Lead With Clarity Not Certainty
In my daily study time yesterday I read Job 38:2-3. In that passage it says: “Then the Lord answered Job out of a whirlwind, and said: ‘Who is this who darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Now prepare yourself like a man; I will question you and you shall answer Me.” You ever been around that person who wants to make sure you know that they know it all – or at least think they do? I am always amazed at how leaders will begin giving details about subjects, events, happenings, initiatives without really knowing all the details. I guess it is that innate feeling we have that we need to be in the know and in authority. As an educational leader I have always found it to be far more effective to be very clear about what I know and what I don’t know – and then go out and find the resources to get clarity.
I believe those I lead do not need me to always be certain, but they do need me to be clear. Individuals can live without certainty from a leader, but not without clarity. “Your people do not need certainty on every issue, but they do need clarity on every issue” (Maxwell, 2003). Leaders must be genuine with their people.
Reference
Maxwell, J. C. (2003). Leadership promises for every day. Nashville, TN: Maxwell Motivation, Inc.
Rental Car Leadership Lessons
From a business travel standpoint, rental cars are a necessity, but recently I began to realize there are leadership lessons to be learned from these rental cars. I pride myself on staying up on the latest gadgets and technology, but let’s face it, this is no longer an easy task. I cannot even imagine leaving home without my iPad and iPhone, or taking a trip without my Powerbag Charging Backpack to keep the iPad and iPhone charged. These items have transformed our lives.
In that same vane think about how the competition has effected the leadership of the automobile industry. In the past month I have rented four different vehicles; a Chevrolet Camaro, Buick LaCrosse, Chevrolet HHR, and a Ford Escape. Even though I’m a GM guy and partial to Camaro and Buick, there are a few things I really like about the Escape. Such as the tapered cup holders. For a guy who hates travel mugs with lids I walk out of the house with a regular coffee cup. With the Escapes design all of my cups have fit – now that’s pretty cool!
Because I backed into the gate post in front of my house and sideswiped the whole passenger side of my truck I will have the Escape for at least seven more days while they fix my truck. In this time I’ve become attached to some of the features and niceties, such as the touch screen.
The speedometer superimposed into the windshield of a new Chevrolet Camaro isn’t distracting at all, and in fact allows you to know your speed without losing sight of the road. Also, you don’t have to worry about checking your air pressure anymore because your car does it for you.
Now my truck has a lot of nice features, but is amazing how much has advanced since 2009. I have learned to take my car rentals seriously, making sure my latest rental “toy” has everything I want and need.
What I would really like to do is design a truck with all of the favorite designs and features of my favorite rentals. That would be quite the truck don’t you think? But isn’t this exactly how we should build our learning organization teams? Select all the right people with all the latest features and skills so when they come together they make the ideal vehicle for moving our organizations forward.
Transformational leadership requires that we study all the people available, just like I have been studying my rental cars to put all the best features together. Think about this next time your in a rental or admiring the cool stuff someone else’s car has to offer.
Win The Day!
My “Win The Day!” Plaque Made By My Son, Heath
It seems like such a simple phrase, but “Win The Day!” has really become my mantra as a principal of a turnaround academy. I must admit that it was actually my son, Heath, that turned me on to this phrase and the importance of living it. Heath, at age 11, is a huge Oregon Ducks fan. He even has a goal of playing for the Ducks, whose mantra is “Win The Day!” It really has even become a part of the University of Oregon football program. Heath has studied the program and has taught me what it means to them.
Win The Day!
Chip Kelly’s top-ranked Oregon Ducks claim “Win the Day” as their motto. It’s splashed on a Eugene billboard, in the locker room and in giant letters on the players’ entrance to Autzen Stadium. With the Ducks’ offense smoking opponents and Kelly inspiring a gurulike following, “Win the Day” has become a team identity, a fan rallying cry and even a brand. “To me, it means you take care of what you can control, and what we can control is today,” Kelly said. “I think people too often look way down the road — you know, ‘I want to do this, I want to do that, I want to be conference champion, national champion.’ If you don’t take care of Tuesday, that’s not going to happen.”
