Should I Stay or Should I Go?

by Elisa Spain Comment Closed

Should I stay or should I go? This is often the question facing clients participating in my You Pivot™ Program. 

The answer, of course, is it depends. 

A friend of mine called me recently with this exact question. He is a senior executive in his late sixties, planning to work until 70. This week the company offered him and several colleagues an exit package. On the surface, at least, the exit appears optional. Should I stay or should I go, he wonders.

A long-time client of mine, who founded a company 20+ years ago, sold to private equity, and she stayed on. The PE firm is hands-off, but it’s not the same. She created something unique and had fun when it was small. She isn’t having fun now but wonders what she would do instead.

A new client has been a professional manager for many years. Recently he was promoted to a senior manager role which he thought would be exciting and different, yet it feels so much the same. What to do?

These are all today stories. In my experience, the answer to the “should I stay or should I go” question begins with identifying what matters most, and then, once you are clear about what matters, writing your tomorrow story. The writing of the tomorrow story is most helpful in deciding and navigating any transition that results. 

Sometimes the decision is to stay, and the transition is to come to a place of acceptance; sometimes, the decision is to go, and the transition is to navigate to the next destination. 

Do You Have a To-Don’t List?

by Elisa Spain Comment Closed

An executive acquaintance of mine was just promoted to a C-Suite role, a significant promotion. While she is excited, she has not yet found a replacement for her previous position. In the meantime, she is doing both jobs. When I asked her how it was going, she responded, “just trying to get it all done, without dropping any balls.”

This conversation reminded me of one I had with one of my clients who was lamenting the challenges one of his executives has with burnout. In this case, the CEO said, “I wish this executive would learn to drop some balls, his effort to get everything done is what is causing his burnout”!

For those of us who want to dot every I and cross every T (I admit I am one of them), the ‘to-do list’ can seem endless. This wise CEO’s response “go ahead, drop some balls”; just choose the ones you will drop.

What if instead of starting each day with a to-do list, we also created, in the words of Tom Peters, a “to-don’t list”? Here are some examples to get you started:

  • What if you reviewed your email once or twice daily and let everyone know that is your plan?
  • What if you paused and asked yourself, does this email, call, text, or inquiry require a response?
  • What if you paused before saying “yes”?

 For more on this topic, check out Dan Pink’s Pinkcast 1.16. 

Oops, I Was Thinking Out Loud – Part II

by Elisa Spain Comment Closed

A while back, I wrote the following story one of my clients shared about his experience with the unintended consequences of thinking out loud. 

“I was sitting in my office with my VP of Operations. I was thinking aloud, wondering what we needed to do next to get to our growth goals. I was going on and on about my frustrations and concerns. The next day, he returned to my office and asked if I was planning to sell the company. He apparently had gone home and thought about what I had said all night.”

Recently, one of my clients shared a different thinking-out-loud story about the ripple effects.

My client was walking the floor of her office, and to engage with the team, she sat down with a couple of team members and shared her observations about their current process of servicing customers. Her intent was to learn their perspective and see if anyone had ideas to streamline the process. Instead, she heard from the direct manager of these team members the next day that they needed to change the process because of their conversation with “the boss” the previous day! 

You may be thinking (silently?), so are you saying I want to be aware of what I am saying all the time? Yikes!!

My sense is the answer is yes. When we think out loud, sometimes we create expectations, alarm, or even actions we did not intend. 

In my own experience, when I have the presence to say, ” I would like to hear your perspective, may I think out loud for a moment?” that frames the conversation. And then, I remind myself to craft the wrap-up so that my listener doesn’t take action based on our think-out-loud conversation unless I want them to. And sometimes, this pausing reminds me that in this circumstance, it is best to ‘zip it.’ 

Happy New Year, L’Shana Tova

by Elisa Spain Comment Closed

Tonight begins the Days of Awe in the Jewish religion. Rosh Hashanah, the celebration of the New Year in the Hebrew calendar, marks this period’s start; Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, marks the end. It’s a time for reflection, which I enjoy, even though I do not consider myself religious.

The prayer we read at the opening of the service goes something like this, ” On Rosh Hashanah, it is written, and on Yom Kippur, it will be sealed – how many will pass from the earth and how many will be created; who will live and who will die. I’ve always been uncomfortable with the idea that everything is pre-ordained, yet the Stoics remind us of the same thing, Amori Fatal, Momento Mori. The message of the ancient rabbis and the ancient Stoics is the same, make today matter, it may be all you have.

