Audio Tidbits

The title tells the story. Let's spend a few minutes thinking about just why some of us are usually up-tight and feeling frantic while others of us are usually relaxed and feeling good about ourselves and how things are going. There are lots of reasons but a couple of things are pretty common factors. When you have finished listening to the discussion, take a few extra minutes to relax and enjoy the music.

We judge ourselves by what we feel capable of doing, while others judge us by what we have already done. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Although Longfellow's pronouncement has superficial plausibility, it's merely an example of polar logic. One pole is what you feel capable of doing and the other is what you have already done. The judgment reduces to can and did. You judge yourself based on can and others judge you based on did, according to Longfellow. The reality is that such judgments rarely reduce to either can or did, for you or for others who judge you.

Look first at can. If this is a judgment you make about yourself, is it reasonable to make it without considering did? Relying exclusively on what you think you can do, without considering what you have done, places no value on prior experience. It also acknowledges an inability to learn. Alternatively, if you consider did to the exclusion of can, your behavior is simply repetitive. and you will need to take Albert Einstein's observation to heart, Insanity. doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

Look next at did. If others are expecting change, improvement, innovation, or new approaches and strategies, you aren't the person they need. They can only expect you to do again what you did before. Unless can is considered, nothing new or different ever happens. The conclusion is that can and did aren't separable. They are the head and tail of the coin of progress. …

How then should one approach success? What is the best strategy for blending did and can? Arthur Schopenhauer pointed out, a man can do as he will, but not will as he will. The message is that you can't simply will things to happen. You have a wide range of options for doing but no magical powers. Alexander Graham Bell said, The most successful men in the end are those whose success is the result of steady accretion … It is the man who carefully advances step by step, with his mind becoming wider and wider - and progressively better able to grasp any theme or situation - persevering in what he knows to be practical, and concentrating his thought upon it, who is bound to succeed in the greatest degree.

The basis for judgment is now clearer. You and those who judge you focus on both did and can. Success is a blending of the two sides of the coin. and if your goal is to get a thumbs-up from you and from others, you need to get high marks on this short quiz. – Good luck!

1. Are you carefully advancing, step by step?

2. Is your mind becoming wider and wider?

3. Are you persevering in what you know to be practical?

4. Are you concentrating on succeeding?

Sure, it's simply a variation on the old story, Nothing succeeds like success.

Charan, Ram, Stephen Drotter, and James L. Noel. The Leadership Pipeline: How to Build the Leadership Powered Company. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2001.

There is little acknowledgment that different levels of leadership exist and that people need to make skill and value transitions at each level. Relatively few organizations are thinking about the core competencies and experiences necessary to be successful at each level.

When you define potential as the kind of work someone can do in the future, it becomes easier to see it as a dynamic concept. This future work potential is based on accumulated skills and experience as evidenced by past achievement, ability to learn new skills, and willingness to tackle bigger, more complex or higher-quality assignments. The more people achieve, the more learning takes place; willingness to tackle new challenges increases as current challenges are met.

Cashman, Kevin. Leadership from the Inside Out: Becoming a Leader for Life. Second Edition. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2008.

The best way to take action for ourselves is through coaching. For self-coaching or coaching others to have a lasting, transformative impact, three interrelated pathways need to merge: Awareness, Commitment, and Practice. If all three are present and operating, breakthroughs will occur and growth will be sustained. If any one of the three is absent, the results will dissipate over time.

He indulged himself in the self-exploration. He listened to the feedback and looked for ways to understand and to apply the information to his career, team, and life. He explored deeply his core meaning and purpose. He projected a new vision for a more authentic life and for more authentic leadership, one that was congruent with his real values. He began to read and reflect more. He shared his insights with others. He began to open up with people at work. He began to admit his strengths and weaknesses to others. He began to ask for their help and to value their contributions. He stayed the course. …

It [awareness] may include keeping our attention on a newly clarified talent we have brought into focus. Or it may involve the more painful process of acknowledging that a behavior is unintentionally self-defeating or affecting others in a life-damaging way. Awareness encompasses the inner discipline of looking within ourselves to shed light on our strengths and our growth challenges, and the outer discipline of observing ourselves through our own eyes and the eyes of others, as we engage in making an important behavioral shift.

Building Commitment begins with comprehending the consequences of our actions. However, it is not enough only to understand intellectually that if we continue on the same course, we're going to fall short of our goals, hurt ourselves or others. We have to feel it. When we have a deep emotional connection to the impact of a behavior, our life can change permanently.

Building Practice entails devising new, disciplined ways of behaving to enrich our life and the lives of others.

