Orchestrating Success

The Leadership Challenge

The #1 complaint I hear from leaders: that they, as leaders, do too much and their teams do too little. Leaders blame others for what they create. There is a reciprocity in over-functioning. The counter-force is under-functioning.

What is over-functioning? It is micromanaging. Over-functioning is doing something for others that they should be doing themselves.

If you want to make an enemy, then do something for them that they should do for themselves.We think we are helping, when, in fact, we are really causing an opposite and emotional reaction.

Be Self-Aware

Look at yourself.Are you doing things that others should  be doing?

What will you start doing today to change your tendency to over-function?

We, as leaders, influence everyone in our presence. The orchestra conductor influences how the instrumentalists play: just playing the notes, or playing with passion. The conductor does not tell the orchestra how to play their instruments or play those instruments for them.

Many leaders struggle with underfunctioning staff, boards, volunteers, etc., and are not aware that they have potentially caused that problem with their overfunctioning presence.

In the recent post, “The Drawbacks Of An Overfunctioning Leader,” Geri Scazzero made these points about how overfunctioning causes problems:

1. Overfunctioning Disguises Itself As Caring

2. Overfunctioning Perpetuates Immaturity

3. Overfunctioning Prevents Me From Focusing On My Own Life Direction

4. Overfunctioning Erodes My Spiritual Life

5. Overfunctioning Destroys Community

Read the post HERE.

The unintentional role that leaders play in problems is elusive.

Here are ways that the Transformational Leader creates balance and prevents overfunctioning:

Define what to delegate: Trying to do it all is the first trap for leaders. We know how it’s supposed to work, therefore, we attempt to model by doing it rather that teaching others how to do whatever “it” is. Define your major skills and your gaps and find the most competent person to fill the gap. Define the end result clearly and then create a process to coach that person into higher functioning.

Learn to delegate: It’s easy to say, “delegate more,” however, learning how delegation works is a challenge for many leaders. Define the end result, allow the other person to define the steps with your approval, and create touch points on a regular basis to make corrections and to mentor - this is not micromanaging!

Do not micromanage: Micromanagement is a form of overfunctioning. Don’t do it.

Work on self: Learn to manage anxiety and learn to listen, observe, and ask good questions. Leaders who don’t know how to manage self fall into the habit of overfunctioning by over talking, over managing, and exerting too much pressure where it’s not warranted.

Autocratic leadership is a form of overfunctioning. Please give me your comments at http://hughballoupodcast.com

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A Culture is a Reflection of the Leader, Part 2

“Perform every act in life as though it were your last.” - Marcus Aurelius, the Roman Emperor from 161 to 180 AD

It's essential for leaders to develop skills and awareness to impact the culture positively.

The leader shapes the culture with their influence and skill good or bad. This included language.

Leaders Get Results with Language - Both Good and Bad

Choosing When to Speak and What to Say

We can say whatever we choose to say...there are consequences to some word choices, however. If you take the quote by Marcus Aurelius one step further, "Speak every word as if it were your last." Then it highlights the importance of how leaders choose words. There is power in the word chosen. There is also power in delivery since research tells us that 7% of the message is in the word and the rest is in facial expression and delivery. Having said this, the wrong word choices and block or change the intent of the intended communication.

Another favorite quote is from Mark Twain who said, “It's better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than open it and remove all doubt.” Being transparent is good. It's different showing ignorance or insensitivity.

Using Unacceptable Words

When I get frustrated or excited, I might become careless with my word choices and event use some profanity. When leaders show insensitivity by using words that might offend someone else, the impact might be damaging to their reputation, and thus their position of influence. The choice of words and the way those words are delivered can make a huge difference.

Some types of poor choices in words might be the following:

Profanity

Harsh or Critical

Sexist

Racist

Political

Religious Bigotry

The list can go on...and on...and on..

Fundamentally, leaders impact others with actions and words. When combining negative word choices and negative emotions the negative impact is magnified greatly. Many times the damage is permanent and there's no going back.

Leaders are Encouragers

One good word of affirmation displaces 37 disparaging remarks. The job of the leader is to influence others. That influence can be either positive or negative. Even when there's a need for correction, discipline, or delivering bad news, there's a way to choose words that are helpful and constructive rather than critical and destructive.

Having positive impact on those whom we lead is using power of influence in a useful and engaging manner. Transformational Leaders use personal influence rather than power of position to facilitate actions and changes. It is important to realize that there is power of position when communicating with others in the organization. There is what is called a "power differential" when communicating with team members. Leaders who are not aware of that power differential leverage that position of power over others unintentionally. Some are intentional as well. Sending unintentional messages can damage the effectiveness of any leader and potential damage reputation and team morale.

