Are You Liked, Respected or Really Useful?

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Are You Liked, Respected or Really Useful?

There’s a conversation that typically happens at some point in leadership training for military officers about whether it’s better to be liked or respected as a leader. That is, do you want your people to enjoy your presence and to feel some sort of emotional attachment to you? Or do you want them to hold you in high regard for your abilities and behavior? 

It’s a good conversation because it highlights a natural tension that exists when you’re in charge of people. On one hand, being liked is a source of power in and of itself. People don’t like working for jerks. On the other hand, being in a supervisory position often requires one to make hard decisions that may not sit well with some people, and if your goal is to make your people like you, it could affect your judgment and behavior negatively. 

There’s no right answer, although sometimes I’ve noticed (at least in my own life in how I understood things and acted as a young leader) that in the military the “liked” versus “respected” distinction is treated too frequently as a strict dichotomy. It’s either one or the other. 

In reality, though, I see this as an “and” proposition. It’s possible—even, dare I say, ideal—to be both. 

But the bigger problem is

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Forget Goals. What’s Your Moonshot?

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Forget Goals. What’s Your Moonshot?

In early 1997, I started the process of applying to the U.S. Naval Academy. I was a junior in high school, yet I was somehow undaunted by the steps involved in this application—one of which is obtaining an official nomination, which typically comes from your U.S. Representative or either of your state’s two U.S. Senators. I applied to all three of these elected officials for my nomination. 

That was the first time I paid serious attention to the name “John Glenn.” 

He was U.S. Senator John Glenn at the time, but he was also, of course, the first American to orbit the Earth, a feat which he accomplished in 1962. He did it again in 1998, at the age of 77. He was also a U.S. Marine Corps combat pilot and

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Siri, Drive the Kids to Soccer Practice

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Siri, Drive the Kids to Soccer Practice

Touchscreen ordering at McDonald’s. Self-checkout at the grocery store. 

Programmable logic controllers that guide manufacturing processes. Industrial robots that weld, assemble and, even, inspect. 

And perhaps one that really sparks widespread imagination: driverless vehicles. We probably have some time before we can get a positive result from telling our iPhones, “Siri, drive the kids to soccer practice,” but

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Why Gratitude is Smart Business for Leaders

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Why Gratitude is Smart Business for Leaders

One of the most prominent experiences I’ve had as an adult was the year I spent in Afghanistan, where I advised the Afghan National Police in 2013. 

And one of the biggest reasons why it was a prominent experience is that it gave me a fresh perspective and sense of how good my life was in America. Being around poverty and people who had live through various levels of armed conflict for the past three decades has a way of making your “problems” seem a little less consequential. It makes you grateful for what you have. 

But it doesn’t take a trip to Afghanistan to develop a sense of gratitude. In fact, I’ve come to realize how gratitude is a daily choice: You must

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Advanced Manufacturing and Two Ways to Reward Agility

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Advanced Manufacturing and Two Ways to Reward Agility

Modern factory floors fascinate me. There’s something about the clang and whoosh of the myriad machines, the hum of an overhead crane gliding along its tracks, the intricate yellow lines demarcating where it’s safe to walk and the ambiguous chemical aroma punctuating the air with hints of solvents or grease or paint or maybe all of them mixed together.

There’s something about the delicate dance of interdependent and interconnected parts and processes that somehow—amazingly—produce that which we and the entire world outside the factory walls often takes for granted. 

When I’m in a factory, I still get the same sense of wonder and curiosity that I had when I was 8 or 9 years old, touring the Rohm and Haas plant in Louisville, Ky. And this week, I had the opportunity to visit one of Cleveland’s (and Ohio’s, for that matter) oldest and largest manufacturing firms: Lincoln Electric. 

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Leadership Advice for the New Administration

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Leadership Advice for the New Administration

On the evening of Wednesday, Nov. 9, one day after the general election here in the United States, I met with my graduate students who are in my course on leadership and interpersonal effectiveness. 

Up until this point, we hadn’t talked much about the U.S. presidential race in class. But I felt that on that one class the day after the election, it might make sense to do so. It just felt weird to not talk about it. Our course is about leadership, after all.

In particular, we’ve talked at length in the course about the agility required for leaders to pivot into new roles. This is particularly true for people who have never managed or led people before—that first-time manager job can be tough. 

And although both Secretary Clinton and now President-Elect Trump have extensive experience leading people and projects, transitioning from presidential hopeful to President of the United States must surely be a dramatic shift personally and professionally. 

For anyone. 

