what success would look like in the timeframe under consideration for a project or initiative. 

The Importance of Timing

A strategic mindset also takes in the consideration of time.  A strategic thinker assesses time from a few different angles – the past, present and the future. Coming back to strategic intent, Dr. Jeanne Liedtka (1998) suggests that effective strategic thinkers ask themselves this core question:

“Having seen the future that we want to create, what must we keep from our past, lose from that past and create in the present to get [to a preferred future state]?”

This question not only frames work within the context of the desired future state, it also takes into account what has been learned from interrogating reality, assessing what the organization may be good at, and what skills or capacities it needs to develop to be successful.  When you think strategically, you are always connecting the past to the present to the future. You learn from the past and use that learning to make predictions. You look at the present to assess the gap between where you are now and where you want to end up.

Intelligent Opportunism

Effective leaders and organizations continue their environmental scans, their assessment of organizational strengths and weaknesses, and evaluation of opportunities and threats on a continuous basis.  They recognize that the assumptions and facts upon which they developed their initial plans are always subject to change.  The concept of intelligent opportunism then should be understood as encompassing factors such as flexibility, adaptability and continuous learning.  This can be where some organizations lose the forest for the trees.  They either question the value of long-term strategic plans (because the environment is always changing) or doggedly follow such plans to the bitter end regardless of changed reality.  

The key to applying the concept of intelligent opportunism within a volatile environment that all organizations operate within is to keep the long-term vision in mind while being flexible on tactics and timing in the short-term.  The balancing act then becomes:

Create, establish, and maintain long-term vision –
where do we want to be in 3, 5 or 10 years?  What are we striving for or to become?

AND

Evaluate the success, necessity and need for adjustment in our short-term goals and tactics every day, week, month and year.  Are we doing the right things to get us where we want to be?

Hypothesis Driven

The final element of a strategic mindset is the ability to vigorously explore a perspective, with an idea in mind, but with a view to testing the validity of that idea and the path towards the goal.  In this case, a strategic mindset and strategic thinking mirrors the scientific method. As strategic thinkers – as curious leadership scientists – we begin with a question or assumption in mind.  That question might start with “What if?” or “Why not?” or “Could it be?”.  One of the keys here is to suspend judgement, a willingness to acknowledge our biases, and vigorously challenge our assumptions. 

Our initial question(s) could then progress into a series of “If this happens…what could happen next?”  This allows us to explore and pursue multiple options either as we interrogate reality, create strategic intent, or evaluate other possibilities as they arise. This personal or organizational willingness to test options can be another strong path forward to balancing between a level of appropriate persistence and pure stubbornness.  One path keeps us aligned to our goals while the second option can take us over a proverbial cliff.

My hope is that this rather long dissertation helps you understand better this concept of strategic thinking and strategic mindset. Developing this capacity is a critical skill throughout your leadership career.  I encourage you to start thinking about you can now move from understanding to purposeful development.  

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

Building Organizational Resilience

Originally published on February 2, 2023.

 In my last blog I introduced the concept of organizational resilience and how we might actually assess this capacity in an organization.  Got some powerful feedback especially as it related to the full scope of what resilience, adversity and trauma are.  Suffice it to say that the whole concept of resilience can be - and is - sufficient to exceed the limited space of any one blog to address and has a breadth and depth of opportunity to support any number of graduate and post-graduate courses and degrees!  All that being said, I want to move beyond identifying how one might start to measure organizational resilience to how leaders could take steps to further develop resilience in their organization.

Whether an organization has undertaken a formal and well-developed assessment of current ability to effectively respond to adversity or has taken a much more limited and cursory approach to this evaluation the results may largely be the same - there is room for improvement and strengthening of organizational resilience.  First off, no organization has all the perfect systems or structures in place. I always believer there is room for improvement.  Second, even if those systems and structures were best-in-class when introduced, they likely need ongoing maintenance and attention as times passes.  Complacency and hubris can lead to unpleasant surprises down the road. Finally, resilience in an organization is a function not just of the structures and systems that an organization has in place but also of the individual capacity of each individual employee as well. The reality is that these individuals operate at different levels of capability and resilience on any given day and that this reality shifts daily. Personal and organizational resilience are always in flux. 

A key takeaway from understanding organizational resilience aside from the need to do some form of assessment and appreciating that it is always in flux is that fact that when adversity (or even a major disaster/trauma hits) that whatever we show up to the event with is what our capabilities will be in the moment.  The organization, its leaders, and its staff will not have the luxury of asking the pain point to come back when we are more ready.  An organization needs to be proactive in preparing for eventuality of adversity and worse.  

Some core elements of enhancing, sustaining and building organizational resilience come back to the areas of resilience assessment introduced in the last blog.

Core Values & Purpose - One of the comments I received from a reader on my last blog related to how too many organizations seem to have lost their "why?"  The passion and clarity of purpose was seen as lacking and an explanation as to why we are seeing so much employee disengagement and turnover.  In this reader's view the lack of articulation AND ADHERENCE to core values and purpose was a key driver of the Great Resignation and Quiet Quitting.  

I agree.  An organization would do well to revisit/refresh its Mission, Vision and Values on a regular basis; ensure that all internal stakeholders (at least) are part of that process to support commitment, buy-in and execution: and then vigorously embed these foundational elements into organizational systems and processes.  This latter effort, continues the organization-wide discussion around the "why", the "where" and the "how" - it makes the commitments and promises real.  As one of my coaching colleagues says all the time - "We need to take these statements off the wall and make them walk down the hall!"  

Organizational Decision-Making - A core part of making the purpose and values real and vibrant is ensuring that they are in fact used in organizational decision-making.  A consistent reference and application of these core elements needs to be part of any decision that the Board, senior leadership, middle management and front-line staff use to make large and small decisions.  Alignment of purpose and grounding in common frameworks allows all internal stakeholders to be centred in advance of adversity and provides them with the ability to get recentred when adversity throws individuals and organizations for a loop.

Investment in Leaders and Staff - Hopefully, it is relatively obvious that resilient leaders provide the capacity for organizations as a whole to be resilient.  If leadership is stressed, exhausted, and otherwise fragile (for any number of reasons) the capacity of the organization to respond to adversity is likely to be limited, reactive, late and even counter-productive.  If physical, emotional, mental and spiritual resilience of the leaders is diminished they cannot similarly evaluate, monitor and attend to the capacity of staff.  Leaders ARE a key point of leverage for organizational success and will determine how your organization will respond in the moment of adversity.  This reality speaks to the need for ongoing engagement surveys (not just once every few years), actionable and credible plans to address the results of the engagement surveys, the development of systems that allow leaders and staff to do work effectively and with limited frustration (e.g., suitable IT systems, sufficient supplies, good equipment, etc.), strong communication throughout the organization, and ongoing leadership and staff development.  

Organizational Coping Skills - Every organization should provide its leaders and staff clarity as to how to respond in a moment of adversity.  The time for critical learning is not at the time of a critical event!  This can be as simple as having a well-understood response plan in the event of a fire alarm (don't laugh - I've seen something this basic be taken for granted and experience miserable failure as a result), an IT outage or hack, all the way through to supports available to react to and immediately recover from an episode of violence in the workplace.  If leaders and staff know the commitment and seriousness of the organization's efforts to support them in the moment - and then experience that level of support in the moment - confidence and resilience are maintained and impact is more rapidly recovered from. 

Organizational Self-Care - Beyond the immediate crisis, an organization must similarly invest in a range of longer range and proactive initiatives that lay a strong foundation for building capacity.  This includes investment of serious time and energy - and sometimes dollars - in areas and systems such as business continuity plans, partnerships with suppliers and other service partners, customer service initiatives and relationship building, succession planning efforts, and long-term capital infrastructure maintenance and replacement plans.  The list is certainly not exhaustive but hopefully illustrates the flavor of proactive investments in long-term organizational strategies that can support organizational resilience. 

Culture & Personality - the final element that I propose that an organization attend to on a consistent and proactive basis is the health of its culture.  This takes on many forms - some of which relate to the initiatives we have just covered above.  Overall, an organization that has a strong, consistent and aligned culture has a greater chance of successfully moving through and beyond adversity than an organization that doesn't understand and own its strengths, doesn't promote or practice within a learning environment, and overall believes in its collective capacity and strength.  

When we put forth the concept of alignment this speaks to two aspects.  One, the organization's systems, decisions and actions must be aligned with, support advancement of, and be driven by the organization's Mission, Vision and Values.  Second, all leaders, staff, departments, and functions of the organizations must know and feel that they are moving in the same direction and hopefully with equal passion and commitment.

