Healthy CEO, Healthy Business

by Elisa SpainNo Comments

I recently heard a CEO say, “when I am healthy, my business is healthy”.  I have been thinking about this CEO’s statement in the context of CEOs I have known or observed over the years. My reflective observation is, he is right; there is a strong correlation between the health of the leader and the health of the business.

In the public company arena, we see the impact on stock prices when the CEO becomes physically ill.

In the private company arena, where most of the CEOs I work with reside, those that focus on their health and fitness are the ones that lead successful companies. I have watched CEOs move from poor mental and/or physical health to good health and back again and observed the company performance move in tandem.

Years ago, I worked with a CEO whose company growth had stalled. He brought me in as an advisor to help him get the company back on a growth track. While certainly there were some operational and structural changes needed, what I discovered was holding the company back was the CEO’s lack of engagement. He had suffered a series of injuries that kept him away from work, followed by a serious issue with his son. Once we put the infrastructure in place that he needed to take the company forward AND he got well and found a way to deal with his son’s issues, the company began to prosper. In fact, it was he that I was quoting in the first sentence of this post.

While a component of health is genetic and beyond our control, and life happens beyond our control, research continues to show that lifestyle and exercise are directly related to emotional and physical health.

So, as we go through our daily lives, what can each of us do to pause, reflect and recognize we have a fiduciary responsibility as leaders to care for our physical and mental well-being?

Why Vistage Works

Elisa K. Spain

Sometimes Things Are Not As They Appear

Sometimes Things Are Not As They Appear

by Elisa SpainNo Comments

Opt 4 June 15 (2)

We make assumptions daily, mostly about other people. These assumptions enable us to take shortcuts and keep us moving forward. Or so we think.

  • We assume a person attended or didn’t attend an event because…
  • We assume a person responded to us a certain way, because…
  • We assume a person took an action or didn’t take an action because…

What if instead of assuming, we, as CEO’s and leaders, paused and asked:

  • What is the reason you made this choice or took this action?
  • When your customer complains about “service”, do you probe to understand what is really going on?
  • When we see something, as the TSA reminds us, do we say something?
  • When an employee behaves a certain way, do we ask what is going on?

When I was a young driver, I learned this leadership lesson from a police officer who pulled me over for passing him on the right, when he and another officer were stopped – blocking both sides of the road. He asked me why I passed him. My response was “I assumed you were going to be there for a while and I wanted to get to my destination”. His reply, “When you assume, you make an ass-u-me”.

I often think of this encounter when I rush to judgement.

Elisa K. Spain

 

Crawl? Walk? Run? Fly?

Crawl? Walk? Run? Fly?

by Elisa SpainNo Comments

Opt 5 June 8

Hard to know when to walk, when to fly, when to run or even when to crawl. In this fast paced world we live in, our tendency is to default to run. And, my sense is, there is a place for each.

The challenge is to let things unfold at their own pace. Here are some questions I ask myself, when I remember to pause, to determine what pace fits best with the given situation:

  • If I am feeling a sense of urgency, what is driving it?
  • If I slow down the pace, what benefits/costs will result?
  • If I speed up the pace, what benefits/costs will result?
  • What will happen if I choose to observe rather than act for some time?

Elisa K. Spain

 

Leadership Quote: If I Had Only One Hour To Save The World…

Leadership Quote: If I Had Only One Hour To Save The World…

by Elisa SpainNo Comments

2013-11-24 iStock_000027536746XSmallThis month’s leadership quote:

“If I had only one hour to save the world, I would spend fifty-five minutes defining the problem, and only five minutes finding the solution.”

-Albert Einstein

How often do we jump in and start solving things before we know what the problem is? When we process issues in Vistage, the set goal is question, question, question until the person whose issue it is finds their own way to the solution. And yet, it is so tempting to jump in with answers. Socrates, like Einstein, tells us that wisdom comes from asking the better questions, defining the problem.

Perhaps us lesser mortals, have the opportunity to be just as wise…by pausing, asking questions, defining the problem, and letting the solution emerge rather than be told.

 

Elisa K. Spain

 

Leadership View #12: Watch For (Perhaps Unintentional) Malicious Obedience…

Leadership View #12: Watch For (Perhaps Unintentional) Malicious Obedience…

by Elisa SpainNo Comments

2013 07-14 iStock_000000937577XSmallLeadership View #12: Watch for (perhaps unintentional) malicious obedience…

Early in my career, I learned this valuable lesson. I had the opportunity to lead a transition of a client reporting group from a fully manual process to a fully automated process. This area was the last functional area to be automated in this company (guess that tells you how long ago this was). When the previous manager left in the middle of the systems conversion, I was asked to take over.

As those of you who have led systems conversions know, it is never a smooth process and there are many long hours that are just part of the process. On one of these long nights, the senior person on the team came up and asked me how to calculate a certain number. I didn’t know the answer, and I didn’t ask him if he knew the answer, I simply guessed. And, I ass-u-me-d, he would tell me if I was wrong. See previous post, What results when leaders Ass-u-me?

In this case the result was, every report, to every customer, went out wrong. Like, I said, I learned a valuable lesson.

Perhaps in this case the obedience was intentional. My sense is, it was not. Here was a man who was overwhelmed by change, his world was being completely turned upside down. He had never used a computer in his life and suddenly his work had to be done on one. It didn’t occur to him that how he had calculated this number before was the same way to do it on the automated system.