Delegation is, for a proactive leader, a critical key to his success. He knows leadership superstars have elevated effective delegation to an art form. In fact, success with delegation is the single most important factor separating leaders who achieve their mission-specific goals from those who do not.

Try this. Design a one legged stool. One end of the leg must be attached to the stool and the other end can touch the ground at one single point but cannot be in the ground or supported by anything else. The stool must be functional, serving the usual purpose of being a place for a person to rest those weary bones.

It is actually fairly easy. Get a board and attach the leg to it. Set the stool up and sit on it. So long as you are sitting on it, your stool works fine. The problem is that if you get up, your stool falls over. You have to do the work of the missing legs yourself, which works fine if you have nothing else to do and are willing to sit on the stool forever.

Now if you are not quite up to eternity on the stool, you will need to make other arrangements, you have to delegate. …

Since a proactive leader is not about to spend his life sitting on the stool, he has three rules for getting others on the team to pitch in.

First, he appropriately delegates tasks and duties. You see he does not pass on his responsibilities. He is still responsible for the team's success, but others on the team can and should help carry the load. This cannot be a whomever happens to be around process. a proactive leader is careful to only delegate to people who have the skills and know-how to get the job done, they have to be up to it.

Second, a proactive leader does not delegate a job to someone and then try to manage it himself or second-guess the person who was assigned the job. His reasons here are important.

a proactive leader is not going to sit on the stool and is not about to hover around just to be sure the job gets done or it is not screwed up. If he needs to do that, he might as well sit on the stool himself. More importantly, second guessing and a hands-on approach with delegated tasks would mean he did not have much confidence in the person given the assignment. If that is where it is, a proactive leader screwed up. He delegated inappropriately, he picked the wrong person to hold up the stool.

Third, a proactive leader always delegates enough authority so the person can get the job done. This does not mean he gives anyone an unlimited, free reign. What each person does must fit with everyone else's activities. The team needs to work together as a team. At the same time, each team member needs the freedom and authority to do what needs done.

a proactive leader does not get into Mother, may I. It certainly is not a Check with me at every step along the way for authorization, approach for a proactive leader's team. Those on the team are competent, make good choices and decisions, and can be trusted to do the right things right. If this is not true, a proactive leader needs to reexamine who is on his team and think about who may need to be replaced. Nonetheless, not to give people the authority they need to get the job done would mean that he does not quite trust, does not really believe. It would also mean he is still holding up the stool instead of getting on with getting on down the road.

Start your journey with E. E. Cummings who said, “It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.” Then invite Samuel Johnson to join your trek. He is the one who said, “There lurks, perhaps, in every human heart a desire of distinction, which inclines every man first to hope, and then to believe, that Nature has given him something peculiar to himself.” You should let Friedrich Nietzsche come along too, for he said, “At bottom every man knows well enough that he is a unique being, only once on this earth, and by no extraordinary chance will such a marvelously picturesque piece of diversity in unity as he is, ever be put together a second time.”

Julius Charles Hare also has some advice qualifying him to serve as your traveling companion, “Be what you are. This is the first step toward becoming better than you are.” It was your fellow traveler, Samuel Johnson, who said, “Almost every man wastes part of his life in attempts to display qualities which he does not possess, and to gain applause which he cannot keep.”

With that in mind, find room in your party for John Mason. You need his wisdom, “You were born an original. Don't die a copy.” “Rabbi Zusya said on the Day of Judgment that, God would ask him, not why he had not been Moses, but why he had not been Zusya.” (Walter Kaufmann) Just be sure you are not asked why you hadn’t been you. …

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According to Orson Scott Card, “This is how humans are. we question all our beliefs, except for the ones we really believe, and those we never think to question.” Wonder if this is true

If so, there are things you believe just because you believe it and others that you believe simply because you’ve never given any thought to not believing.

Add this to Felix Cohen’s observation, “Generally the theories we believe we call facts, and the facts we disbelieve we call theories,” and you are left with a discouraging conclusion. Most of what you think is true and factual, most of what you really believe, is little more than one more theory, just another personal opinion.

There is an important glitch here. Most everyone else also chooses belief over non-belief, subscribes to one more theory, another personal opinion. That then becomes their belief, the principle according to which they live. Of course, since you really believe, you are right and they are wrong. The way you choose to live is good and right, and the way they choose to live is wrong and unjust.

Here is a suggestion that might lessen the tendency to discount everyone else’s perspective. Pick one principle you use to govern your life. Assume you are wrong, that this cherished principle is invalid. How would that change your world, your perception of you and your actions?