Overall, this perspective implies a level of investment in organizational self-confidence, recognizing and rewarding individual, team and organization performance and successes.  This implies a level of connectivity and camaraderie within the organization with limited to no barriers for information sharing and collaboration.  This suggests that the organization has both the humility to assess and test itself, is driven to improvement, and is willing to learn from (versus simply punish) mistakes. This suggests that the organization and its staff have the confidence in all circumstances to maintain control over events rather than seeing themselves as victims of external forces. 

Ultimately, organizational resilience - once understood and assessed - can be improved by a series of purposeful and aligned initiatives.  Failure to undertake such efforts puts not only organizational heath and success at risk but may also result in complete failure and demise of the enterprise.  

I suggest that attending to and promoting organizational resilience is neither simple nor easy.  But it is critical.  And ultimately a resilient organization is all about leadership. 

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

Assessing Organizational Resilience

Originally posted on January 26, 2023.

The concept of resilience has gained a lot of attention in the past several years most notably because everyone one of us has been tested in countless ways, through several years of the COVID-19 pandemic.  Understandably much of the focus has been on evaluating, building and sustaining personal resilience.  However, the conversation around organizational resilience has also started to gain similar attention the more so, perhaps, as the strain on the capacity of various companies and sectors has become more and more noticeable in the past year.  News stories and the reality of hospitals grappling with significant turnover in staff and resulting vacancies, supply chain issues that continue to plague the automobile industry, and the challenge that almost all organizations have faced in pivoting in response to new demands from both customers and staff.  Organizational disappointments, failures and other shortfalls have become relatively commonplace and even expected in today's environment.

An interesting question was posed to me recently on organizational resilience, "How serious is the conversation and the follow-through on organizational resilience?"  A provocative question.  Unfortunately, my response reflected a reasonable degree of cynicism and view that too many leaders might be paying lip service to the very real need to attend to organizational resilience and to sustain such efforts on a long-term, consistent basis.  In some ways, the issue of organizational resilience might fall into the same category as issues like black lives matter, diversity/equity/inclusion, the me too movement and other such events that gain a lot of traction and attention in the moment but whose momentum fails after a few short months.  We have proven ourselves to have notoriously short attention spans on even critical issues, make large and glorious pronouncements, pat ourselves on the back, and try to get back to business as quickly as possible. 

The consequences of a drive to get back to business as usual in current circumstances, however, is that we only further weaken and exhaust our organizational capacity and resilience.  Paradoxically, if want to improve our business and organizational fortunes, leaders will have to go slow to go fast.  Leaders will have to see assessment, development and sustainment of organizational resilience as a key strategic imperative for many years yet to come.  All this begs some questions though - how does one measure organizational resilience and once a benchmark has been established how do you grow organizational resilience?

For now, let's start on the assessment side of resilience.  There are a myriad of tools available for us as individuals to assess our personal resilience.  These tools benefit from strong grounding in schools of thought informed by psychology and efforts to support individual mental health.  I have yet to find as comprehensive or encompassing a tool that helps to assess organizational resilience.  One option to address this gap is to consider the organization as its own living, breathing entity and extrapolate and modify assessment categories accordingly.  The result might start to then focus on key areas of organizational health:

Core Values & Purpose - how well articulated, integrated and widespread are the organization's Mission, Vision, Values and Strategic Directions?

Organizational Decision-Making - to what extent does the organization consistently respond to adverse events in a proactive and constructive manner (versus reactive/panicked mode)?

Organizational Coping Skills - what is the quality and range of tools and supports the organization has for itself, staff and even key stakeholders to support organizational function in the immediate aftermath of an adverse event?

Organizational Self-Care - what is the quality and range of initiatives the organization has in place to build resilience and capacity in advance of any adverse event?  In contrast to organizational coping skills, organizational self-care represents long-term and sustained investments in building and improving capacity in advance of adversity (e.g., business continuity, learning & development plans, succession planning, etc.).

Organizational Pride & Confidence - this may seem an odd assessment category, but it starts to reflect an investment in organizational culture that rewards and recognizes achievements, strengths and accomplishments of individuals, teams and the entire organization.  The assessment focus can be supported in part through staff engagement surveys but also through evaluation of image/presence in the marketplace.  What is the "personality" or reputation of the organization with its stakeholders?

Organizational Connectivity - this assessment category looks at the degree to which the organization supports not just information sharing but also collaboration and support between teams and different functions/departments within the organization.  A similar effort and lens could be applied to the extent to which an organization is constructively connected and engaged with key external stakeholders (e.g., suppliers, funders, service partners and even competitors).  What is the degree and quality of connection, collaboration and support that the organization can call upon in time of need?

Proactive Worldview - this category can potentially also be assessed through a staff engagement survey or external stakeholder evaluation, and relates to the extent that the organization consistently takes initiative, proactively anticipating changing market conditions, versus constantly or consistently being on the defensive.  This could include an assessment of the strength of the organizations forecasting tools and methods, the ability to strong interrogate reality, and the willingness to support constructive conflict and contrary opinions (i.e., don't shoot the messenger).

Learning Culture - it is suggested that the key to this assessment category is primarily in how the organization handles mistakes, failures, missteps and even significant setbacks.  Can the organization face these issues with some degree of organizational humility and with a focus on appreciating that every challenge has critical feedback and lessons that might have to be sought out and applied for future growth?  

Each of these assessment categories are only as good at assessing organizational resilience as the nature of the questions posed and the degree of honesty and courage in addressing the areas under investigation.  Like individual self-assessments, I recommend that the questions in each area not run to pages and pages but rather focus on the critical few and essential elements.  Similarly, the organizational assessment should err on the side of simplicity so that it can be revisited on a regular basis (and not just annually or every few years).  This ease and simplicity of use will better support the organization to keep its finger on the pulse of the organization and adjust its approach to building and sustaining resilience over time.  

I have not addressed what to do with the results once obtained.  How do you build organizational resilience?  Space and capacity call for that to be addressed in a subsequent blog.  At this point, I welcome you to explore the assessment thoughts posed above, critique them, trial them perhaps, and suggest other options for assessing organizational resilience. 

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

Governance Coaching - Why not? What if?

Originally published on January 12, 2023.

Several years ago an organization reached out to me requesting consulting support in respect of both strategic planning and governance. When the request came in I had this tremendous sense of deja vu.  The organization and the issues they presented to me had an air of familiarity that I could not place and yet I sensed that in some way, some how, in some fashion I had heard this story before.  And it wasn't just that the issues they presented were generically common to other such engagements.  As a consultant and executive coach I was certainly well-versed with this organization's stated desires - revitalize and confirm long-term strategic directions; re-establish understanding and commitment to Mission/Vision/Values; and, clarify and confirm governance framework and implementation through agreed upon policies and protocols.  

For several hours (if not days) after having received the request I found myself wracking my brain as to why this seemed so much more tangible in my mind then any other similar request from any organization.  And then it came to me. I hadn't done this kind of work with this organization before - but a colleague of mine had!  This very same organization had engaged my colleague to provide in-depth governance and conflict resolution services that had resulted in the creation and solidification of governance philosophy and framework with particular emphasis on a Board of Directors code of conduct.  This organization had been experiencing significant conflict at the board level up to an including threats of legal action.  They sought and got support from my colleague to navigate them through this minefield. 

The board had done good work with my consulting colleague.  They had tackled hard issues.  They had arrived at short-term resolution and had set up agreements to help them move forward. Yet two or three years later they were knocking on my door looking to centre themselves yet again.  What had happened?  How did things get lost (again)?  

Make no mistake, every one of the board members was very interested in the work of their organization.  Every one of the board members wanted to make a difference or impact in the work that they were doing.  None of them sought a board position merely to put that type of position on their resume.  For the most part, this is true for almost any board especially for those boards that rely on voluntary (versus paid) commitment.  Almost without exception, directors become involved in an organization because they are committed to its mission and want to help it achieve great things. Yet many boards find themselves floundering and seem to reinvent the proverbial governance wheel on a too frequent basis.  

How do we get boards off this groundhog day type process, where there is a need for a major intervention every few years, where external supports are called in, and significant time, energy and $$$'s are expended to get back to stability and base function?  Increasingly I have come to believe that the answer lies in governance coaching.  Over the past several decades leadership and executive coaching has become more mainstream as it relates to support executives and teams at an operational level.  The reasons for utilizing coaching in this way are many as are the documented benefits of utilizing this leadership and team resource.  This resource has been less utilized or even thought of for boards of directors.

The possibilities for utilizing governance coaching are as extensive as they are in the leadership and management realm including:

• Supporting an entire board establish and affirm their governance philosophy including creation and application of a board of directors code of conduct;

• Supporting a new Chair or other officers of the board to understand their leadership approach, their role as Chair/Officer, and establishing goals/plans to succeed in the role;

• Supporting a Chair and their CEO/Executive Director assess and establish the parameters of their working partnership - for some organizations, by design, this kind of work could take place on an annual basis; and,

• Providing a regular, periodic checkpoint (e.g., monthly, quarterly) through engagement of a governance coach to support the board of directors to maintain momentum and traction on its governance role and goals. 