‘Win the Day” resonates with me, because to accomplish stuff, you have to focus on the day. As a leader, I need all of our team of teachers and staff to hone in like a laser on those things that we have control of and that we can do today. My most treasured item in my office is three foot piece of 2×4 that my son found in the garage and made into a “Win The Day” plaque for me. Heath painted it in Emmerich Manual High School colors. Trust me, I look at it every day. I even have teachers who come into my office and touch it like the Oregon Ducks players do.
Winning the day can mean many things, but to me it means giving all I have every day and making the most out of the things I can control. As a leader, I owe it to all those I serve to “Win The Day!”
Tending The Leadership Fire
Last night as we sat around the fire visiting, my son, Heath, asked a very astute question. He asked: “Dad, why won’t one log burn? It takes several to make a fire.” This was a great question and I explained that fire needs a “critical mass” in order to burn well. Just one log sitting in a stove will not ignite or burn. You must first establish a good draft in the chimney or fire pit and a good bed of red-hot embers to achieve a good burn.
A good Flame means a good Fire – Much of the heat from wood is in the form of the gases we know as “smoke”. If you burn your stove improperly, lots of unburnt smoke will escape up the chimney and cause excess creosote (tar) formation on your chimney and also pollute the great outdoors. A proper fire BURNS this smoke. In general you should always see a flame on your fire. This is a simple gauge of whether you are burning properly. A smokey fire is a dirty and inefficient one!
Leave some space between the wood – Musicians say “it’s not the notes we play that make great music, it’s the spaces between the notes”…same with a fire. Cris-Crossing your wood or placing odd-shaped pieces in the fire help the airflow through your stove or fireplace.
Now think about all the qualities and requirements of a good fire I just included above. Do we not need all the same qualities when tending our leadership fire?
It is nice to sit and watch the fire, watch the flames flicker but soon if you only watch and don’t feed your fire it dies down. You start to feel the chill back in the air. You must get up and put on another log on the fire. As leaders, we must have the situational awareness to make sure our organizational fire is stoked with the right people all burning together as a roaring learning organization.
You need to feel like a roaring fire about getting a sale, about new members and about helping others. That is true leadership. You are cheating yourself if you are not feeding the fire. When you have a good fire going people feel that. They want to join and work with you. They feel the warmth, peace and security.
Discipline is required so the flames within you and the others in your organization never die down to an ember. Be a pro, be a leader and keep the fire growing within yourself and those you lead. Do not let the fire burn down to coals that need a poke to get started again.
Examine yourself. Be honest. Do you have your fire blazing everyday? You need to put logs on your fire to keep it going. Be possessed by your fire. Do the things required to succeed. Work at your situational awareness, work with your team; educate yourself, read each day. You can’t just sit back and watch the fire. It will go out. It has to be fed. One log by itself will not burn with any heat or intensity. Each day you need to put logs on your and your organization’s figurative fire.
Stay focused on your goals. Stay focused on your organization’s goals. Be aware of how you can tend to the goals of those you lead. Think of how it feels to reach those goals.
Keep your leadership fire burning bright!
Tend your organization’s leadership fire!
Learn From The Day!
I just finished Cal Ripken, Jr.’s book, Get In The Game: Eight Elements of Perserverence That Make The Difference (2007). It was an incredible book on leadership and learning! There were so many takeaways, but the one that stood out the greatest was Ripken’s (2007) formula for learning – Awareness >; Curiosity >; Learning. This was an incredible formula that he described.
When you are aware of something you get curious. This curiosity leads to learning. We must strive to be aware of those things we don’t know. More importantly, however, we need to be aware of those things around us we need to be curious of. In my case this awareness may be what is happening with the culture of my school, new ways to bridge the learning gap with students, or more effective ways to lead. I am always curious and spend time reading, collaborating with others, and studying to satisfy this curiosity with learning.
I was particularly touched by the phrase that Ripken (2007) quoted from his father, Cal Ripken, Sr., who said: “Get in the game. Do the best you can. Try to make a contribution. LEARN FROM THE DAY. Apply it to tomorrow” (Ripken, 2007, p. 247). My favorite sentence there is, “Learn from the day!” We need to remember to take time and reflect each day on what we have learned.
My challenge to you is to be AWARE, be CURIOUS, and LEARN FROM THE DAY!