For me, this reminder causes me to pause, reflect, ask and affirm that what I am doing today, and each day, in the words of Steve Jobs, is what I would be doing if I knew today was my last. L’Shana Tova, Happy New Year.

Play, Playful, or Have Fun?

by Elisa Spain Comment Closed

Last week I was talking with a woman friend who said, “My husband keeps telling me I need to spend more time playing.”

Her comment resonated with me, as my husband and some of my male friends have said the same to me.

We agreed that while neither of us considers ourselves “playful,” we both like to have fun. While our definition of fun doesn’t include going to the playground or even adult playgrounds like golf courses, we agreed that our time together in conversation is something we both describe as fun. 

We decided to look up the definition of the two words and found the Oxford dictionary defines them similarly.

Play – activity engaged in for enjoyment and recreation

Fun – enjoyment, amusement, or lighthearted pleasure

So if they mean the same, here’s our wondering:

  • Do men and women define the words play and fun differently to themselves?
  • Or is play an extrovert term rather than a gendered term? 
  • Is one person’s play, or fun, another’s work? e.g., an introverted detail-oriented person might find it fun to analyze spreadsheets, while an extrovert would describe this as work.

What Is Your Personal Strategic Plan?

by Elisa Spain Comment Closed

September is the time of the year most companies begin their strategic planning process. But what about your personal strategic plan?

As part of my You Pivot™ Program, I suggest that my clients write a personal strategic plan. And I further recommend that they apply the techniques they have learned from business planning to this personal plan; frankly, most find it challenging. 

Business people are comfortable with and adept at business planning but rarely do these same executives choose to define their mission, vision, and strategic plan for their lives.

If you want to give it a try this year, here is a suggested approach:

  • Begin with your mission, your personal Why? Listen to Simon Sinek discuss finding your Why here. 
  • Then spend some time getting clear on What Matters to You, what really matters. 
  • As you reflect on your personal Why and your What Matters together, you should be able to craft your life vision. 
  • Finally, begin to draft your strategic plan, the actions you want to start, stop or continue so that you can achieve your life vision. 

Same, same, but different from your business plan. 

How Is This Labor Day Different?

by Elisa Spain Comment Closed

The first nationally recognized Labor Day celebration was in 1894. The AFL claimed this day with a street parade sending a message of “the strength and esprit de corps of the trade and labor organizations.”

Yet, before the pandemic and what we perceive as the consequent labor shortages, except in specific industries like construction, unions had declined. Today unionization is growing in companies like Apple, with a reputation for being employee-centric. 

While unions certainly have always had their place, especially in the safety arena, I wonder what else is driving the change we see today?

Economists say inflation is the cause; prices are going up faster than wages, and people are organizing because they can’t keep up. People often feel that being part of something gives them agency. Human resource professionals say that a lack of effective two-way communication leads to a lack of trust, leading to organizing.

Whatever the reasons for the change, as we celebrate this first post-pandemic (yes, I know it’s still with us) Labor Day, that marks the end of summer and the beginning of autumn, might we also view it as a beginning for how we show up at work and ask ourselves:

  • As a leader, what can I do tomorrow to learn what drives each person on my team and create an environment where each person can pursue their individual passion while contributing to the success of the team?
  • As a follower, what can I do tomorrow to add additional value to the success of our company while being true to what matters to me?

These Are The Best of Times…

by Elisa Spain Comment Closed

Charles Dickens said, “these are the best of times; these are the worst of times.”  

How can it be both?

One way to interpret this is to say that it depends on who you are and what your life experiences are.  For some, the past held the best of times, and the present holds the worst. 

And for the pragmatists amongst us, admittedly, I am one, the present is where we live. Therefore, by definition, regardless of who we are, the present is both the best and the worst of times. 

At this point, if you haven’t already quit reading, you are probably asking yourself, “what is she even talking about?”

Earlier this week, I was in conversation with a friend and fellow coach about the attraction many people have toward attending their high school reunions. These reunions allow the attendees to revisit the past, thus providing perspective on both the past and the present. Yet, some of us have never attended, or if we have, we didn’t find it to be the magical experience that it was for others.

As we discussed this more, I remembered my mother’s choice when my father died. He was the love of her life, yet she put away all her photos of him. If my sister hadn’t rescued the albums, they would be gone. 

One reaction to this story is, OMG, how could she? Another is perhaps it was too painful for her to look at him. And a third is she was someone who chose to live in the present; the past was, well, the past. 

  • What is the difference between these perspectives? 
  • Does the question of whether these are the best of times or the worst factor into the difference?
  • Is it a function of our life experience, or is it a function of our philosophical view of the world?