Part Six – Encourage the Heart

I hope you are enjoying this new, little series I have posted. Over the last several weeks, I have been posting my notes from the book The Leadership Challenge. I have heard it said that leaders are readers. My idea was to help keep you from having to read the entire book. I would even encourage you to download my notes for yourself. And, I ask that you subscribe to my/this blog (upper right side of the page.) Next week will be the last of my series on this book. Enjoy!

Part Six – Encourage the Heart

Chapter Eleven – Recognize Contributions

The human heart drives a company's success … Success must be kindled.

Your real job is to get results and to do it in a way that makes your organization a great place to work – a place where people enjoy coming to work, instead of just taking orders and hitting this month's numbers.

Most people rate “having a caring boss” even higher than they value money or fringe benefits.

We're using standards to mean both goals and values.

Values set the stage for action. Goals release the energy. The ideal state is often called Flow.

Vast amounts of research show that people feel best about themselves and what they do when they voluntarily do something.

People's motivation to increase their productivity on a task increases only when they have a challenging goal and receive feedback on their progress.

Giving encouragement requires us to get close to people and show that we care. No news has the same impact as bad news.

Expectations are powerful because they are the frames into which people fit reality. People are much more likely to see what they expect to see even when it differs from what may be actually occurring.

Research on the phenomenon of self-fulfilling prophecies provides ample evidence that other people act in ways that are consistent with our expectations of them.

One of the clearest and most often mentioned responses to the question “What is so special about leaders?” is that they bring out the best in us.

If we have someone in our life who believes in us, and who constantly reinforces that belief through their interactions with us, we are strongly influenced by that support.

There is no doubt, expectations–high or low–influence other people's performance. But only high expectations have a positive impact–on actions and on feelings about oneself. Only high expectations can encourage the heart.

People get excited about the challenges they face.

Optimism is important. When we fail, or come up short, we might remind ourselves, “You'll get it next time.”

At its root the word Lead comes from an Old English word that means “go, travel, guide.”

One way of showing you care is to pay attention to people, to what they are doing, and to how they are feeling.

Controlling managers have low credibility. Highly controlling behaviors–inspecting, correcting, checking up–signal lack of trust.

If people know there's a caring leader in their midst, in search of achievements to recognize, they'll want to show the best of themselves.

Learning to understand and see things from another's perspective–to walk in their shoes–is absolutely critical to building trusting relations and to career success.

Learning another's language, literally or figuratively, is essential to leadership, and absolutely critical in this era of global leadership.

If others know we genuinely care about them, they're more likely to care about us.

It is absolutely necessary for leaders to be clear about standards and to create a condition of shared goals and values.

When we're open we make ourselves vulnerable–and this vulnerability makes us more human and more trusted.

By demonstrating the willingness to take risks, leaders encourage others to take chances as well.

To make recognition personally meaningful, you first have to get to know your constituents.

Take the predictable and make it a surprise. Find variety in repetition.

To the extent possible, you want to create a climate of personalization.

It's well worth the effort to make a connection with each person.

Instead of relying only or even primarily on formal rewards, effective leaders make tremendous use of intrinsic rewards–rewards that are built into the work itself, including such factors as a sense of accomplishment, a chance to be creative, and the challenge of the work–immediate outcomes of an individual's effort.

There are few if any more basic needs than to be noticed, recognized, and appreciated for our efforts.

Leaders are constantly on the lookout for ways to spread the psychological benefits of making people feel like winners, because winners contribute in important ways to the success of their projects.

Intrinsic rewards are the fun you have while being down on the field playing the game. Extrinsic rewards are the results posted on the scoreboard. What we found among leaders was not so much an either-or mentality as a both-and type of thinking. Leaders are remarkably skillful in using these types of rewards in complementary ways.

Leaders get the best from others not by building fires under people but by building the fire within them.

What personalized recognition comes down to is thoughtfulness.

Telling your story in public will create more meaning.

Leaders expect the best of people and create self-fulfilling prophecies about how ordinary people can produce extraordinary actions and results.

Leaders make people winners, and winning people like to up the ante, raise the standards, and explore uncharted territory.

A major part of the reward comes with the presentation.

(What one gal remembers most) was the call from the CEO who took the time to personally congratulate her and thank her.

Having high expectations, and providing feedback, increase the likelihood that your people will achieve competence and mastery.

Being a Pygmalion entails developing a winner's attitude in those around you.

If criticism is necessary, comments should be restricted to behaviors rather than character. Similarly, feedback–preferably extensive–should stress continuous progress rather than comparisons with other people.

Positive expectations generally reflect a meritocracy in the minds of leaders, and a strong respect and appreciation for people from different backgrounds. You need to envision the possibilities for greatness within each of the people on your team.

Make sure that whoever makes the presentation knows exactly what is being recognized and can talk about specific contributions that have affected the company. Also, give the recipients an opportunity to make a few comments.

Setting a positive example gives people a sort of behavioral map to follow.

Weekly breakfast meetings are perfect opportunities to ask about people who are doing things right.

Part of a leader's job is to be a cheerleader.

What makes a “thank-you” work is the leader's genuine care and respect for those who are doing the work.

Chapter Twelve – Celebrate the Values and Victories

Celebrations serve as important a purpose in the long-term health of our organizations as does the daily performance of tasks.

Find ways to bring people together to have some fun.

Promoting a culture of celebration fuels the sense of unity and mission essential for retaining and motivating today's workforce.

Every gathering of a group is a chance to renew commitment.

Everything about a celebration should be matched to its purpose.

Celebrations are to the culture of an organization what the movie is to the script or the concert is to the score–they provide expressions of values that are difficult to express in any other way.

Working with others should be rejuvenating, inspirational, and fun.

Make gatherings pleasant, playful, and humorous so that people want to participate wholeheartedly.

Our files are full of personal-best leadership cases in which strong human connections produced spectacular results.

Leadership stories should have themes. There are stories that kick start urgency, stories to make people brave and wise, stories about core values, stories to inspire innovation.

One leader flies slightly out of formation because he firmly believes it breeds curiosity, builds new relationships, and encourages innovation.

You want to celebrate your company's victories, and make sure everyone has fun.

You need set the example. Working shoulder-to-shoulder, with your people, shows that you care. This visibility makes leaders vulnerable. It also makes the leader more real and more genuine.

You can't delegate any of these practices.

Public ceremonies provide opportunities to reiterate key values and to make heroes and heroines of individuals with whom everyone can identify.

Intimacy heals; loneliness depresses.

Whatever you wish to celebrate, formalize it, announce it, and tell people how they become eligible to participate.

There is nothing wrong with having fun and playing games at work. Liven up the place.

Being a human matters.

Always be on the lookout for people doing things right (not just people doing things in need of correction)

Emotions are contagious. Literally. Moods are social viruses, and you can catch a bad mood as easily as a bad cold.

You can cheerlead for your group better than anyone else.

Try a thank-goodness-it's-Monday party.

Most personal-best leadership experiences were a combination of hard work and fun.

People love it when they can laugh with the boss.

Encouraging the heart is not the end of the process. It's a continuous part of the leadership journey.