Upsize Your Leadership

We are constantly bombarded with marketing messages proclaiming some new product or service labeled as innovative. Being innovative has broad appeal.

Indeed, when companies outline their core values, innovation appears on the list more often than any other quality. It even outranks integrity and respect.

Yet, when we delve into what companies are calling innovation, it's soon evident that they often confuse innovation with mere ingenuity or inventiveness.

Ingenuity is often no more than a clever or imaginative solution to a pressing problem. Innovation is far more than that.

In this episode, I examine five criteria which must be met for something to be properly called an innovation. I do not take up this theme to be picky about word choices. Rather, it's to protect the true meaning of innovation in the popular mind.

Our world faces monstrous challenges. They beg for innovation. But if we debase the word "innovation" so that mere ingenuity and inventiveness pass for it, we lose the ability to talk about innovation in a meaningful way, because any improvement can pass as innovation.

It behooves all of us, therefore, to protect the integrity of the term "innovation." This first step in that direction is to gain clarity on what the word itself means. This episode strives for that goal.

A transcript of this episode can be downloaded at https://www.upsizeyourleadership.com/episodes.

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I have a friend who has been known to say, "If you can fake integrity, you can fake anything."

Whenever he throws out that line, it gets a laugh. There's something comically nonsensical about combining the words "fake" and "integrity."

Integrity is the bedrock on which healthy societies are built. Yet, we seldom delve deeply into what the word means. We generally describe it in ways that make it almost synonymous with honesty and truthfulness. And indeed, a person of true integrity will be honest and truthful.

But integrity entails far more than being honest and truthful. In this episode, we examine the hallmarks of what constittues genuine integrity.

A transcript of this episode is available at https://www.upsizeyourleadership.com/episodes.

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Both managers and leaders are charged with getting things done. How they get things done is one of the key contrasts between managing and leading.

Managers always occupy some slot in the organizational chart. As a result, they have what I call positional authority that allows them to compel compliance with what they want done.

Leaders, however, do not always have positional authority. It's common to find people within an organization who hold no managerial title, but whose judgment and expertise are so respected that a following gathers around them. They man be described in a variety of ways. As opinion leaders. As thought leaders. As subject matter experts.

Whatever our name for them, they have the ability to make a telling impact on how the organization functions and the kind of culture it spawns. And they exert this influence, not because they have any power to compel, but because they have telling influence.

The source of this influence is credibility. Without it, no one can lead. And credibility, in turn, rests on three considerations: the leader's character, the leader's competence, and the leader's ability to achieve desired concrete results.

This podcast takes up these three considerations and examines how they contribute to optimizing a leader's credibility.

A transcript of the program is available through the index at https://www.upsizeyourleadership.com/episodes.

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In this week's podcast, I interview Jeremy Ryan Slate about his recent book From Unremarkable to Extraordinary.

One of the nation's preeminent podcast hosts, Jeremy has interviewed hundreds of highly successful men and women, many of them internationally renowned for their influence and accomplishments. From these 1200 or so interviews, he has gleaned a dozen traits which all of these successful people have in common.

These traits form the framework for his book. In this episode he shares the thought process that went into choosing these traits and his aspirations for how the book can be most beneficial for ordinary people who choose to become extraordinary in their life pursuits.

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Even though I've taught principles of values-centered leadership for decades, I was well into that process before I recognized the complex conceptual framework within which values function. And each of our values has its own unique framework.

For reasons which I outline in this podcast, I began referring to this framework 20 years ago as a molecule. At the center of the molecule is a value. Surrounding this nucleus are our beliefs which we hold about the value. Then, attached to each belief are principles which we derive from that belief -- principles which dictate how we should implement that value in our approach to life.

I refer to this construct as a VBP molecule. Values, Beliefs, Principles. I first introduced it in 2006 in my book Leadership and the Power of Trust. Since then I've fleshed it out extensively in keynotes and trainings. It helps me provide clients with a more comprehensive understanding of motivation.

We've long recognized that all motivation is based on values. That is, we are not motivated to pursue anything which has no value to us. This would imply that behavior (which is prompted by motivation) is the product of the values which we cherish.

In reality, however, behavior is not the direct by-product of a value or particular set of values. Behavior is a by-product of what we believe about those virtues. And the pattern of our behavior stems from the principles which we deduce from those beliefs.

Therefore, we do not change behavior by changing people's values. We change behavior by helping them change what they believe about their values. When beliefs change, principles change. And when principles change, behavior changes.

A transcript of this podcast is available for download at UpsizeYourLeadership.com. That same link will give you access to a downloadable graphic which provides a visual depiction of the VBP molecule.

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Over the course of my life, I've had a variety of mentors in a number of different ventures. Two stand out as having had a particularly telling impact on my career and on me as a person.

In this episode I relate two maxims which they instilled in me and describe how these maxims have shaped my life immensely.

One has made me far more effective at building strong teams in organizations which I've led. And it has contributed in large measure to the success of these endeavors.