Carefully chosen words engage others in active listening and empower them to strive for results.

Examples of Negative Words of Phrases

Negative words creep into our language mostly by habit. We form bad habits and therefore send negative messages in our communications, both verbal and written, which can cloud the real message. Be aware of negative word choices.

Negative messages might be one of the following:

Blaming tone or words

Communicate a position of doubt that the other person can't succeed

Only stresses negative results and doesn't include any possibilities of success

Includes negative words such as, can't, won't, unable to...etc.

Examples of negative words and phrases:

You...when identifying a place for improvement or failure is received as blame...blame language

You have to understand...no they don't have to do anything...power language

Men are anxious to improve their circumstances, but are unwilling to improve themselves; they therefore remain bound. - James Allen

Leaders Model What Others Should Do

As a musical conductor, I know that the ensemble is a reflection of the conductor. The better we are in inspiring excellence, the better the performance is! Conductors are skilled at creating excellence. If the musicians respect the conductor, then they play as the conductor intends and not as they direct. Some of our motions might not be exactly what we intend, so the players respond to the intent. This only happens when there's respect for the conductor (the leader).

In non-musical situations, it's pretty much the same. Leaders are basically influencers. The Transformational Leader leads by influence and not by power of position. That's a difficult transformation for many leaders. We have been taught things that don't work. Mostly we've been taught to be the BOSS. This is not good in today's culture.

Effective leaders create relationship with those whom they lead so that the team members respond to the leader like a highly skilled orchestra musically responds to every nuance of the conductor. The leader must develop the skills to lead. There is no option.

Leaders are Developed

Yes, that's true. Leadership skill is not something that we are born with. We must develop our skills. We must adapt to the current culture and the current situation. Leading a charity is different than leading an investment business.

There are many styles of leadership that fill the entire spectrum, from autocratic leadership (the BOSS, it's about me) to servant leadership (about the vision).

I have worked with leaders of all types in a mentor role for over 30 years and have found that leaders have some of the same challenges, no matter what type of organizations they lead. I found lots of helpful stuff, but none of it met my expectations for a fully implementable strategy; therefore, I developed my own programs and systems that totally integrate strategy and implementation. Others provide pieces of the puzzle and I provide the fully integrated system.

I'd love to share this with you if you are interested. Go http://leadingforprofit.com to get my free report and training videos that will impact your success, starting right away. In the series of messages, you will have an opportunity for a 25-minute power session with me that will give you lots of value.

It's Not Your Team...It's YOU

If you are...

1. Facing leader burnout...

2. Struggling with an under-performing team...or

3. Not generating the revenue to achieve your mission...

It's time to change the results.

Let's chat.

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Leadership IS Influence

We confuse authority with influence, when in fact, we must influence others to be perceived as a leader.

If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.

- John Quincy Adams

Envision the Future

Everybody has a dream. Only 3 out of every 100 people will actually do something about that dream by acting on the vision. Unfortunately, 9 out of 10 people attempting to launch a new enterprise, whether a business or a charity, will fail without achieving that dream.

What's the difference? It's having a plan and surrounding yourself with a competent team to implement that plan. The first priority, however is equipping yourself for the journey. Develop your skills to lead, implement the plan, and build the right team. And, by the way, equip yourself to build the income that you deserve with this enterprise.

I was glued to the television every night for the Rio 2016 Olympics and was massively impressed with our American athletes! They are highly skilled, masterfully trained, and consequently highly successful. Each successful athlete has a very competent coach.

Take Action

This is the same for professional athletes, actors, musicians, and business professionals. They all have a coach and train for success. We would never consider running a 26.2 mile marathon without training our bodies and minds for the task. Then why do we even consider starting and running a business or charity without having a coach and a content specialist mentor? That's why over 90% fail...they lack the ability to lead the enterprise, as defined in the D & B research in 1995.

There's an alternative. I have coaches, therefore I do what I teach.

Leading is influence.

Check out my Unbound Leader program to learn the process for success at http://TheUnboundLeader.com 

I’ve called that program, “Unbound Leader: Unlocking Your Inner Potential for Success.”

It’s time to do something different.

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A genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus but a molder of consensus. - Martin Luther King, Jr.