This list above is not exhaustive and there are as many ways to consider supporting and sustaining board function as do exist for the administrative arm of an organization.  Historically, governance coaching has not been as strongly utilized as leadership coaching both for reasons of cost and an assumption that skilled and committed volunteers or paid directors implicitly understood governance.  In my experience, both of those perspectives have been more often proven (egregiously) wrong than right.  Again, this is NOT for lack of desire to deliver quality work for an organization on behalf of the board members.  But like the leaders and staff they will derive benefit from an external sounding board that helps them confirm and clarify goals, build self-awareness, and keep them on track to the benefit of themselves and their organizations.

In my biased opinion (as a governance coach) organizations need to utilize governance coaching to get governance right.  If we can build and sustain effective governance we provide a strong foundation for effective executive leadership and ultimately sustained organizational success.

It's about governance and its about leadership!

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

Building Governance - Sustaining Governance

Originally published on January 4, 2023.

2022 is in the rear view mirror!  Looking back if I could identify themes from the past year one of those, unfortunately, would be governance dysfunction.  Or rather, I might say continuing governance dysfunction.  I have either been on boards, reported to boards, counselled boards, or counselled leaders reporting to boards for nearly 40 years now.  Despite the supposed advancements in training and development opportunities for boards of directors, certification programs, the proliferation of books and articles on the subject of governance, and a long line-up of well-intentioned people too many organizations are still struggling mightily to get governance right. 

What does dysfunction at the board level look like?  Here are only some of the examples that I could cite from this past year alone:

• Confusion and even outright disagreement on governance philosophy and framework for the board.  As a result, individual board members operate in different and conflicting ways, seeking to engage on issues at different levels of detail, and send confusing messages and directions to operational leadership.

• Rogue board member(s).  Rogue behavior can manifest in several ways.  Sometimes it is one board member, up to an including the Chair, that dominates the board discussion and decisions. There is no opportunity or allowance for other board members to contribute to board decisions in any meaningful way.  This may even include not sharing information that all board members are entitled to receive.  In other cases, rogue board members may be those who take on a role beyond what they have been authorized to do and/or actively undermine decisions made by the board as a whole.

• Lack of clarity of roles.  This can operate at various levels within the governance structure: (1) what is the role, power and obligations of the Board Chair, (2) what is the role, power and accountabilities of other officers of the board and any board committees that may be in place, (3) what is the relationship between the Board Chair and CEO, and, (4) what is the relationship between the Board as a whole and the CEO.

• Off-the-record or side-bar meetings.  The work of a board of directors should be done through formally established committees or working as the whole board.  To the extent that select board members start to operate in the shadows, aligning interests and positions, and even making decisions outside of the sight of the whole board leads to board member disengagement at best and deep distrust and conflict at worst.  

• Failure to take role seriously.  This dysfunction can take on many forms from something as simple (but impactful) as not being prepared for (or even attending) board or committee meetings, not bringing forth their ideas and expertise to board deliberations, and avoiding hard conversations on real issues.

This is only a small listing of challenges that board's face on a regular basis.  How do we (finally) resolve this reality?  The first thing that I believe is necessary to appreciate on the part of any board is that no matter how successful they might believe themselves to be at a moment in time, ongoing success requires the regular expenditure of time, energy, effort and thought in maintaining governance equilibrium and growth.  I have more than one example of being called in to resolve board conflict or improve function two or three years after they have done similar work with another consultant.  Failure to continuously attend to governance can result in a version of groundhog day.

The next step is to for the board to constructively discuss and vigorously debate what the governance philosophy and model should be for the organization.  In this case, while the discussion and final decision can and should be informed by a variety of governance models that exist and what other organizations are doing, every organization should make sure that their model works for their circumstances and in light of their identified mission, vision and values.  All too often a board can find itself hamstrung by preoccupation with procedural matters, worrying more about parliamentary procedure than the big issues they are supposed to be focused on.  In effect, the board loses the forest for the trees.    

This leads us into ensuring that the board in question even understands the mission, vision and values of the organization on whose behalf they govern.  This may seem obvious but too often these foundational elements can be seen as more relevant to the organization as a whole than to the board.  As a result, too little time is spent by the board understanding how they can or should translate these concepts into action at a governance level and how they should be using the mission, vision and values to evaluate the organization's progress and board function.  Therefore, a deep dive into mission, vision and values is called for and should form part of at least an annual touchpoint for the board.

Once these core elements are better understood, the board should dig into its operational procedures including a deep dive into the roles and responsibilities of the Board Chair, Vice-Chair, other officers and committee chairs.  It is important to have each individual taking on these roles understand what they are committing to do on behalf of the board, but it is also important that there be clear understanding on the part of all board members so that they can support these leadership roles and expectations going forward.  In addition, for the purpose of recruitment and succession planning for the board (yes, there is work to be done here as well) you want to make sure that those pursuing or being considered for board membership or positions on the board know what is expected of them.

This point of discussion naturally leads into the need to create, solidify and hold to a code of conduct for the board.  This can be a follow-up on the values discussion we noted earlier. What do the values look like in practice for the board?  How do board members interact with each other?  How do they interact with the rest of the organization and external stakeholders?  What behaviors are "off-side" and what steps do individual board members, the Board Chair or the board as a whole take to resolve such issues?  This conversation and plan must be grounded in practical examples and specific remedies rather than theoretical or abstract constructs. 

The final thing I want to leave you with is the need to integrate all of these deliberations and outcomes into a set of structures and processes that support and reinforce the approach to governance that a board has decided on. While we have not talked about the relationship with the CEO or Executive Director, the concept of board evaluation, the need and approach to measurement and reporting, and more, it is critical that the board leverage and support the good intentions of its members to stay on track.  In its simplest form this is an agreed-upon annual calendar of board events and responsibilities.  Rather than relying upon memory and goodwill, the organization as a whole is guided by and can anticipate governance work weeks, months and even a year ahead of time.  Rather than responding or reacting in the moment - or even creating crisis in reactive mode - the board is supported and prepared for all aspects of its governance role.

As I have said to some of my clients, I see the role of consultants supporting boards of directors to move them out of reactive and crisis mode to proactive and considered deliberate consideration. In short, I want to help them find and deliver quality through governance.  I want to help them leverage their expertise and good intentions.  I want them to be inspired and to inspire through governance. 

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

Lessons in Leadership - from Ukraine

Originally published on August 24, 2022.

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky seems - or seemed - an unlikely exemplar for leadership at the best of times, much less during the most significant conflict in Europe's history since World War II.  Prior to taking office in May of 2019, his history was as a comedian, actor and producer. His political credentials were (rightly) questioned as was his leadership in general.  He had not proven himself in any leadership capacity, much less in a neighborhood as dangerous and volatile as Eastern Europe has become especially as the Vladimir Putin's reign as Russian leader has evolved over the years.

Against all odds, and despite all prognostications on his leadership and the resilience and capacity of Ukraine itself, here we are, 6 months into a war that was predicted by a variety of experts to last only a few days or a week at the most.  The vision for Russia was a military parade in Kiev, a puppet government installed that would be supportive of imperial Russian designs, and the weakness of western democracy laid bare.

Without question, we can attribute a large part of the current success of Ukraine's war effort to the skill and tenacity of its troops and population at large.  There is even some credit to be given to Western powers who have helped in the training of Ukraine's army prior to this time and the not insubstantial supplies and intelligence being provided to Ukraine since the war started.  However, the leadership skill being demonstrated by President Zelensky cannot be discounted.  So what are the leadership qualities or principles that he has demonstrated and how might these be relevant to other less tumultuous circumstances?

1. Leadership With vs Apart

A sharp contrast in image (and reality) has been evident in terms of how Zelensky and Putin have been portrayed or shown up in media reports.  On the one hand, we have the image of Putin separated from foreign dignitaries and his own military and political leadership by long conference tables in an equally large room.  The image may be intended to convey power and hierarchy but also comes across as arrogant and out-of-touch.  Zelensky on the other hand has been seen on numerous occasions either seated cheek-by-jowl with his closest advisors and fellow leaders or walking the streets of Kiev or other communities in Ukraine.  Putin conveys a distance in a real and metaphorical sense from his people.  Zelensky is with and shares the pain and burdens of his fellow Ukrainians. 

2. Messaging that Matters & Resonates

As the war began so many months ago, and with expectations of imminent defeat for Ukraine so prevalent, Zelensky seemed to mirror Winston Churchill in the darkest days of World War II when he said "The fight is here; I need ammunition, not a ride."  In one simple sentence Zelensky encapsulated the fighting spirit of Ukraine while at the same time sending a message that resonated not only with the people of his own country but all those who shared and supported the cause of freedom and self-determination.  Zelensky touched an emotional cord with many around the world.  

