results – Page 13 – Elisa K. Spain

Leading Isn't Easy

June 22, 2014 by Elisa SpainNo Comments

I can hear the response now, “Well of course it isn’t easy, if it were easy, everyone would be doing it”. Yes I know, and when those difficult moments arise, and we are in the midst of, “not easy”, this is an important reminder.

Recently I was reminded of a personal leadership moment, several years ago, that I am hoping by sharing, will inspire you.

I was in a multi-vehicle car accident last week. Fortunately everyone involved walked away. Minor whiplash and vehicle damage were the only consequences. And, this accident should never have happened…

Two of us were sitting in traffic, in two separate lanes. The driver that caused the accident was an elderly gentleman, who was on oxygen, and could barely stand up, much less drive. My guess is he was either disoriented or passed out. Not easy to rear end one car, and then rear end another car in another lane!

One of the hardest things my sister and I did was take away my Mother’s car keys. She didn’t speak to me for a year; and this situation reminded me to pat myself on my back for doing it. I remember the deciding moment was when a friend of mine said, “How are you going to feel when she runs over a 5 year old?”

So what is the leadership lesson in this?

Sometimes, we have to make decisions where no option is a good one. Either choice we make has negative consequences, and yet we have to choose. And when we choose the more strategic option, the short term pain may be higher. Easy to say, hard to do.

Elisa K. Spain

Elisa Spain

elisaspain.com

Sometimes Things Are Not As They Appear

June 15, 2014 by Elisa SpainNo Comments

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

Elisa Spain

elisaspain.com

Crawl? Walk? Run? Fly?

June 8, 2014 by Elisa SpainNo Comments

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

Elisa Spain

elisaspain.com

Growth Doesn't Have To Be A Lonely Path…

June 1, 2014 by Elisa SpainNo Comments

Join us on June 11th, to learn more…

All the economists are reporting steady growth and I see it in my Vistage groups. For the first time, in a long time, members are focused on expansion. And, they are cautious, the Great Recession is still fresh in our collective memories.

Here are some of the questions I am hearing:

How does a business expand without shouldering the capital burden alone?
Is it possible to continue to grow and begin to diversify and take some money off the table?
My management team is in for the duration; how do they begin to put skin in the game?
As the business has grown, my partners and I have different personal goals, how do we resolve the financial challenges associated with this?
I want a sustainable enterprise that continues on beyond me; how do I finance my retirement and accomplish this goal?

With these questions in mind, I had a conversation with a friend of mine at Duff & Phelps and this led to an exciting seminar in Chicago on June 11 to answer these questions. Duff has assembled the top experts on private financing to address these questions in an interactive session with open dialog.

For those of you who will be in Chicago on June 11, here is a link to register. If you can’t make it and want the transcript, let me know.

Elisa K. Spain

Elisa Spain

elisaspain.com

Hold The Advice…

May 18, 2014 by Elisa SpainNo Comments

When we discover something new, or see someone we know in pain, or struggling with a problem, we want to help, to solve the problem. And off we go, giving advice. And, more often than not, that advice is received with resistance. “How can that be?”, we ask, “I genuinely wanted to help, and I am sensing my advice is not being well received”.

Here are some examples I have experienced lately, perhaps you can name one or two of your own:

I was watching my partner try and figure out how to do something on his Ipad. He didn’t ask for help, but there I was offering a “better way”; just wanting to save him time I said…
A friend found a new exercise program for his back, and instead of simply sharing his happiness with the results, he was working really hard to convince me to agree to try it (even though I reminded him I have one I use).
A colleague and I were discussing best practices, sharing ideas and then, without asking, I received a series of emails offering advice.

Offering unsolicited advice is the opposite of asking the better question. So, next time you are tempted to give advice, don’t. Wait until you are asked. And if you must say something, consider asking a question.

Elisa K. Spain

Elisa Spain

elisaspain.com

The Other Side Of Change

May 4, 2014 by Elisa Spain1 Comment

As leaders, we are frequently driving change. Lots has been written on how to do it effectively. Two weeks ago, I published a blog about the challenges and opportunities associated with changing, or bending an organization’s culture.

And, while change can be good for an organization, tinkering sometimes may not. We all know the leader who loves change for change sake, whether it’s a new award system, a new comp plan, a new training program, a new sales structure, the key word is new. Change, for change sake. Harmless, perhaps. And perhaps not.

My experience is those of us who say we like change, are thinking “we like driving change”. I have yet to meet a person who says “I love having change thrust upon me”.

With this in mind, next time you are thinking about making a change in your organization, pause and ask yourself, “what is driving this desire for change”?