This is an ongoing conversation that comes up with about every organization that I work with. I find that people universally don’t understand the concept of consensus and confuse it with compromise. In fact, many leaders consider either on to be a weakness of leadership rather than a strength of an influencer leader.

Most groups attempt to utilize the principles and processes outlined in Robert’s Rules of Order, which is a time honored system of best practices. Utilizing consensus strengthens the Robert’s system.

When there are active, caring, engaged individuals working together and having meetings, there will be differing perspectives and opinions on things. This is a good thing. It’s the leader’s duty and delight to utilize those perspectives into a synergistic collaboration in which everyone understands the challenges and the benefits of every decision and backs the process. Consensus builds relationships. Compromise erodes relationships.

It will be obvious which side of this debate I fall on…consensus is giving consent to a decision. Many feel that compromise and consensus are the same. I disagree.

Despite my revealed opinion on this topic, I trust that you will be interested to see how I distinguish these two standards.

The comparisons to musical ensembles might make sense to you if you are a musician. If you are not a musician, then you might have some misconceptions of how the system works. The musical conductor is perceived by non-musicians, and some musicians, to be a dictator when, in reality, the musical conductor is an influencer. We influence singers and instrumentalists to function at their highest level. That's a form of consensus.

Compromise is...

Everyone giving up something in order to agree on a decision

A Win/Lose or Lose/Lose

Holding to a view point and bargaining for middle ground

Like a tug of war

Bargaining

Power plays

Personal needs/opinion positioning

Everyone loses something

More talking than listening

A contractual legalistic agreement

Consensus is...

Everyone coming up with a better solution than each had originally conceived

A Win/Win or No Deal

Looking for additional options and not holding fast to an opinion

Open and honest conversation

Listening for options

Open to options

Holding the value for the organization and not for self

Everyone gains more than originally perceived

A group process of open conversation and decision backed by relationship

A covenant agreement and relationship

Consensus means that the individuals in the group function like a musical ensemble, in that they carefully listen to each other player/singer and adjust their playing for blend, tempo, dynamic, and tone, and don’t give up their excellence in musicianship. The synergy created by seeking and practicing consensus building, builds a culture that functions at a higher level and develops mutually agreeable accountabilities and standards of excellence.

By facilitating this process, the leader reaches a higher level of functioning by not micromanaging group process, but guides the process much like the conductor guides the ensemble. Conductors don’t make the music; they provide the leadership for musical excellence to happen.

Leadership is influence.

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Sandy Papavero works with excited entrepreneurs who have a passion for their business but might not have the experience to manage the financial part of their business. Unfortunately most entrepreneurs I meet aren’t even aware that they are driving themselves into debt, or at least leaving themselves open for massive financial stresses in the future, simply because they didn’t understand the business of their business.

The Interview Transcript

Ep 61, Interview with Kelli Holmes

Hugh Ballou: Hey there. This session of “Orchestrating Success: Converting Your Passion to Profit” is an interview with my longtime friend, Kelli Holmes, a longtime friend who I haven’t seen in a number of years. We just connected on email and said, “Let’s tell people what we need to know about getting outside of our office to connect with those people who are so important to our business but we don’t know.” We call it networking. Kelli, welcome to my podcast.

Kelli Holmes: Thanks, Hugh. Wow. Fantastic to be here. Great to see you. Don’t we love technology? We can see each other with being thousands of miles apart. It’s great.

Hugh: I’m in Virginia, and you’re where in California?

Kelli: Just outside of LA in a sleepy town called La Verne.

Hugh: Oh yeah. We in the South think California is another country.

Kelli: Sometimes in California we think California is another country.

Hugh: Kelli, tell us your company name. It’s a really cool name.

Kelli: TEAM Referral Network. TEAM stands for the motto “Together, Everyone Achieves More.”

Hugh: I love it. What does this company do?

Kelli: We primarily help small business owners, entrepreneurs, and independent contractors—those in some way, shape, or form responsible for generating their own success—by teaching them how to network effectively and build valuable business relationships that can build and grow their business. It’s really through the power of relationships and referrals. We are known for networking groups and events. Our marketing path is through the word of mouth and networking opportunities.

Hugh: Awesome. There is a crossover here. I teach that leadership is basically building relationships. I talk about the pathway to revenue is built on relationships.

Kelli: Absolutely.

Hugh: Communication is based on relationships. There is a hand and glove with my methodology and what you actually do in real life. How did Kelli get interested in building this networking business? You have been doing this 19 years?

Kelli: No, 15 years. We just celebrated our 15th anniversary last week at our signature event. It’s an annual event, but last week’s event we turned into a 15th anniversary celebration.