In contrast, Putin has continued to present in a very stolid fashion that mirrors what we have come to expect from decades of Soviet and post-Soviet bureaucracy.  The intent is no doubt to present strength and confidence, but his overly long speeches are hardly engaging, are highly professorial in tone and approach, and laced with resentment and grievance that connect with very few, even within Russia itself.

3. Messaging & Context

One of the clear strengths of Zelensky's messaging to the world comes from the way he is presented and shown up at various world forums - mostly of a virtual nature - from the beginning of the war to the present time.  This starts even with something as simple as how he dresses for the occasion - not in business suit, but rather in common clothing and combat gear.  His presence again conveys powerfully that my country is under siege, times are not normal, and we are determined to prevail regardless of sacrifice.  No power suit - as per Putin - for Zelenzky.

Zelensky has also been very successful in understanding his audience and speaking in experiences and metaphors that resonate with that particular audience.  He has not used concepts that only have meaning for Ukraine.  He has taken time to understand comparative stories that resonate with his audience - whether Canadian, American, German, etc. - and have put those within the context of the war in Ukraine.  By doing so he has built common cause with other using their own history to make the connection.

Finally, he has also been at pains to speak to others, albeit in sound bites, in their own language.  He has not just relied on translators to convey his message.  This is especially true in parts of his message that are the most powerful pieces of what he wishes to convey. 

4. Humility

The contrast between the personality and leadership style of Putin and Zelensky cannot perhaps be seen more starkly than when comparing levels of humility (or arrogance).  No doubt that the relative power positions of the two nations at war put Zelensky in the least favorable position and suggests a need for humility.  This is particularly so when you are literally begging for the means to defend your country and the lives of your citizens (and yourself).  Zelensky's honest presentation and engagement with the world has, however, been a source of strength rather than weakness as he continues to rally support for the cause of Ukrainian independence.  There is no façade, there is no pomp and ceremony in any presentation by Zelensky.  Rather he uses a bare office or the destruction of Ukrainian cities and villages as a backdrop for his work.  

5. A Shared Vision

Despite the odds and expectations, Zelensky has continued to speak of a stronger and better future for Ukraine.  He paints a picture of a free and united Ukraine.  He paints a picture of a Ukraine built back better than before.  He paints a picture of a Ukraine that has weathered a storm and comes back stronger.  He has been consistent in articulating and pushing this vision of hope since the beginning of the conflict.  And it is a SHARED vision. It has encouraged and supported much sacrifice and dogged resistance on the part of the Ukrainian nation. But, combined with the very staying power of Ukrainians themselves, it is also a vision that has inspired action and support from around the world.

This contrasts sharply with what Putin has been able to cobble together.  There is certainly a vision, make no mistake, but one that harkens back to Imperial or Soviet Russia.  Both models have some nostalgic appeal for some Russians, but clearly does drive a level of commitment or support at the levels that Ukraine is experiencing both within and outside of its borders.  Rather, we see strong (although small) dissent within Russia, lack of motivation and performance on the part of the common Russian soldier, and little to no external support that isn't simply driven by cold calculation of what's in it for me (e.g., buying Russian energy at a discount).

This is a very short list of lessons in leadership that I believe we can observe from Ukraine and Zelensky in particular.  Back in January of this year, I further wrote about what I believe defines leadership It's About Leadership: Defining Leadership (breakpointsolutions.blogspot.com).  At least two of those qualities stand out for me as it relates to President Zelensky - Courage and Selflessness. Going back to the earlier quote, Zelensky was made every offer to leave Kyiv.  He has chosen to stay along with his family.  No easy exits for him. No easy choices for him.  In this same regard, he has clearly made the choice to do what is best for his country and not just for his own survival.  

Never has it been made more demonstrably true than through President Zelensky's approach that it is All About Leadership!

Slava Ukraini!

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

Toxic Leadership - A Way Forward?

Originally published on April 7, 2022.

Just last week I published a post on toxic leadership, a variety of its forms and some personal experiences of that reality.  The response to that blog was overwhelming.  Thousands of views and many comments - mostly of commiseration!  At the end of that post the question of not just simply identifying a toxic leader but effectively working or managing in such an environment was left open.  The article that I drew from at the time seemed to imply that the only effective strategy in dealing with a toxic boss was to simply cope with that reality.  A less polished way to put it would be "suck it up buttercup."

So I put it to you - the reader of this blog - to ponder alternatives to managing a toxic leader and surviving the personal angst and chaos that ensues.  Unfortunately, even with time and discussion and feedback what came back to me were two relatively harsh alternatives.  The first commonly stated alternative was in fact to merely accept this as an inevitable consequence of a working life.  In this harsh assessment it is clear that those who shared their thoughts (or despair) with me were not alone.  Gallup research seems to consistently bear out a common theme of poor leadership and lack of engagement of staff in literally all industries.  Common terminology used to describe such poor leaders includes - self-absorbed, unaware, stubborn, overly demanding, and impulsive.

The second most common response I received back was that the (best/only) way to manage a toxic leader was to accept defeat and move on to another role in another part of the organization or to leave altogether.  The challenge with that alternative goes directly back to the Gallup research just noted above.  Most industries, sectors, and companies all seem to suffer from poor leaders.  So you might just be moving from the frying pan to the fire in your attempt to escape a bad situation.

I did get some other insights from my readers and I've expanded upon those kernels below.  Perhaps these are more practical then simply resorting to the alternatives of self-suppression and flight noted above.  The first solid piece of advice to provide is to clearly understand yourself.  While that may seem like an odd place to start when trying to think about dealing with a bad boss it's crucial in making sure you know what's important to you and what your boundaries are.  What this understanding of self positions you to do is more effectively pick your battles.  You can then better evaluate whether a "compromise" is morally and ethically defeating versus simply being annoying and inconvenient.  Essentially you can determine which one of the options for coping - management or flight is the best option.

It was also clear from the responses I received that while I might have focused on the more malicious type of leader in my first post, a number of you are dealing with a different varieties of poor leaders.   Hence you have some specific "solutions" to provide in that context.  The broader array of poor leadership included the micro-manager (short on vision, long on telling you how to do "everything"), the grand visionary (long on vision, unable to comprehend or frustrated by the work required to achieve the vision), the "analyst" and risk manager (every contingency and piece of data mapped out), the self-centred leader (it is all about me) and finally the truly incompetent leader.

While these are all very different types of scenarios and leaders there are some common techniques and strategies by which you can perhaps more effectively manage - and perhaps even succeed - in these environments:

• Be prepared.  Unfortunately you are going to have to put in more time into this "relationship" than your boss will.  Regardless of what type of bad boss you have none of them have as much at stake as you do.  Understand yourself and your boundaries, prepare in advance for each meeting, and map a plan/objectives for each meeting or initiative.  As a leader yourself you can manage the relationship.  In some ways it's important to think of your boss as your most important customer.

• Don't assume.  As a corollary to "Be Prepared" don't make the mistake of assuming anything about what your boss will want, knows, expects or will do.  In any of these scenarios you don't have the luxury of not planning for or anticipating a variety of circumstances.  Plan for the worst, hope for the best.

• Don't try to be right.  This is a hard one to swallow but in the "battle" you're in you are going to have to decided whether you want to be right or get the right thing done.  They are not necessarily the same thing.  Be clear about your ultimate goal for the particular project or initiative and be prepared to alter tactics to ensure success.  In addition, be clear and solid on your big picture career goals.  Be prepared to alter your tactics to keep moving forward in your career despite the short-term reality of a toxic boss. 

• Understand your boss.  I found with one of my worst bosses that I really had to make an effort to get into his head.  I certainly would never lead the way he did, but I did try to anticipate what might set him off (e.g., one too many chairs for the Board meeting!) and resigned myself to many agonizing minutes of silence as he "visioned" the next big thing.  This meant being disciplined in my work habits and approach.  I also tried to emulate his language.  Explaining things my way was not as successful as explaining things his way.

• Support your boss.  Several of my readers reflected on a boss who has clearly been promoted too quickly, had an awesome interview that belied a lack of substance, or was the best of a bunch of poor candidates.  Now what?  For most of us, if we are committed to our organization, our staff or our customers, it means we do our level best to deliver great service regardless or in spite of the leadership handicap we labor under.  Our satisfaction comes from succeeding despite that handicap.

• Engage a team.  Most times, despite the strength and validity of your arguments, the strength of your position, or even your own personal credibility and history as a leader you won't be in a position to effectively counter a poor leader one-on-one.  You may need to engage like-minded allies.  I'm not suggesting fostering a mutiny.  That's a dangerous road.  Rather, you need more than one voice offering alternatives, respectfully questioning direction or decisions, and otherwise offering other solutions.  If you become the lone voice within you could soon be the lost voice without.