The second has expanded my grasp of the world around me, so that I can make better decisions and offer clients wiser counsel.

Both of these maxims are just as valuable for anyone else as they have been for me. And they are especially valuable for those in leadership.

The first maxim is this: We all have a flat side on our wheel someplace. The sooner we can identify that flat side and build people and systems around us to compensate for it, the sooner we will be successful and the more successful we will be.

The second is: Read wisely. Read widely. Read well.

The podcast shows how both of these maxims have empowered my work as an executive leadership coach, keynote speaker, trainer, and consultant, not to mention my effectiveness in a variety of high-demand leadership posts.

A transcript of the episode is available at https://www.upsizeyourleadership.com/episodes.

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We've all heard the adage, "People don't like change." What I've found is that people don't dislike change so much as they dislike the way it is often implemented.

It's easy to confuse their discontent with the implementation process as resistance to change itself. No one can survive in today's world without accommodating change. But accommodating it and accepting it are two different matters.

While we have a vast array of books, seminars, workshops, and podcasts on managing change, there is one aspect of change which these programs rarely address. And it's a major contributor, I've found, to people's discontent with change initiatives.

Thomas Sowell famously noted that there are no solutions, only tradeoffs. That's particularly true with major change. Something must be given up in order to take advantage of the benefits of the change.

But if what must be given up is something treasured or enjoyed, the tradeoff brings sadness. And if leadership fails to take that sadness into consideration, they are likely to misread a worker's reaction as opposition to change, when in reality, it's mere hesitancy to embrace something new until there has been time to process the loss of something they value.

This episode explores the "sad" side of change. It looks at a classic example of a company which failed to do so, and the dysfunction which resulted put them out of business.

A transcript of this program is available for download at https://www.upsizeyourleadership/transcripts/2315-sad-truth-about-change.pdf.

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Historically, mankind has been more inclined toward political leaders who are autocratic than those who protect liberty and freedom for their people.

The fact that America has kept the idea of personal freedom alive for 12 generations is an unprecedented human event. Yet freedom always hangs by a precarious thread, even after enduring for nearly two-and-a-half centuries.

It is forever threatened by what I call the deceptive allure of authoritarianism. As Erich Fromm explained so powerfully in his book Escape from Freedom, maintaining a society based on genuine principles of liberty is a daunting task.

Freedom mandates personal autonomy and self-responsibility. And being responsible for self often brings more anxiety that some people can bear. They are therefore forever susceptible to the enticing claim of authoritarian leaders that they can eliminate whatever gives rise to the anxiety.

This promise inevitably proves false, because autocratic leaders cope with their own anxiety by imposing repressive and intrusive regimes. More than one electorate, however, has been seduced by the the illusory promise of authoritarian movements.

Today's episode delves into the intrapersonal dynamics which bring such leaders to power. It highlights why the greatest threat to democratic governments is not a takeover by an external enemy, but by the internal threat of citizens quietly acquiescing to authoritarianism.

A transcript of this episode is available at https://www.upsizeyourleadership.com/episodes/2314--allure-of-authoritarianism.htm

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Done properly, delegation is one of the most powerful weapons in the manager's arsenal. Done poorly, it results in untold problems later on and no small amount of lost productivity, momentum, and effectiveness.

When delegation is unsuccessful, it's usually before insufficient care was given to the preparation phase of delegation. Indeed, I'm struck by how many online guides on effective delegation don't even mention a preparation process.

In my judgment, however, the preparation phase is even more important than the execution phase. When preparation is done properly, making the actual delegation is teed up for success. Without that preparation, delegation is typically performed in a "fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants"fashion. And that approach is fraught with endless possibilities for miscommunication or confusion about expectations.

Therefore, in this episode I offer an eight-point checklist for making proper preparation for delegation. The checklist is workable in any delegation situation and in any type of organization.

A transcript of today's podcast can be downloaded at https://www.upsizeyourleadership.com/episodes.

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Wherever you exercise your leadership, one of the highest expectations of you is that you will be an effective problem-solver.

As leaders, much of our problem solving is in group-settings, where controlling the process can be a challenge. Strong personalities and opinionated voices frequently exert themselves so forcibly that they take over the discussion and drive the solution which they want, not necessarily what the group wants.

In today's episode I examine a six-phase problem-solving structure which minimizes the opportunity for problem-solving exercises to be derailed by personalities or lack of an orchestrating focus. This structure assures that every aspect of a problem-solving endeavor is given due time in a setting where everyone can be heard.

The structure I describe is adapted from Edward de Bono's book 6 Thinking Hats, an approach that has been used globally to tackle thorny geopolitical issues. If it is helpful in problem-solving scenarios such as that, it's certain a technique that can benefit any of us in problem-solving roles.

A transcript of today's podcast can be downloaded at https://www.upsizeyourleadership.com/episodes/2312-imaginative-problem-solving.pdf.

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