Is something not working or is something going on with me, perhaps I am bored? And if it ain’t broke, perhaps the best thing to do is to pause, before setting out to fix it.

Elisa K. Spain

Elisa Spain

elisaspain.com

Culture Doesn't Change, But It Can Bend

April 20, 2014 by Elisa SpainNo Comments

It is often said that culture change is the most challenging change one can attempt in an organization. In fact, Edgar Papke, Vistage Speaker and author of True Alignment, says that culture can only change when you change the majority of the people at the same time.

Hmm, does that mean if we aren’t willing to fire 1/2 of our team, we may as well not bother?

I say no. While I agree with Edgar that complete change will only happen with a complete change in players, culture does bend.

It’s hard; it takes a long time and can sometimes (often) be frustrating. Yet, the results can be worth it. Here is an eight step process (synthesized from John Kotter’s landmark book, Leading Change) that can serve as a template toward bending the culture.

Create a Sense of Urgency
Pull Together a Guiding Team – choose a powerful group with leadership skills, credibility, authority and a sense of urgency
Develop a Simply Stated Vision for Change – paint the picture of how the future will be different
Communicate – create a surprising, compelling and visual experience – strive to change feeling, rather than thinking
Empower Others to Act – remove barriers, including people that are barriers
Produce Short Term Wins – find them and celebrate them
Don’t Let Up – press harder and faster after first successes
Institutionalize the New Approaches/Behaviors – continually reinforce

Elisa K. Spain

Elisa Spain

elisaspain.com

Ask, The Answer May Surprise You

April 13, 2014 by Elisa SpainNo Comments

Sometimes, in our zeal to anticipate our customers’ needs, we forget to ask what they prefer.

The notion of anticipating customer needs has been around for some time. And… certainly it makes sense when it comes to product development. Steve Jobs was famous for anticipating customer needs; knowing that we often don’t know what we are going to want next, best to give it to us and let us try it out. While it isn’t easy to anticipate customer product preferences, when we do it successfully, awesome innovations enter our society.

I wonder though, if we have taken this notion of anticipating needs beyond where it was intended, i.e. toward anticipating (guessing) preferences. I keep learning that when I guess at what someone wants, I am often wrong. Here are some small examples:

I believe the customer I meet with regularly wants to meet in the morning, so I keep scheduling morning meetings. It turns out, she would prefer afternoons and thinks I am only available in the mornings.
I believe a customer has referred someone to me because they expect me to include them in my vendor search. But instead, he is indifferent, and just providing a referral in case I need one.
Because my service provider is organized and intentional, I assume she is inflexible and unwilling to adapt to my scheduling preferences.

In short, ask for what you want and ask them what they want; the answer may surprise you.

Elisa K. Spain

Elisa Spain

elisaspain.com

Leadership Quote: It Is Only As We Develop Others…

March 30, 2014 by Elisa SpainNo Comments

This month’s leadership quote:

“It is only as we develop others that we permanently succeed.”

-Harvey S. Firestone

As leaders, we truly have only one job: to develop others. The success of our organizations rests entirely in the hands of the people who build our products and deliver the service to our customers. So, we have two choices, we build the products and deliver the service ourselves or… we develop the leaders who work for us, and they, in turn, develop their teams.

When we choose the latter, we permanently succeed because we have built a sustainable enterprise.

Elisa K. Spain

Elisa Spain

elisaspain.com

Did I Delegate Or Did I Abdicate?

March 23, 2014 by Elisa Spain1 Comment

Here’s a simple test to know if you have delegated or abdicated.

At what point in the process will I know if my expectations were met?

Hmm… guess that means if my intention is to delegate, I must take the following 5 actions:

Clearly outline my expectations
Check-in to see if my expectations were understood
Agree how both progress and outcome will be monitored and measured
Agree when and how progress will be reported
Agree when and how progress will evaluated and adjustments made

You might be asking yourself at this point, “seems a lot of process; do I have to do this every time I ask someone to do something for me?”

This decision of course, is yours to make.

Meanwhile I will share a personal story that happened years ago and reminded me of the value of following these five steps, and following the DIME Method, whenever I assign work to someone else.

I emailed a document to my virtual assistant, asking simply, “please clean up this document and send it to FedEx to make into a poster.” What I had in my head was a black and white, 24×36 printed document that I could roll up and take with me to a meeting and then throw away at the end of the day. The cost of this type of document is about $5.

When I arrived at FedEx, my bill was $100 and what they had ready for me was a full color, 24×36 printed document, mounted on a board and laminated.

Which do you want? And, have you made that clear?

Elisa K. Spain

Elisa Spain

elisaspain.com