While you are contemplating this alternative reality, keep in mind most of the people in the world are certain that your valued principle, your most cherished belief is wrong.

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“The bicycle, the bicycle surely, should always be the vehicle of novelists and poets.” Christopher Morley’s point is certainly worth pondering, for as the famous Anon. observed, “It would not be at all strange if history came to the conclusion that the perfection of the bicycle was the greatest incident of the nineteenth century. It is as Iris Murdoch argued, “The bicycle is the most civilized conveyance known to man. Other forms of transport grow daily more nightmarish. Only the bicycle remains pure in heart.”

“When man invented the bicycle he reached the peak of his attainments. Here was a machine of precision and balance for the convenience of man. And (unlike subsequent inventions for man's convenience) the more he used it, the fitter his body became. Here, for once, was a product of man's brain that was entirely beneficial to those who used it,

Cameron, Kim S., Jane E. Dutton, and Robert E. Quinn. Positive Organizational Scholarship: Foundations of a New Discipline. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2003.

For the sake of contrast, now imagine another world in which almost all organizations are typified by appreciation, collaboration, virtuousness, vitality, and meaningfulness. Creating abundance and human well-being are key indicators of success. Imagine that members of such organizations are characterized by trustworthiness, resilience, wisdom, humility, and high levels of positive energy. Social relationships and interactions are characterized by compassion, loyalty, honesty, respect, and forgiveness. Significant attention is given to what makes life worth living. Imagine that scholarly researchers emphasize theories of excellence, transcendence, positive deviance, extraordinary performance, and positive spirals of flourishing.

Specifically, we define authentic leadership in organizations as a process that draws from both positive psychological capacities and a highly developed organizational context, which results in both greater self-awareness and self-regulated positive behaviors on the part of leaders and associates, fostering positive self-development. The authentic leader is confident, hopeful, optimistic, resilient, transparent, moral/ethical, future-oriented, and gives priority to developing associates to be leaders. … The authentic leader does not try to coerce or even rationally persuade associates, but rather the leader's authentic values, beliefs, and behaviors serve to model the development of associates.

The mature man accepts the natural limitations of life. he does not expect Providence to be prejudiced in his favor. he does not ask for loaded dice to play the game of life. He knows, with Carlyle, that there is no sense in vilifying the sun because it will not light our cigars. Will Durant

Sure, some lucky ducks were born with silver spoons in their mouths. and in life's great poker game, some people get better cards than others. It's enough to make you just sit down and cry. The old law-of-averages certainly doesn't apply to you. If luck were really a lady, the world would be a fairer place. Even if it weren't, at least you would get better cards. Maybe your luck will turn. but then again, maybe not. In the meantime, you will need to simply go with the cards you are dealt.

Okay, you get it. but it's still a roll of the dice and you can't do much about that fact of life. but, maybe you can. A friend tells this story. It was bright-and-early one morning when Grandpa found an exceptionally fine sea shell on the beach. I flippantly commented, ‘That was just dumb luck, your finding that shell.' He smiled and replied, ‘Yes, it was dumb luck for a guy who was already on the beach and looking before 6.30.'

Sure, luck and maybe even dumb luck at times play a big part in a lot of things. Things happen and you can't control everything. but you can make a point to be on the beach before 6.30 and can make the extra effort it takes to improve the odds for your success. The old-timers call this smart luck.

Thomas Jefferson also supported personal responsibility as an important key to good luck. I'm a great believer in luck and I find the harder I work, the more I have of it. The famous Anon. added one more key to unlocking luck's door, Luck is when opportunity knocks and you answer. It really is just likeE. Shay said, Depend on the rabbit's foot if you will, but remember it didn't work for the rabbit. …

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In a hierarchy, every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence. Laurence Peter

This maxim is known as the Peter Principle and is thought to account for the fact that there are incompetent people at all organizational levels, although not necessarily at a given level in a specific organization. Peter's notion is that people are promoted based on their competence at a lower level. The pool of people who are eligible for promotion to any level in an organization is limited to individuals who have demonstrated competence at a lower level. If you are the employee, you will keep getting promoted until you eventually get a position for which you aren't competent. That's as far up as you will go. and since everyone knows that is how it works, you will stay there until you quit or retire. Since Peter is right, at least to some extent, how can this organizational tendency be best managed?

First, recognize that the knowledge and skills (competencies) for success in a lower position aren't the same as those required for a higher position. Usually, job descriptions are mostly a list of duties and responsibilities. The position description for the next higher level simply says that the employee is expected to supervise or manage employees who perform the duties associated with the lower position. If you are a brick layer, promotion to foreman means that you supervise/manage brick layers. You get the idea.