• Network and Remain Connected - one of the worst things that I have observed in dealing with a toxic leader - particularly one that we would consider abusive - is the tendency to blame self and self-isolate.  We start to believe the narrative being created around us and about us.  We begin to lose confidence in self and trust in others.  This becomes a spiraling downward cycle.  A request I often make of others - having been in this position myself - is to foster relationships inside and outside of work, find a place of support, and find a place of safety that just even allows you to vent and brainstorm with others.  Engage others to ensure you are realistically and objectively evaluating your state of affairs. 

One final and far more risky tactic that one can take when dealing with a toxic leader takes a page from the Me Too movement - exposure and truth telling.  As I know you can well imagine, this is a far more intimidating prospect than just coping or leaving.  In some cases, it can feel like a scorched earth policy and akin to burning all bridges behind you. In many cases, it also may feel like you are similarly burning all bridges in front of you as well.  If the toxic leader in question has been able to deliver results in some form, has a charismatic personality or is well-liked/connected within and outside of the organization how will your grand reveal be perceived by those in positions of power?  If change happens will it simply be in the form of your departure/martyrdom?  

This final option is not an easy choice.  Many of us would far prefer to take what seem to be easier roads.  There are no guarantees of success or survival in this path.  That being said, we have seen examples of change in other circumstances with powerful personalities brought down for their historic transgressions. Successful or not, this path is often long and bruising.  Gird for battle, wounds and a process of recovery. 

It often takes more energy and effort to lead up than it takes to lead a team of subordinates.  Your team has less choice about whether to follow you.  This is also true of a CEO who is trying to work with a Board of Directors, a Board Chair or a group of shareholders.  Leadership is not just about working with those who recognize your authority because you are one or more levels up the ladder from them.  Leadership is also about how you can manage others above you.

Success in managing a poor leader takes a lot more strength, discipline and emotional maturity than feels reasonable but it can be a harsh reality.  I certainly can't say that I've always passed my own personal tests but then continuous learning and growth should always be part of what being an effective leader is all about.

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

Toxic Leadership - Hidden (and not so hidden) Reality

Originally published on March 30, 2022.

Four years ago I posted on the subject of toxic leadership.  In fact, I wrote about this sad reality in back-to-back posts.  I was prompted by an article I came across that spoke eloquently on the subject of toxic leaders.  In recent weeks, I have again been motivated by the unfortunate experiences of colleagues and clients with toxic leadership to review what I had written before.  Unfortunately, not much has changed in that time period. One might argue, in fact, that things have gotten worse rather than better.

Why?  Why are we still burdened with a mix of incompetent, self-serving, and even malicious leadership?  Why are some of these leaders recruited, tolerated, enabled, promoted and even lauded?  The recent examples that have put my clients, colleagues and myself to despair include:

• leaders who drift from leadership role to leadership role, staying in place only a couple of years or less - what are organizations not seeing that causes them to overlook such transient commitment or capability?

• leaders who have an incredibly high rate of turnover in their teams and who brush off such turnover, year over year, with reference to work ethic, competitive marketplace, lack of commitment and so on.  Those "arguments" might stand up to scrutiny for a short period of time, however, when that reality persists year-over-year for a decade then one should start to question the leader's skills in hiring, guiding, mentoring and developing their team.  Or questions should be asked about the work environment that they are creating. 

• leaders who actively undermine their subordinates.  This takes many forms - throwing your direct reports under the proverbial bus when the organization fails to perform; failing to take accountability for poor decisions/outcomes that directly trace back to the leader; failure to prioritize initiatives and/or providing staff with tools to succeed - then making them pay the price for inevitable failure; leaders who expect/demand their subordinates take responsibility and accountability for their actions but then impose their own solutions that align with a personal (not organizational) agenda.

• leaders who pay lip service to team development and succession planning, but then either don't invest in capacity building of their teams or even actively diminish the skills, abilities, opportunities - and even confidence - of their direct reports.  Why?  Variety of reasons that I have seen encompassing a full range of motivations from ego boots to complete insecurity and fear on the part of a leader.

• leaders who create an "us versus them" culture.  This can happen at many levels and I have seen this play out where a CEO pits Board against Administration, a leader pits management against staff (or union), department vs department, and so on.  Again, information and withholding of information, restrictions in decision-making power and authority, and other tactics are used to reinforce and support the toxic leader's position of power and personal agenda.

As I said, all of these recent realities brought to mind an article I came across on toxic leaders some years ago.  It was written by Richard Gunderman, Chancellor's Professor of Medicine, Liberal Arts, and Philanthropy at Indiana University-Purdue University.  The author had so many good points that I decided to simply share and comment on his thoughts.  In this case, I've emphasized Gunderman's points in bold lettering and provided supplementary comments based on personal experiences.

Gunderman posits that just as effective bosses can do considerable good for an organization, toxic ones can inflict a great deal of damage.  In my estimation, its also true that the extent of the damage is not fully realized or understood until the toxic leader leaves or is let go.  Oftentimes the organization is left repairing the damage for some time after.  

Sadly, the individual that takes on leadership AFTER a toxic leader departs is often left to clean up a substantial mess.  Worse yet, by discovering or stumbling across the wreckage left behind by the toxic leader it is often the successor that pays a heavy price - including termination - for the damage done.

The author suggests that the first step to coping effectively with a toxic boss is recognizing that you have one.  Here are the 10 indicators that Gunderman provides to help you diagnose that your boss is probably toxic.

One.  When the toxic boss comes on board it feels as thought all fellowship and joy are being sucked out of the organization.  Like Dementors in Harry Potter, toxic bosses drain people of their passion, leaving nothing in their wake but a widespread feeling of despair.  Employees come to resemble mice who have been subjected to random electrical shocks, lapsing into a state that psychologists called learned helplessness.  As another former employee of a toxic boss put it, "It wasn't long before the whole organization took on a soulless feel."

Two.  Within weeks of the toxic boss's arrival, the mercury in the organization's "distrustometer" begins rising precipitously.  People begin eying one another with suspicion.  Lively meetings become deadened, as though no one would dare voice a divergent opinion.  According to one employee, "People stopped saying what they really thought. If they ever spoke their mind, they did so only after glancing over both shoulders to make sure no one was listening, and then they spoke in a whisper. It was like Invasion of the Body Snatchers."

This one really resonated with me from a couple of my past experiences.  I've had a "leader" who has either taken an active approach of "divide and conquer" as it related to their subordinates or actively disengaged from their team leaving agreements or disputes to fester.  If you take a lead from Patrick Lencioni's work, the absence of trust that is created (and fostered) leads to suppression of any constructive conflict, lack of common commitments and so forth.  By design or neglect, a toxic environment is established.  Similarly, if you start to see a rise in sick time, stress leave, and turnover amongst staff, the organization needs to dig deeper and not settle for simplistic answers/excuses.

Three.  Power becomes consolidated in the hands of a few people who report directly to the toxic boss.  People who question this process are moved aside or completely out of the organization.  In many cases, the toxic boss achieves these ends not by direct confrontation, but like a subtle poisoner, delivering the lethal dose in tiny amounts that build up over time.

Four.  Toxic bosses quickly seize control of the pathways along which knowledge is shared.  Organization charts and reporting hierarchies are rearranged so that everything flows through one central hub, with few if any alternatives.  Without admitting to it, toxic bosses feel threatened by more open patterns of information flow.  As the former colleague of a toxic boss put it, "He sensed that if others knew what was really going on, his position, power and prestige would be undermined."

I've experienced these realities directly and seen too many of my clients/colleagues share this reality.  Some leaders become incredibly adept at this and even leave a subtle suggestion that the one-on-one discussions - versus team-based engagement - represent a privileged reality between leader and subordinate.  I trust you more than the others.  You are more capable than the others. Sometimes the approach is much more direct - thou shall not speak with your peers!  The whole goal is to ensure that a complete picture of reality is only held by the toxic leader.  Even appropriate collaboration for the benefit of the organization is seen as a threat to leadership power. 

Five.  With a toxic boss, employees may have a hard time remembering why they came to work for the organization in the first place.  The true mission of the organization is obscured.  The toxic boss shifts everyone's attention to crasser metrics, such as revenue and rankings, and the organization's mission is treated as a mere tool for boosting results.

Sad but true.  I've been in one too many large organizations where the stated values seemed very remote from the actions that the "leader" or leadership team took on a regular basis.  The substantial disconnect led to more than just a bit of disengagement on the part of employees and seemingly intractable morale issues.

Six.  Toxic bosses leave others feeling manipulated and used.  Some are simply so insensitive that they do not appreciate the toll that their modus operandi takes on their colleagues, but others seem positively to revel in it.  Said an employee, "She seemed to believe that the only way to make herself bigger was to make the people around her feel progressively smaller."