Proverbs 29:18
For the second week in a row I am going to reference a Bible verse. I received an email from one of our teachers this week thanking me for the leadership I have been providing. I really appreciated the email, but also appreciated the reminder of what it says in Proverbs 29:18: “where there is no vision, the people perish but blessed is he who keeps the law.” It was great to see this reference in his email.
I love references to Proverbs because I read a chapter a day, as there are 31 chapters. Perfect for a daily reading. I learned this from reading Steven Scott’s The Richest Man Who Ever Lived: King Solomon’s Secrets To Success, Wealth, and Happiness.
This reference was so appreciated because I believe having a vision is so important. More important than the vision is the action. You can plan and visualize all you want, but until you “do” nothing happens. We have a vision for a great school for our students and are working very hard to provide that.
Isaiah 1:18
As we reach the point of being only about four weeks from the November 6th Presidential election I was reminded of why our system of government works. I just finished Bill O’Reilly’s (2012) new book Killing Kennedy: The End of Camelot which was delivered to my iPad Kindle App on the day it was released. Today during my study time I finished the book and right now I am calling it my top read of the year! That is a big deal considering I have read books like No Higher Honor: A Memoir of My Years in Washington by Condoleeza Rice (2011) and Steve Jobs (2012) by Walter Isaacson.
Amongst all the great stuff O’Reilly (2012) included in this book, one part really moved me; particularly in a Presidential election year. In the book, O’Reilly points to Lyndon B. Johnson’s (LBJ) favorite Bible verse: Isaiah 1:18. This verse exemplifies LBJ’s passion and abilities for building coalitions; or being “collaborative” as I would call it. I have written about collaboration in previous posts such as Putting Learning Organization Theory into Practice andPelican Leadership Lessons.
Isaiah 1:18 says, “Come Now And Let Us Reason Together.” Isn’t that what democracy is supposed to be about? Really, isn’t that what any top performing organization is all about? I think it should be!
John F. Kennedy and LBJ hated each other so LBJ had to work his political magic and coalitions to his advantage. Now, my thoughts on why our system works and we must tolerate, embrace, and try to work with a bipartisan system: LBJ was not really a champion of civil rights because of right and wrong. But, he became a major player of social change related to civil rights in our country for the better. As O’Reilly (2012) stated: “For Johnson civil rights has nothing to do with right or wrong. Taking this stand just makes good political sense.” So, what this tells me is that having issues be political can work.
President Johnson Works With Civil Rights Leaders
So what am I saying? I’m saying I believe in our imperfect system and believe we should strive, as LBJ did, to follow Isaiah 1:18 and “Come Now and Reason Together.” Make no mistake, my points here are not about being Republican or Democrat, but about using our form of government to collaborate and be a Learning Organization!
Am I Done? No!
The Horizon Has No Boundary
Yesterday (September 29, 2012) I had the honor of addressing the graduates of the Northwest Indiana Campus of the University of Phoenix on the beautiful campus of Valparaiso University in Valparaiso, Indiana as their keynote speaker. Earlier in the summer I addressed the University of Phoenix graduates of the Indianapolis campus with a speech I titled “It’s Not All About You!” When asked to serve as the keynote speaker again for another campus I asked what they wanted me to focus on. They told me to give the same speech I had in Indianapolis. I featured that speech in my blog on July 4th. To read the speech click here.
The University of Phoenix has an incredible graduation ceremony which features graduates reflecting on their experience with the university. I was moved by the student speakers yesterday. One, Sherri Green, told about how she had gotten tired of training individuals with degrees to take her jobs. She then told how she started her degree and then was in an accident and had to fight through a long rehabilitation to finish her associates degree. Throughout her speech she kept referring back to a question – “Am I Done?” Then she would say, “No!” She finished her speech with “Am I Done?” “No,” she continued, “I have now started my Bachelor’s Degree!” I was so moved because my speech of “It’s Not All About You!” could easily be retitled “Am I Done? No!” because I spent a great deal of time talking about a very important point – YOU MUST BE READY FOR WHAT YOU DON’T KNOW YOU NEED TO BE READY FOR!