More importantly, I didn’t ask, I told. And, I didn’t lay the ground work for my being open to being questioned, I simply ass-u-me-d he would know.

I wonder, how many of the big disasters that we read about could have been avoided by the leader asking questions and making sure the team knows he/she wants to be challenged?

As you go through your day on Monday, I encourage you to pause and notice how you respond when someone on your team asks questions, and perhaps consider answering the question with a question of your own….

Elisa K. Spain

 

Leadership View #6: Some Problems Can’t Be “Solved”

Leadership View #6: Some Problems Can’t Be “Solved”

by Elisa SpainNo Comments

2013 05-12 Fresh PerspectiveiStock_000019408214XSmall Leadership View #6:

Some problems can’t be “solved” (and, hopefully, made to go away) – they must be managed and may require the leader’s repetitive attention and time.

As leaders and managers, we have been taught to find the root cause and fix the problem. This Leadership View seems to fly in the face of that.

What do you mean “some problems can’t be solved”?

For me the key word here is repetition. For anything to be sustainable, it must be repeated. We humans get distracted, forget what we learned and have to be reminded. This is what Vistage is all about. Our members hear from a speaker 8 times a year. Do you really think each speaker brings something new to the table? Rather, they often are reinforcing a similar message. And, we hear the message differently depending on where we are in our lives and our businesses at the time. An entrepreneur leading a start-up will hear a leadership message differently 10 years later when he or she is challenged with building a leadership team that will lead to a sustainable enterprise.

I asked one of our long term Vistage members recently if he had ever considered leaving Vistage. His answer was “never, I learn something at every meeting, every one-to-one.” He leads a highly successful, high growth business. My belief is he learns something new each time, because he comes with different ears each time.

The same is true for the people that work for us. Some problems can’t be solved, because things happen. Life isn’t static and our businesses and our processes aren’t static. Last year in a post entitled “Is Your Leadership Team Your Co-Advisor“, I talked about the DIME Method: Design, Implement, Monitor, Evaluate. For me the repetition speaks to the Monitor and Evaluate part of the continuum. As problems get solved and things change, we must monitor, evaluate and then design again.

As you mull over this idea that problems can’t be solved, I encourage you to ask yourself the following questions:

  • When was the last time we monitored or evaluated the systems we have in place?
  • Are we doing things, “because that’s the way we have always done it”?
  • What is the root cause of the problems that exist in my company today? Which of these require my repetitive time and attention?

Elisa K. Spain

 

Celebrate Your Gift

Celebrate Your Gift

by Elisa SpainNo Comments

At this gift-giving time of the year, I am reminded that we all have natural gifts.

The notion that we can constantly make ourselves better, in theory, is a great idea. But when does it become too much?

For me, the best way to answer this question is to notice our strengths and work to enhance them. In my Vistage work, and as a leadership coach and advisor, I refer to this as discovering and working in our genius.

While personal growth and development are part of living a full life, and after all this is what Vistage is all about, I wonder sometimes if we have become so focused on achieving that we are never able to appreciate who we are or what we have already accomplished.

For me, the best way to avoid the “better, better, better” trap is to ask the following questions:

  • What am I already good at? What do I need to do to become excellent at this?
  • Of the things I am not good at and am striving to improve, what can I delegate to someone else?
  • Can I find a way to accept being adequate or “good enough” at the rest?

Once we know and understand our strengths, and focus on that, we not only become more effective, we become more satisfied, and ultimately become better leaders.

P.S. This is the last post for 2012. Happy holidays to all.  See you in the new year.
Leadership Habit: What If I Can't Today?

Leadership Habit: What If I Can't Today?

by Elisa Spain2 Comments

We as leaders are told all the time that everyone is always watching us. A smile, a frown, silence, all are interpreted as “a sign”. And since most of us think in terms of impact on ourselves, our followers interpret these “signs” as a sign of something that impacts them. This of course frequently results in “absent information, people make stuff up”.

As leaders, we hear this and interpret it to mean, we need to be “on” all the time. Yikes, especially the introvert leaders say, that is exhausting!!

What if instead, when we are feeling pressured, angry, sad, depleted, we let our folks know that we are working on whatever problem has put us temporarily out of commission, “I had a tough conversation this morning and I am distracted by that, I will look for you later this afternoon so we can talk about your issue”.

For me, time and time again I have seen this sort of human response draw people toward their leaders…

What has been your experience?

Elisa K. Spain

Leadership Habit: Because That's The Way We've Always Done It….

Leadership Habit: Because That's The Way We've Always Done It….

by Elisa SpainNo Comments

Several years ago, I was working with a key executive who had been in his position for many years. We were discussing the way things were done in his department and every time I asked him the reason why they did something a particular way, his answer was “because that’s the way we’ve always done it”.  Over time, this answer became a private joke between the two of us as we worked together to modernize his department.

One of my favorite examples of this habit is the seat belt announcement on airplanes.  Once, I heard a flight attendant put it this way “for those of you who have never been in a car…” Clearly at least this one flight attendant shared the same humor as my key executive friend and me.  And yet, this announcement continues on every airline.

Perhaps it is time for someone (FAA, Airlines?) to pause and ask, “What should our safety message be?” And, for each of us to ask,  has “that’s the way we have always done it” become a leadership habit at my company?

If so, is it time for to pause and begin asking:

  • Why are we doing “that” this way?
  • What is the goal of doing “that”?
  • Is doing it “this way” getting you the results you want?

Elisa K. Spain