Seven.  Soon after the toxic boss arrives, people begin disappearing.  Almost invariably, such departures go unannounced, completely devoid of fanfare or explanation.  One day they are there, and the next day they are gone, and only later do people learn that former colleagues were abruptly told one day to pack up their offices and hit the pavement.  The toxic boss will never express gratitude to their service, publicly or personally.

The other way that I've seen this reality play out is not in letting people go or marginalizing those with contradictory perspectives but rather in hiring individuals who will be more malleable to the toxic leader's directives.  This sometimes simply plays out with a feeling of personal obligation that a new hire has to the person who has hired them.  Alternatively, I have seen toxic leaders ensure that new hires ARE simply weaker or less experienced and, therefore, can pose no credible contrary points of view.  Overall, a great means to ensure the toxic leader remains unchallenged but hardly a tactic to build organizational strength and success.

Eight.  The toxic boss has no interest in what others have to say.  Some savvy operators appear to listen to other perspectives, but when it comes to action, their in-boxes are black holes.  They seem to believe that being an effective leader means being the center of attention.  Before long, their behavior at meetings begins to reveal their true stripes.  Said one former employee of a toxic boss, "She kept cutting other people off, belittling their contributions, and ended up listening to nothing but her own voice."

Nine.  The toxic boss starts to act like a playground bully.  People are treated not as sources of insight but as tools of implementation.  When they diverge from this path, the toxic boss reminds them how easily they could be replaced.  In short, the tools of persuasion give way to the instruments of coercion.  And such techniques are powerfully augmented by the enhanced sense of vulnerability that accompanies the swelling ranks of the disappeared.

I have vivid memories of getting a phone call "pep talk" from a toxic leader of mine that was a couple of rungs higher up the ladder than I.  Her relative distance from me didn't dissuade her from giving me a shout and probably reflected as much her lack of confidence in my direct supervisor as in myself.  At the time, my organization was going through significant - and noisy - change.  The essence of the pep talk was summed up in her parting words to me - "There are going to be casualties in this time frame, don't be one of them."  I understood my role and standing quite clearly.  I understood that I was quite an expendable and replaceable tool.

Ten.  Do you feel like your every move is being watched by unseen eyes?  Like you are in some kind of jail?  Do you feel like your boss is taking leadership lessons from Jeremy Bentham?  His creation, The Panopticon is a building with a watchman sitting at the center, looking out on all the inmates, who are arrayed around the periphery, each in a separate cell.  The inmates cannot see the jailer, generating a sense of constant surveillance.

For me this goes back to the feelings of mistrust created by the toxic leader ala Lencioni.  In those environments where a toxic leader's impact has been particularly "impressive", it becomes the unfortunate reality that no member of the team believes they can trust any other member of the team - peers or subordinates.  The environment becomes marked by extraordinary caution and guardedness.  The environment becomes risk averse and lacking in a desire for innovation and creativity.

At the end of this article - and my supplementary comments - we have been provided with one set of variables that describe what toxic leadership looks like.  What is lacking is how to effectively tackle it.  In fact, Gunderman seems to suggest that the best one can do is to COPE effectively with toxic leader.  Is this really all that we are left with as a tactic when dealing with a toxic leader despite the very real damage being done to an organization?

So I ask you, what's been your experience in dealing with toxic leadership?  More importantly, what steps did you and others take to effectively DEAL with a toxic leader?  I'm looking forward to your answers, supplemented by my thoughts, as a means to creating a response or tactics that might be useful to us all!

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

Maybe it's not them...

Originally published on February 9, 2022.

Some themes seem timeless even if the circumstances that gave rise to certain scenarios varies over time and place. I first wrote much of this post in November 2013.  Different time, different place, and different person than who I am today. That being said, what goes around comes around and the subject matter appears equally relevant to me as it did many years ago.

A lament that I've often heard from many leaders is "Why doesn't my staff perform at the level I need them to?" The context for this can relate to many things: a focus on developing new products or service offerings, a desire to enhance customer service capability, a shift in emphasis in strategic direction, or any number of other "big-ticket" ventures that a leader believes their organization needs to undertake and achieve. Regardless, the long and short of the story is things are not going right and certainly not as well as the leader expected. In fact, rather than succeeding, there is a feeling of losing momentum, of being stalled, failing, and even of going backwards.

The leader's frustration - and mystification - at the lack of success arises because in his/her mind, the initiative should be moving forward rapidly, smoothly, and with a minimum of bumps along the way. From the leader's perspective, the reasons for moving forward assertively and confidently are self-evident. There should be no reason for confusion or lack of action. From the leader's perspective, the importance of the initiative is clear. From the leader's perspective, implementation and execution should now be a foregone conclusion. Barriers? Challenges? Problems? Hardly worthy of consideration. We shall overcome.

Yet, success is not forthcoming. And maybe that means it's time for a change in perspective. Maybe it's not about them. Maybe it's about you.

It's often far easier to blame others for a lack of success or progress in moving an organization forward than in taking a hard look at what we are doing or not doing as the leader. It's personally challenging to start asking some hard questions about what role I as a leader played in not setting the organization up for success. What steps did I not take? What warning signs did I ignore?

So maybe your leadership is getting in the way. First off, like anyone else, leaders can develop tunnel vision. We may have become so engaged with our day-to-day work that we start to lose perspective. Despite the fact that we are specifically tasked with maintaining that 50,000 foot view - or maybe as a result of it - we can lose a sense of what else might be happening in and around the rest of the organization. In essence, we have become trapped by our own mental box and simply can't conceive of factors or issues that might impact successful implementation of our ideas. The facts may even be staring you right in the face but you simply are no longer able to see them. Here's where developing a true climate of trust and confidence in your team can pay huge dividends. The more objective eyes on the ball the better.

Related to the tunnel vision is a phenomenon I'll describe as the speed trap. As leaders we can easily get caught up in the desire to move forward as fast as possible. Time is money, we have to get out ahead of an issue, we have to be first to market, we have to move, move, and move faster. This driving sense of urgency, however, can cause us to plan in a superficial fashion and gloss over challenges. More importantly, as we try to solve a problem, the anxiety we feel to get on with things can actually prevent us from understanding the issue before us. As a result, we may not be tackling the real problem but only dealing with its most obvious symptoms. The adage of pay now or pay later bears listening to. Only in this regard, the currency in question is time. Slow down to move faster and more effectively.

Leaders can also be confounded by an overconfidence in their ability to communicate. Effective communication is never simply about getting the memo(s), emails, or newsletters out, or about having a grand launch event. For any significant initiative, the leader has already spent a considerable amount of time coming to grips with the whys and wherefores of the initiative. The leader believes they understand the importance of the effort at an intellectual and gut level. Leaders are therefore surprised and amazed that the rest of the organization doesn't have the same level of understanding and commitment. The reality is nobody else has been able to spend as much time on this idea as the leader already has. They truly don't yet "get it" because they have not yet been given the time to understand the rationale for the effort. A leader must communicate and allow time for the idea to be digested. In addition, effective communication will ensure and incorporate a feedback loop that allows a check on understanding of key messages and expectations.

Paradoxically, I have also observed that leaders can similarly be confounded by their own lack of confidence or sense of self. There may, in fact, be a lot of exceedingly strong-minded contrarians among your leadership team or other significant stakeholders. I have observed too many conscientious and "nice" leaders failing to follow through on their core values when faced with well-stated or vociferous opinions. They hesitate, change their mind, or never achieve the full potential of what they envisioned for the team or their larger organization. Ultimately, they find themselves challenged by not owning their own values and hopes for the organization strongly enough. Or they hold out false hope that eventually consensus will win out. Unfortunately, many leaders - effective or ineffective - discover eggs have to be broken to make an omelette.

Success in implementing past initiatives may also cloud judgment on a go-forward basis. A lack of planning, preparation, and good communication may not have confounded success in the past. A leader may have succeeded in spite of himself for a whole variety of reasons. A fact-based analysis may not have been undertaken to help identify key learnings. Perhaps we were saved by even worse planning and preparation of a competitor. Perhaps we were saved by the extraordinary efforts of our staff. The truth is, we don't really know what factors supported success or what that success actually cost us. The result is that a leader is unduly confident in their own ability or is otherwise complacent relative to what the next effort is really going to take.

Finally, the ability to move an initiative forward may be most fatally confounded by the organization's assessment of the leader and his/her motivations. Ultimately, I believe words and actions of a leader must line up over the long run. Staff and stakeholders will commit more strongly to something if they believe it serves the achievement of the organization's stated mission, vision, and values. They will commit if they can see benefit for themselves as individuals, and for the organization as a whole. If, however, past experience has informed them that the leader is first and foremost concerned about his/her personal gain, an integrity gap will develop and grow. In these circumstances, the leader may gain compliance but they will not gain true commitment to future plans. Staff and stakeholders will ultimately see through the motivations of a self-absorbed leader. It may take some time, but eventually organizational performance will suffer.