And so, on Nov. 9, with my class, we

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You Already Won the Lottery

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You Already Won the Lottery

A few weeks ago, I was discussing the topic of stress and well-being with my students in class. Our focus was on the importance of monitoring your well-being and managing your stress when you’re in a leadership position. Being a manager and having to get work done through a team is tough work, and it’s often full of stressors which, left unchecked, can take a toll on the manager. 

That toll can include negative outcomes such as:

  • Irritability,
  • Reduced productivity,
  • Burnout
  • And a host of physical symptoms, from higher blood pressure to weight gain.

So it’s critical for managers of all levels to take care of themselves, both mentally and physically. 

As the class went on, I discussed the importance of self-care for managers and how it can include many techniques, but one that I find particularly interesting is something that’s free and relatively easy. That technique?

It’s

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Never Give Up, Never Stop Learning

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Never Give Up, Never Stop Learning

Although I teach courses on various topics related to leadership, I’m quick to admit it: Learning a lot about leadership won’t necessarily make you a great leader. 

Similarly, just because someone has 20 years of experience doing something doesn’t necessarily make him or her an expert. It’s quite possible—and common—for people to have the same experience, 20 years in a row. 

What oftentimes elevates truly great leaders above the rest is their tenacity, their commitment to never give up—and to never stop learning. It’s their ability to persevere through adversity with an open mind, applying the lessons they acquire along the way. 

One such leader whom I’ve always enjoyed listening to and reading about is United States Marine Corps General James Mattis (ret.). Among recent military leaders, Mattis is a legend, particularly if you talk with other U.S. Marines. 

Stories about his selfless, direct style of leadership abound. 

Additionally,

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Are You “Rewarding A While Hoping For B?”

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Are You “Rewarding A While Hoping For B?”

Incentives matter. Rewards motivate people to behave in certain ways. Using incentives, therefore, is one great way to influence the form, direction and intensity of how people act. 

Goals also matter. They help us clarify where we’re headed and how to focus our efforts. Setting difficult, specific goals, therefore, is one of the best ways to motivate yourself and others (see the numerous studies on the topic, particularly those by Gary Latham and Edwin Locke). 

But goals and incentives can—and sometimes do—run amuck. 

And when that happens, it’s often in the form of

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On Human Connection, Vulnerability and Leadership

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On Human Connection, Vulnerability and Leadership

Years ago, as a young junior officer in the U.S. Navy, a few hundred of my peers and I shuffled into a large auditorium to hear an admiral speak. I don’t remember his name or his title. But I remember one phrase, one nugget of “wisdom” that he provided. 

He said, “Leaders are people who know stuff.” 

At the time this seemed like a simple, yet compelling insight. And it’s certainly the case that one source of people’s power and influence over others can be their expertise. In many situations, we follow those people who know the most (or at least seem to know the most) about how to solve problems. 

We also tend to follow people who have definitive answers. People who are decisive, outspoken, direct. 

But such tendencies grossly oversimplify

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The Courage to be Agile and Pivot

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The Courage to be Agile and Pivot

My morning routine gives me comfort. I get up at the exact same time almost every day. My coffee maker is set to turn on 15 minutes earlier, so I go downstairs, pour my coffee and fill my 1-liter water bottle. I then head to my home office and get oriented for the day’s activities. 

After about 40 minutes, my coffee cup and water bottle are empty. Then, it’s time to get ready for some exercise. That lasts for about an hour, after which comes the remainder of my tasks to prepare for the day prior to the stampede of our four soon-to-awaken children. 

And so on. 

These are comfortable routines; they are generally productive habits. 

But sometimes habits can become too comfortable. We can stick to routines for the sake of sticking to the routine—when in fact, change is necessary. 

For example, 

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Orienting New Employees Starts Well Before You Meet Them

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Orienting New Employees Starts Well Before You Meet Them

My fascination with the military—and the U.S. Navy, in particular—started before I was 10 years old. And during the decade between then and when I was commissioned as an officer in 2002, I acquired a whole set of ideas about what actually being in the Navy would be like. 

These ideas came from books, movies, stories from veterans and myriad other information sources around me. 

Some of those ideas turned out to be accurate; others weren’t. For example, most of what you experience on a day-to-day basis in the U.S. Navy—especially if you’re a ship driver like I was—bears little to no resemblance to Maverick’s job as a fighter pilot in the 1986 movie Top Gun. 

But other patterns of behavior such as respect for rank structure, commitment to teammates, and aspects of selfless leadership that I’d learned about turned out to be

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Can Leadership Prevent Mistakes?

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Can Leadership Prevent Mistakes?