I have a very typical entrepreneurial story. 15 years ago, knowing that I loved this type of business and working with entrepreneurs and there is a lot of networking groups and choices out there, how do we build a better mousetrap so to speak? We decided to start TEAM Referral Network based not only on the premise of better networking and relationship building and referrals to grow your business, but also how to insert better technology. 15 years ago, there was a different picture in terms of the technology landscape, and we were able to be pretty cutting edge with what we brought to the table and to put heart into it by working with nonprofits. We have opened hundreds and hundreds of chapters of TEAM Referral Network, and our goal is to plug in a nonprofit to each of those chapters, donate the membership to them, teach them to network, and connect them with a great group of businesspeople in our community to further their organization. It was adding the community outreach plus technology on a traditional theme of networking events and groups that started TEAM Referral Network.

Hugh: I love it. What is your secret power that brings energy to networking?

Kelli: My personal philosophy is a lot of people confuse networking with relationship marketing.

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Leadership is a container, which supports healthy growth for people like a garden supports healthy growth for plants. Planting the seeds is just the beginning. The health depends on constant feeding and care. - Hugh Ballou

We are leaders because we have a vision and act on that vision. Out of every 100 people who have an idea, only 3 will do something about it. Out of the 3 that act on their vision, less than 10% will succeed. If you are leading a functioning organization, then you are in a very small segment of those who dream. Many people dream and few succeed.

Insuring success comes with a price - that is equipping yourself for success. Define the strategy and develop the skills for implementing that strategy. After all, your vision will not happen if you don’t make it happen.

The price, your investment, is risk mitigation, in the viewpoint of an investor. Your investment is creating clarity with careful, strategic, planning and implementation. Very few of us, if any, can do this alone. I teach strategy and leadership implementation. I can’t do those things for myself with either of my enterprises - a for-profit or nonprofit. I need specialists in those skills to assist me in gaining objective perspective, to identify my blind spots, and to fill in the gaps in my thinking and awareness.

When I interview potential clients, I typically ask the following questions:

1. What is your vision?

2. Identify your competition?

3. What makes you different from the competition?

4. What’s the gap between today and the realization of your vision?

5. Do you have a written strategic plan?

Often, I get the following responses:

1. Lots of unclear, rambling thoughts that are unclear and not specific.

2. Lack of knowledge or denial of competition

3. A description that could apply to thousands of others.

4. Unsure of what’s next.

5. There’s no written plan, but I know what I want. A written plan will limit my creativity. Also, I’m to busy to do this?

Here’s how I reply:

1. Until you can identify your vision and people can understand why they need you, there’s no reason to do anything further.

2. If there’s no competition, then there might not be a need.

3. You sound like a lot of others, why do you need to launch (or grow) you initiative?

4. It’s what you don’t know that will compromise or even block your success.

5. There’s no success without a strategy in writing and an integration of that plan with team performance.

If a leader is not willing to invest in the “upfront cost” of building a solid foundation for the enterprise, then why should they expect to succeed? You can’t build a house with no solid foundation and expect that it will last for long. You can’t, or shouldn’t attempt to fly a plane without taking flying lessons. And, certainly you can’t launch and grow a successful enterprise without preparation and hard work…much of which comes at the beginning.

The “Upfront Cost” is by far lower that the cost to replace or repair later on. The loss of time, money, and likely in relationships is far greater.

Why not invest in success?

Check out my Unbound Leader program to learn the process for success at http://TheUnboundLeader.com 

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David A. Duryea is business improvement veteran with more than thirty-two years of experience in practical business improvement and technology innovation. He has led more than sixty business improvement and innovation projects in sixteen different industries.

As a legal expert witness for failed technology and business innovation projects, David has performed project forensics on failed implementations for over a dozen large-scale projects.

A popular speaker on business improvement, he has been featured at Computerworld, InfoWorld, and industry conferences. His articles in the area of ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) and advanced technology implementation practices have been featured.

David holds a patent from the United States Patent Office, degrees in business administration and computer science, and an MBA with a focus in project management. David is happily married with seven children, four of whom were adopted from China. He and his family live near Cleveland, Ohio. When not studying the intricacies of business improvement, he enjoys hiking, bicycling, baseball, coaching, and investing time in activities with his children.

His Business-Improvement Model

Part 1: Business Strategy Structure

Step 1 Understand the Law of Business Reality Organizations serve customers in a profitable way (balancequality and efficiency) or cease to exist.