There could probably be a few more warnings posted here about not rushing to judgment on one's staff. The cautionary tale is one of making sure to look at yourself in the mirror first before casting aspersions on the skills, abilities, and motivations of your followers. Have you done enough to set the stage for success? Have you provided the right tools to support effective implementation? Have you looked at the issue from all perspectives?

In the end, it may be that it's not them that failed you. Maybe you failed them.

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

What is Culture...and Why Does it Matter?

Originally published on February 3, 2022.

The subject of culture continues to be one that I grapple with and encounter on a regular basis in my coaching and consulting practice. The reality and challenge of culture comes forward from a number of different angles - leaders not appreciating how their actions or inaction foster a dysfunctional or low-performing culture; lack of consensus throughout an organization on what the culture is or should be resulting in a whole series of competing subcultures; a need for an organization's culture to adapt to changing external realities; a lack of appreciation for how legacy systems confound an imperative for change that is being communicated by a leader. The examples are myriad of how culture needs to change, but how unprepared or unaware we might be about what culture is and how we impact effective shifts in culture to support goal achievement.

In my career as a leader, learner, executive coach, and consultant, I've gathered a few gems of knowledge (if not wisdom) along the way related to culture change. Included among those insights or lessons are included a need to persevere through adversity with optimism and energy, a commitment to celebrate milestones and achievements even in tough times, a need to continuously develop one's own leadership and the leadership skills of your team, and the necessity to balance work with one's whole life.

So much food for thought, but for this blog, I choose to focus on one key question: Is there really a recipe for culture change, particularly at an organizational level? So being either bold or foolish I'll take a crack at the question.

First, I believe there is some value in defining what we might mean by the term culture. Being a creature of our time, I googled the term and came up with the following (amongst a variety of definitions): "...the total of the inherited ideas, beliefs, values and knowledge which constitute the shared bases of...action..." and "...the total range of activities and ideas of a group of people with shared traditions, which are transmitted and reinforced by members of the group." I've highlighted what I think are some key elements of the definition and upon which I will touch in this blog.

The phrase Culture Eats Strategy for Breakfast is probably familiar to most of us and reflects the very real challenge in moving an organization forward or changing its direction. As many an executive will attest to, you can have spent countless hours and money on developing a world class strategy, putting together and delivering a slick internal marketing campaign, and engaging all manner of expertise and external resources, and yet find that after a year (or less), you have made no progress on your lofty goals - and may actually have taken your organization a step or two backward. The culture of the organization - its inherited ideas, beliefs, values and knowledge - can be a very effective barrier or block to your plans.

So instead of developing the glitzy strategy, or restructuring the organization, or implementing new processes or systems, why don't executives focus on organizational culture? My perspective is it often appears easier to tackle structure and process than culture. One can implement structural and process changes in a far shorter timeframe. Quick or easy, however, doesn't equate to effective. Such initiatives can certainly disrupt the organization and give the appearance of action, especially to those looking at the organization from an external perspective (e.g., shareholders, community leaders). Cultural changes take a much longer period of time to realize a more intense and sustained effort. Unfortunately, too many leaders (and too often a variety of stakeholders) don't have the patience for these types of efforts. We want instant solutions and instant results.

The term inherited also implies something that is built or created over a long period of time. And it will take just as long to mold, alter, or modify this reality, as it took to create. Moreover, it's critical to understand that, for the most part, this set of shared ideas, beliefs, and values have worked for the organization or key stakeholder segments. It doesn't mean life has been easy or great. But the organization has survived, it has accomplished something, some element of progress has been experienced, and the organization's staff believe it works and/or is good enough. If it ain't broke don't fix it. If it ain't broke why change it? So suggesting there is need for change or trying to initiate big cultural change will not come easily or without effort.

One of the first key steps in changing culture is to define the characteristics of the new culture and why it is important to shift to this new set of beliefs, behaviours, and practices. This is the leader's role. The leader has to achieve clarity for self as to the where, what, and why of culture change. If the leader doesn't have a clear idea about this preferred future and the necessity of this new path, a change in culture will be a non-starter. Clarity of vision is critical to to overcome resistance and inertia.

Just as important as defining the new desired culture will be the concrete actions that a leader and the organization as a whole must take to reinforce and support the shift. This includes steps such as recruiting, hiring, retaining, rewarding, and promoting individuals who will, by their behaviours and actions, develop and reinforce the tenets of the new culture. People build culture. Focus on cultivating the right people. Make a long-term commitment to them. They become the proverbial stones thrown into the water, with ripples emanating out from them and influencing the behaviour of others.

Communicate, communicate, communicate. Along with that comes the importance of leadership visibility and reinforcement - by word AND action - of key organizational values and expectations. As a leader you are being watched all the time and people will rapidly determine whether you hold the values of the new culture sincerely or merely as another fad of the moment. Your energy, your perseverance, and your consistency is going to be critical to success.

Make sure all processes and systems of the organization are aligned and supportive of the culture you are trying to create. If you are marketing the organization as one that prides itself on innovation but have an incentive system that rewards everyone at the same level regardless of performance, then creativity is not likely to be sustained. If you are asking for daring and bold initiatives but your performance management systems actually reward a risk management mentality, you may make stuttering steps forward. If you are touting yourself as an organization that fosters empowerment and employee participation but have a human resource system that tolerates old-style management practices, you will quickly short-circuit your efforts.

As leaders you also have to ensure your own personal words and actions are aligned with the corporate culture you say you are trying to build. If you set yourself apart from what you are expecting of your staff - do as I say, not as I do - you will have compromised your leadership credibility. You won't be able to retain your best leaders or get the kind of change you were expecting or hoping for. In addition, you have to have patience for this effort; you have to be in it for the long haul. Culture happens through long-term, consistent behaviour and effort. The best and most successful organizations build from within and stay true to their core for years.

Rome wasn't built in a day. Neither is the culture of your organization created or changed in a fiscal year. And building a new temple to the gods won't keep the barbarians away from the front gates. Only strong and vibrant citizens/staff working from the same page will ensure long-term success.

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

Defining Leadership

Originally published on January 19, 2022.

The beginning of 2022 finds me on the cusp of more opportunity and creativity.  I am working on a series of leadership development modules for several organizations.  The topics to be covered will range from a coach-approach to leadership, to the foundations of strong teams, through to performance management.  One other subject near and dear to my heart will be the foundations of personal leadership.  For many years now, and prior to becoming an executive coach and management consultant, I have devoted considerable study, time, effort, and thought to leadership, what makes a leader, and how to further hone leadership.

I have seen other authors or pundits put together their top list of what qualities or strengths great leaders possess. The listing I offer below has some similarity to that approach but perhaps goes a bit more off road.  I am interested in leadership qualities to be sure, but hope that I have gone a bit deeper in distinguishing the core of what leadership is - from my point of view - as compared to the notion of management, for example. 

Leadership requires self-awareness. What does that mean?  In my view, this relates to the understanding of one's own strength and weaknesses and having a regular practice of evaluating growing edges. This appreciation and drive to self-evaluate requires a healthy dose of humility and a willingness to explore personal bias and blind spots. If a leader is not prepared to face and understand themselves, they will be less effective in understanding the capacities of the teams and organizations they lead.

Leadership is visionary. Leaders know what needs to get done. And they experience this vision and future state both for themselves and for their organizations. Leaders can read the tea leaves, appreciate potential and possibility, see a new or better way, and feel passionate about what lies before them.  Moreover, this vision isn't abstract in conception. This vision is understood at a visceral level. This vision is not created in a series of spreadsheets or models. While those might be useful tools or supports, leaders are far more apt to tap into the emotional and even spiritual aspects of a vision - they can literally see, feel, hear, taste and smell the future!

Leadership is, and must be, expressive. A vision that is unexpressed, poorly articulated, or not understood by others, doesn't lead to action. If others cannot be brought on board or do not appreciate the power and possibility the leader feels for the future, we have a dream of one that is likely to go unfulfilled.  So leadership – good leadership – means being able to take a vision out of one’s head and articulate it to others in a way that they can understand and powerfully engage with. 

At this point, I want to make sure there is no confusion about being articulate, passionate, and committed to a cause and the notion or quality of charisma or being charismatic. Charisma for me too often equates to superficiality and insincerity. Effective long-term leadership success can use charisma (personality, charm, presence) as a tool, but it doesn’t long stand without supporting substance. 