"While I was in the middle of the room, the attic floor and beams collapsed onto the second floor crashing down to the first floor where I was standing. The time between us entering the building and the time of the collapse was no longer than 90 seconds. I was knocked to the floor and was trapped under the debris. I suffered a head injury and a torn patellar tendon. The contents of the upstairs ended up in the first floor room and I could have been killed. By my judgment, approximately 80,000 gallons of water was pumped into that structure and we were ordered in anyway. This was after a previous call to evacuate 45 minutes earlier. This should not have happened!"

Mistakes happen. Sometimes, those mistakes hurt or kill people. I’ve studied them among fire fighters, who sometimes experience events like the one described above (which comes from Report 07-0001036, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, 2014). The mistakes that people in the fire service and other high-risk occupations make often have important safety implications. In other industries and occupations, mistakes may not hurt or kill people, but mistakes often derail projects or anger customers. They create conflict and they degrade the quality of what we make or do. 

Mistakes aren’t exclusive to any industry or sector. 

Mistakes also almost happen. These close calls or near misses—when discussed well and integrated into a learning program—can serve as powerful wakeup calls for people and teams.

Regardless of whether we’re talking about mistakes or near misses, learning from the past to improve future performance is

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The Higher Calling of Managing People

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The Higher Calling of Managing People

As my students can attest, I have a tendency to get rather enthusiastic in the classroom. The reason for that is twofold: (1) I find the topics I teach rather interesting and important and (2) I think that if I expect anyone else to get excited about the material, then I have to demonstrate that excitement myself. 

And there’s one part of one class lecture in particular when I get especially fired up. 

It’s in my concluding comments regarding the topic of

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What LeBron James Gets About Leading in Adversity

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What LeBron James Gets About Leading in Adversity

Both the 2016 Cleveland Cavaliers and their opponents in the 2016 NBA finals, the Golden State Warriors, are extraordinary professional basketball teams. 

But on Thursday, June 16, the Cavaliers became only the third team in history to come back from a 3-1 deficit in the NBA finals to force a seventh game in the series. Clearly, Cavaliers star LeBron James is central to their performance. They’re one win away from taking the championship, but even if they don’t win, there are some interesting insights we can take away from how James has led his team in the midst of adversity.

Most of the time, we have little insight into what happens behind the scenes within professional sports teams. Or when we do, it might be well after the fact, from memoirs of players, coaches or confidants. 

The case of the 2016 Cavaliers is different. 

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Customer Experience Doesn’t End When the Check Clears

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Customer Experience Doesn’t End When the Check Clears

You only wanted my money. 

Once you had it, you didn’t make me feel special anymore. 

I feel a little bit … used. 

Two weeks ago, I praised the customer experience I had with a seasoned contractor named Mike. He managed a wide range of work on my house, which included replacing the siding and the windows. Throughout the process, he was thorough and extraordinarily responsive. 

But then, something happened. 

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When Drowning Prevention Meets Business Strategy

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When Drowning Prevention Meets Business Strategy

My children love the water. They swim, they splash, they laugh. 

My children, like most children, are fast. They dart, they scurry, they hide. 

Therefore, when my children encounter water, it can be an exhausting experience for my wife and me. We must be vigilant. 

The pool we frequent has lifeguards. But their vigilance will never match mine. 

Unless, of course, we’re talking about

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Customer Focus: Lessons from a Roofer

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Customer Focus: Lessons from a Roofer

Recently, a flurry of skilled laborers worked on my house. Some of them replaced the siding; others replaced the windows. A separate group painted the exterior trim, and still another group handled replacing the rain gutters. 

Quarterbacking this major project was a big, friendly guy who has been doing roofing and siding on homes in my area for decades. 

We'll call him "Mike." Because that's his name. 

A number of aspects of how Mike managed this project impressed me, but most of all, 

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Leadership is a Game of Inches

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Leadership is a Game of Inches

The 1999 movie Any Given Sunday tells the story of a fictional American football team, with much of the focus on the team’s head coach. To be honest, I don’t remember much about the plot aside from one scene.

In that scene, the coach, played by the actor Al Pacino, delivers a speech to his team. He says:

“You know, when you get old in life things get taken from you. I mean that's, that’s—that’s part of life. But you only learn that when you start losing stuff. You find out life’s this game of inches. So is football. Because

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The Rise of HR … Agility

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The Rise of HR … Agility

It’s easy to fall into patterns and comfortable routines. 

Some of those are great. Take, for example, dental hygiene. Or strength training. 

But if our routines too often keep us around the same people, we run the risk of stagnating. It’s even worse if we’re isolated—or insulated, depending on how you look at it—from other ideas. 

That’s one reason why I enjoy professional conferences. Even if you’re around people in a similar area of expertise or interest, you’ll learn a great deal from their different perspectives and experiences. 

Last week, I spent a few days at the annual conference of the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP) in Anaheim, Calif. And in between all of the

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