Step 2 Understand the Target—The Core Business Model Why organizations generate profit different from their

competitors.

Step 3 Influencers of the Core Business Model Pressure and Enhancers on Performance

Step 4 Embrace Business Strategy and Structure Basis for Improvement—Whether Leaders Know It or Not

Part 2: Business Process Structure

Step 5 Common Processes and Functions of a Business Model The Law—Inherent to Process, Functions, and Operation

Step 6 Industry Processes of a Business Model Developing Industry Common Process Structure

Step 7 Core Business Model Processes Embrace for Uniqueness and Profitability

Step 8 Business Processes Influencers Influencing Process Structure, Performance , and Profitability

Step 9 The Business-Improvement Objective Change Operations to Further an Organization’s Core Business Model

Step 10 Business and Operational Performance The Performance Goal—Core Business Model Productivity

Step 11 True Operational Performance Measurement Measure the Goal: Core Business Model Productivity

Part 3: Business Enablement Structure

Step 12 Business Process Enablement: Resources to Realize the Core Business Model

The Interview Transcript

Interview with David Duryea

Hugh Ballou: It’s Hugh Ballou again. My guest tonight is a man I met through another person, his publicist. We talked a little bit, and I discovered we had a lot of values in common and we do similar work. We are going to talk about David Duryea’s new book that is out. I have a copy of this book, and it’s really good. It’s 200 pages of really, really well-researched, well-written content. The book is called- I’m getting to the cover. I’ve started reading and I am deep down into it. The cover is a light bulb, and it says Do the Right Thing. My guest on this podcast is David Duryea.

David, tell people a little bit about yourself and what inspired you to want to write this really great book Do the Right Thing.

David Duryea: Well, first of all, Hugh, thanks for having me on again. It’s been a great conversation and connection with you as well. Basically, Do the Right Thing is doing the right thing in business improvement, including process and technology. I would have to say that I came up with the idea, or at least the inklings of the idea, somewhere around the late ‘90s, believe it or not, when we were in the heydays of putting in a lot of different technologies. Dot coms were coming up as well, and we were doing a lot of implementations. I also saw at the same time a very high failure rate.

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Hope is the thing with feathers, that perches in the soul, and sings the tune without words, and never stops at all.

– Emily Dickinson

Once, upon hearing a person tell me that he had worked continuously for four years with no vacation, I stopped to think about how unsuccessful that person appeared to be to me. Now, I fully realize that, to some people who enjoy their work, this might be a desired result – work all the time, because that’s what makes you feel good.

I prefer to think of life like a musical composition. It’s full of variety – tempo changes, dynamic variations, rests, fermatas, and more.

With a variety in life, the Transformational Leader is equipped to think clearly and respond to the challenges of leadership with a continuing fresh perspective.

My 4th leadership principle is “Balance.” This principle allows all the other principles to work. If we are burned out, we compromise our work. We owe it to ourselves to order our day, our week, our month, and our life.

Balance means thinking about the total self: spiritual, physical, mental, social, intellectual…and so forth. Caring for self is a priority if we want to be at our best as a leader and if we want to be fully present in the life that we create.

Caring for self is not being selfish. Caring for self is allowing us to be equipped to serve others in a more comprehensive and engaging way.`

TIP: If you plan to create variety in your life, the change of pace will empower you for challenges ahead for your leadership. Do not lag behind the curve; be prepared to lead the charge by being rested and focused.

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Let’s focus on Success! That means accomplishing what we set out to accomplish!

According to the research…

D & B determined that 90% of entrepreneurs fail due to the lack of skill…

The Myer Foundation discovered that 45% of nonprofit leaders are burned out!

Others of are might be doing fine…

…we could do much better, if we only know what was missing.

I have been working with Social Entrepreneurs for 31+ years on 4 continents with many types of organizations.

I have discovered the common threads that limit their effectiveness, and consequently, their income. Organizations cannot develop any more than the leader’s ability to lead.

The Problems as I Have Discovered Are:

* Too Much to Do…

* No Team or Little Team…

* Insufficient Income…

* Relentless Stress…

* Not Sure What To Do About It…

So, I created a step-by-step course for busy people to get out of their current situation and create a different future.

I’ve called that program, “Unbound Leader: Unlocking Your Inner Potential for Success.”

In one way or another, we are all bound by conditions of our own making.

It’s time to do something different.

Look at my short video to see if this program is a fit for you

http://TheUnboundLeader.com

I’ll see you on the video…and then in the winner’s circle!

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