Leadership sees the big picture and plays the long game. The comparison to a chess grand master may hold true here. A key distinguishing variable between leadership and management is how expansive the view is for each. Management is more often focused on a select number of variables within a defined period of time; e.g., I know what tasks I have to accomplish today, which staff I have available to me, and what problems I might encounter.

Leadership has a more expansive view. A good leader contemplates execution and realization of their vision considering a host of factors and variables, how those variables might interact to support or confound each other, and is often looking to a future laid out months and years ahead. Like a chess player, they see the whole board, see how each move might impact the next, and anticipate several moves ahead.  They have a long-term systems view.

Leadership is about change. Leaders are good at anticipating change as might be expected from a chess master. More importantly, they also are often (or always) initiating change as they evaluate and make sense of the big picture view they have been forming for themselves on behalf of their organization. They have a view on challenges and opportunities, initiating change to mitigate one and realize the other. This change effort can manifest in any number of ways – creating a sense of urgency, seemingly tireless energy and passion, and a dynamic and flexible mindset. Creativity, innovation and out-of-the-box thinking can also characterize this leadership change mentality.

Leadership is about capacity building.  Because leaders see potential, understand or perceive the shifting environment around them, and appreciate that change will be necessary to both survive and thrive, they are constantly looking to develop new skills and capacities in their organizations. They believe a couple of things about capacity building. First, the strengths that helped you achieve success in the past will be insufficient, if not irrelevant, to survive and thrive in a new future state.

Second, they have a commitment to leaving the organization in a better position then when they found it.  This includes building bigger and better capacity in their followers, investing in training and development, succession planning, and building new leaders. This has short-term benefit in supporting voluntary and committed engagement amongst staff. More importantly, it builds resilience and capability in the organization to overcome adversity and reach new performance heights.

Leadership is about discipline. Author Jim Collins (Good to Great) has dissected organizations trying to distil what separates good companies from great companies, and what allows great companies to continue on that path. More than one of his concepts applies to effective leadership as well. Discipline – in thought and action – is one of those concepts.

Leadership is able to pull all of the variables noted above together, sort the wheat from the chaff, keep in mind (while still challenging) their capabilities, and stay focused on their preferred vision. Good leadership is able to stay focused in the face of distraction that too often masquerades as opportunity.  Leadership is not distracted by the next shiny bauble. Leadership understands its core competencies and/or is prepared to undertake the necessary investment to do different. In short, leadership knows that success is based on making sound choices, sticking to its core values and strategies, and setting up supports and systems to drive success.

Leadership is about courage. None of what we describe above comes without a very strong dose of courage. Leadership requires developing a comfort level with ambiguity and a near daily confrontation with doubt and fear. 

You might consider a comparison between leadership and being a weather forecaster. Rare is the day when anyone gives us 100% certainty on any weather-related fact. We lament but prepare for the possibility that a 60% chance of partly cloudy skies might turn into drizzle or a momentary downpour. Leadership operates within similar shades of grey. Leadership must interpret, with imperfect data and imperfect lenses, what the future may hold and try to prepare accordingly. There is always the real and tangible risk that they may decide incorrectly.

Leaders must have the courage to act despite this uncertainty. Seeing what needs to be done, understanding the forces at play, anticipating the chess moves of organizational life and the business environment are all well and good. However, if this knowledge or intuition are not put into action, then this insight is worse than useless. Inaction is action where no decision becomes a decision. The environment or others will choose a path for you.

Leadership is selflessness. Finally, I come to a personal philosophical belief that all good leadership is fundamentally about being selfless. I appreciate the challenge that might come from others on this point!  However, I believe that truly impactful leaders are NOT solely or primarily focused on their own success.  Rather, they are ambitious for the success of their teams, organizations, or businesses. Make no mistake, they are competitive and they want to win. Will they accept or appreciate personal accolades or glory should it come? In many cases, yes. But that personal recognition or reward is NOT THE motivating factor for their efforts. They want to win for the benefit of the bigger cause. They want to build capacity and realize potential for their organization. They want to see foundations built and a legacy for success established that lives beyond their leadership tenure.  

There you have my perspective on leadership. There you have some insights and snippets into what is starting to coalesce into various leadership development modules for 2022 and beyond.  

For me it really is all about leadership!

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543

The Great Return?

August 24, 2021. At this point in much of North America, we are seemingly resetting for the umpteenth time as we continue to navigate the ongoing saga and impact of COVID-19. The desire and longing for a return to normalcy - the pre-COVID times - is heavy on all of us. Levels of exhaustion, frustration, anxiety, and anger ebb and flow with the fall and rise again of COVID cases. Businesses in all shapes and sizes and in every sector have been similarly been trying to pivot, reconfigure, respond, and stay afloat through all of this.

At the beginning of this saga back in early 2020, many of us probably operated under an assumption that we could batten down the hatches, stiff upper lip, and ramp up our reserves for a few days, weeks, and maybe even a month or two. But as each successive wave has come and gone and come again, we are increasingly pushing our personal and organizational resilience beyond all reasonable expectation. And maybe that is the key word after all to explain some of our more challenging behaviors and responses since this all started - expectation.  

Regardless of who we are - pro or anti-vax, pro or anti-mask, pro or anti-lockdown - our expectations of what should or should not happen have continuously been confounded.  

Earlier this summer, as I worked with a number of my clients, there were a variety of plans in place to resume on-site operations, meaning that there were expectations that staff were going to return to their normal places of business, offices, or workstations. Some of this was going to coincide with the start of the school year or the start of the next business quarter, all around or about September 1, 2021. Even before the fourth wave of COVID was starting to ramp up in Alberta and Canada, staff in some businesses were pushing back on coming back to their former work environments. A variety of reasons were offered to justify the hesitancy (or even outright refusal) to return to the office - immuno-compromised, child care issues, fear of public transit and potential to acquire COVID, cramped office space, cramped common areas including elevators, etc. Some client organizations have since allowed for voluntary or graduated returns as of September 1. Others have postponed re-launch to October 1 or even into the new year.  Others have been adamant that the return plans remain on schedule. 

Certainly some of the motivation behind a drive to get back to the "office" comes from a desire to return to normal. For some, there almost seems to be a perspective that we shall just force normal back on COVID; we will compel normalcy through force of will and determined leadership. If we think positive thoughts, positive things will happen. In other circumstances, there is a strong belief that those who work at home are really not working.

What I believe is missing from these assessments, plans, and actions is a much more thoughtful, purposeful, and considered evaluation of the organization's strategy, goals, and culture. There are too many organizations that seem to have a blind belief that bums in seats = success or productivity. Against what metrics? I will certainly grant that the challenge of maintaining organizational culture and team cohesion are manifold in a virtual, Zoom-based environment. Beyond that, some leaders seem to be operating from a standpoint that if I cannot lay eyes on my people at any point in time, I can't TRUST them to be giving me their all.

I would suggest that, as a leader, if you can't trust your staff in their remote work environments, you probably did not have trust in them when they were around the corner from you in the office. I would suggest that, as a leader, using presence in the office as a proxy for productivity was a failure to measure such adequately (if at all) in the past.

I'm not suggesting that a return of an office or work environment is wrong. Rather, I am suggesting that there should be a much more thoughtful, considered, and intelligent evaluation of that option as it relates to the overall strategy of the organization. What will the presence - or absence - from the workplace gain or lose the business? Do we need all or some staff back? Do we need all of our work space as it was in pre-COVID times? If we don't really understand productivity of staff at this point, how do we get a better handle on it now? If you really want to be so bold, ask these leadership questions of yourself - how important are our staff to the achievement of our goals and what am I doing to support their ability to deliver on those goals?

True leadership is not simply about ensuring control over other people. True leadership, in my estimation, is generating and responding to change (planned and unplanned), understanding all the forces at play, having a big picture view, playing the long game, and supporting/influencing others to contribute their best efforts to understandable and shared goals.  

Physical presence in an office cannot and should not be confused with commitment and productivity on the part of your people. I have worked with far too many people who simply put in time at the office while dutifully maintaining a 9-to-5 schedule. In too many other ways they had already retired on the job.  

My recommendation for this present time and moving forward through the continued challenge of COVID is to then get well-grounded in your organizational strategy and objectives, truly understand what it is going to take to succeed despite COVID, and perhaps engage your valued staff as allies in getting there - regardless of or despite where they work.  

A productive return to work is not going to come from simply calling out the troops (or prisoners?) on to the parade ground on September 1. A productive return to work - COVID or no COVID - is going to come from understanding your strategy, understanding productivity and effectiveness, and creating an organizational environment that supports your valued staff committing their time and energy to the cause. 

It's not simply about eyeballing your staff across the hall. It's About Leadership!

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Greg Hadubiak, MHSA, FACHE, CEC, PCC
President & Founder - BreakPoint Solutions
gregh@breakpoint.solutions 
www.breakpoint.solutions 
780-250-2543