This also goes right along with my new definition of a Lifelong Learner: Education continues an unfinished past into the future. Think about it; this applies to all of us. We all have an unfinished past. As James P. Carse put it in the tremendous book Finite and Infinite Games: A Vision of Life As Play and Possibility (Carse, 1986) one never reaches a horizon. It is not a line; it has no place; it encloses no field; its location is always relative to the view. One can therefore never be close to one’s horizon, though one may certainly have a short range of vision, a narrow horizon.
Those of us who live life as an infinite game see life as theatrical and never ending. We see our death happening while we are living. The finite see it happening at the end of life. “We are never somewhere in relation to the horizon since the horizon moves with our vision” (Carse, 1986). In other words, every move I make is toward the horizon not toward a boundary. As Carse (1986) put it: “Who lives horizontally is never somewhere, but always in passage.” I am hoping you are like me and what to live horizontally, because; I AM NOT DONE!
Reference
Carse, J. P. (1986). Finite and infinite games: A vision of life as play and possibility. New York, NY: The Free Press.
Mind Vs. Brain
I just finished reading Walter Isaacson’s Einstein. Besides being a great read, I learned so much from reading this book. From an educator’s perspective I found it amazing that Einstein always believed that he had no special talent – he was just as he said, “passionately curious.” This points to the important fact that we have a tremendous obligation to help our students develop and find their curiosity. Einstein posited that the brain was wired and set up as it was, but we all have the ability to develop the mind.
It is important for us to develop and create minds that question. Individuals with intuition and imagination are crucial to our future. The locksmith of the atom and universe also realized that power without wisdom is deadly. The events of the time that Einstein lived was proof of this. Along with developing the free mind and curiosity we must have tolerance and humility. Einstein was a very humble man and we can all learn a lot from his example!
Mending Fences
As most of you know I live on a farm. My son raises Jersey dairy cows so one of the jobs that periodically has to happen is fence maintenance. I got to thinking how true this is in leadership of organizations as well. There are basically four jobs my son and I were doing:
#1. Checking for areas that needed maintenance or repair.
#2. Tightening up loose wires (we have high tensile fence).
#3. Replacing fence staples that had popped out (the fence staples hold the high tensile wire to the posts).
#4. Cleaning out and spraying weeds around the fence.
If these four maintenance items are taken care of regularly a fence will remain strong and do it’s job. Let’s look at each of these actions individually and compare them to leadership in an organization.
Checking of Areas of Needed Maintenance/Repair
Marzano (2005) calls this situational awareness and has it as #2o on his list of 21 Responsibilities of a Leader. Situational awareness is knowledge of what is going on in the school (or organization), feelings and emotions, day to day activities. This will allow the leader to anticipate any issues, or be better prepared should a situation arise (Marzano, 2005). It is very important that we, as leaders, know what is going on in our organizations. We must be out checking the fences, so to speak, knowing what is going on. As I always say, “People by day, paperwork at night.”
Tightening Up Loose Wires
Our high Tensile fence makes use of eight wires (heavy gauge) that are tightened to give them strength. Loose wires encourage the animal to try to go through. Because I believe in the flattened hierarchy of the learning organization (Garvin, 2000) I really believe in a tight-loose approach to leadership. Successful organizations ensure every person, regardless of position, has a clear understanding of what the vision and mission is and the ability and the opportunity to achieve the goals and drive results. Movement toward a tight-loose culture, which is high on clarity and empowerment, enables all employees to lead from where they are and be effective ambassadors for their organization.
Replacing Fence Staples That Have Popped Out
This may mean at times we may need to bring new people in to replace employees that just aren’t getting it done or provide professional development to get individuals back on track. This goes back to my first point of being situationally aware of what is going on.
Removing the Weeds
This point is so important to leading an organization. Weed removal is analagous to leading in a complex organization. Just as the fence needs a clear pathway to realize it’s full potential, so do our team members. An ideal environment contains the correct mixture of diversity, climate, capability, and potential. The key is to cultivate them and diligently remove the competition (weeds) and through really understanding (situational awareness) their different needs, build lasting relationships.
Hopefully, these four points of fence mending and maintenance can help you do a better job of maintaining your organization!
References
Garvin, D. A. (2000). Learning in action: A guide to putting the learning organization to work. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.
Marzano, R. J. (2005). School leadership that works: From research to results. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
Byron's Babbles 
2 comments