As a brick layer, the position requirements primarily focused on being able to correctly lay X number of bricks under Y circumstances. As a foreman, the position requirements include knowing a lot about laying bricks. but actually being an expert brick layer isn't necessarily required. You need to be able to supervise/manage brick layers. The point is that the major competencies needed to be a successful foreman vary a lot from those required to be a successful brick layer.

Have you ever played Twenty Questions? Someone is thinking of something. There usually is a category or some other limitation; but you need to guess what the person has in mind. You can ask up to twenty questions that can be answered "Yes," or "No." If you figure it out, you win. If not, the other person gives you the answer and is the winner.

Imagine how it would be to play this game if you had no idea what the category was. Now imagine how you would feel if, after your twenty questions, you were never told the answer. Do you think that you would keep playing? It is doubtful.

Relationships where one or both people do not talk and share are like the Twenty Question game. At first, whoever is most socially inclined asks the questions. The answers are non-responsive and vague. There is just not much useful feedback. Maybe sooner and maybe later, the twenty questions decrease to fifteen. The game is too frustrating and is getting boring. Fifteen decreases to ten and then to five. It is really exasperating and not worth the effort. Besides, who cares anyway? Five becomes four and the game fizzles out. No one is talking and sharing and no one cares. …

Even without talking and sharing, you both continue your lives, are growing and changing. You each are having new experiences, are having new thoughts, see things differently, and are becoming different people. If this continues long enough, neither of you knows the other anymore.

What about your relationship? There is no relationship to be concerned about. You may still be going through the motions; but what you had together is gone. Perhaps you can have a renewed relationship eventually; but not any time soon. You would have to start building it all over again, if there is any interest or motivation for that sort of thing.

Simon's advice is simple. Talk and Share. Do it for each other, do it for today. Also do it for tomorrow, unless you just like starting things over again. Whatever your choice, understand the cost of your silence.

Bowditch, James L. and Anthony F. Buono. A Primer on Organizational Behavior. Sixth Edition. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons, 2005.

Business ethics constitute a way of translating values into appropriate behaviors that respond to the realities of daily life.

There also seems to be an ethical theory to justify virtually every form of behavior--from teleological ethics that examine the consequences of an act to deontological ethics that look at the extent to which a behavior conforms to certain universally accepted guiding principles.

As a way of thinking through these issues in an applied framework, the Center for Business Ethics at Bentley College has formulated six simple questions about a behavior or act for the "practical philosopher" that are used in its corporate train- ing programs: Is it right? Is it fair? Who gets hurt? Would you be comfortable if the details of your decision were reported on the front page of your local newspaper? What would you tell your child to do? How does it smell?

As researchers began to focus on the interaction between the structural and behavioral dimensions of organizations and the influence of the external environment, the concept of a business firm as a system began to dominate organizational theory. According to this perspective, an organization is conceptual- ized as a system composed of subunits or subsystems that continually interact with and are mutually dependent on each other. 4 ' Actions that occur within one part of the system not only affect that particular unit but can have a "ripple effect" through other organizational subsystems as well. The impli- cation of Systems Theory, therefore, is that things do not simply happen, but rather they evolve from multiple pressures and can entail multiple outcomes. …

…an organization receives feed- back or information concerning its performance. The continuous flow of information between a system, its internal components, and the external environment forms a.feed- back loop that enables the organization to adapt to changing environmental conditions. Thus, the capacity to use this information to control the system and make necessary changes is crucial if organizations are to become self-correcting systems.

Caution must be exercised, however, when determining functionality. Certain behaviors that may appear to be dysfunctional for task performance may be quite functional for individuals and their informal system by fulfilling social needs and reinforcing certain norms and interaction patterns.

Communication is essentially an interactive, person-to-person process. It is a dynamic transactional process in which individuals construct meaning and develop expectations about their experiences, what is occurring, and the world around them, and then share these meanings and expectations with one another through the exchange of symbols.

…there are different types of leadership, several of which can operate at the same time. Similarly, groups and organizations often have multiple objectives that may be addressed by different leaders.

What is the appropriate way to divide and coordinate work and work-related processes throughout the organization ? Where will these decisions be made in the organization ? How will the organization attempt to control the actions and activities of its members ?

…designing integrative mechanisms that actually coordinate and integrate rather than merely control is, perhaps, one of the greatest challenges in today's organizations.

The main drawback associated with decentralization is when so much authority is delegated throughout the organization that managers at all levels are able to make their own decisions, making system-level planning and coordination difficult at best. In this instance, organizations can begin to lose control over their deci...