Archive for Attitude
Leading difficult people: Critical Carl
Posted by: | CommentsThere’s room in any organization for every type of person. From the big-picture person to the detail-conscious, all can make a valid contribution. But sometimes a team member’s strength can be their weakness. Attention to detail can become fixation on the negative. And the voice of reason turns into the voice of discouragement.
This is the problem we have with Critical Carl. He’s probably the most thorough and conscientious team member. He’s a great planner. But he seems to only see the negative. And he voices his criticisms to anyone who will listen.
We’ve been spending the past few weeks talking about leading difficult people. You can click the names to read about Fearful Fred, Slumped Susan, Excited Eddie, and Disorganized Debbie. Now let’s discuss how to understand, listen to, and lead Critical Carl.
Understanding Critical Carl:
- Behavior: Often negative
- Motivated by: Someone to listen to him
- Strength: Detail-consciousness
- Weakness: No filter
Listening to Critical Carl:
- Privately sit down and discuss Carl’s concerns.
- Discuss the way he’s chosen to voice them.
- Point out that he tends to focus on the negative.
- Find out if he wants to change.
- Share when, how, and with whom it’s appropriate to point out his concerns.
Leading Critical Carl:
- Ask the people negatively affected to meet with you and Carl.
- Ask for their side of the story.
- Ask Carl for an explanation.
- Share with them that Carl has a problem with criticism.
- Share with them the process you’ve asked him to follow.
Growth Plan:
Read Be a People Person together
What impact does Critical Carl have in your organization? His negative comments have the potential to discourage fellow team members and halt all forward momentum. By accepting at least some of his concerns as valid, and teaching him how he can – and can’t – share them, you might channel his attention to detail in a way that builds the team and contributes to every project.
Next week: The final difficult person in this series, Grandstanding Gary
Leading difficult people: Excited Eddie
Posted by: | CommentsI love spending time with enthusiastic people. I’m pretty high-energy myself. An enthusiastic follower can be a joy to work with. His excitement about his work has the potential to energize the entire team.
With one exception.
Let’s talk about Excited Eddie. He’s got loads of enthusiasm for his work, but only to a point. You see, his excitement only lasts for as long as the project is new. Eddie is a fantastic starter, but his ability to finish projects is lacking.
Just like Fearful Fred and Slumped Susan, you need to lead Excited Eddie in a way that works with his personality. If you understand, listen to, and lead him appropriately, you can harness his startup enthusiasm and help him to finish well.
Understanding Excited Eddie:
- Behavior: High Enthusiasm
- Motivated by: New Challenges
- Strength: Starts Strong
- Weakness: Seldom Finishes
Listening to Excited Eddie:
- Privately sit down and listen to Eddie’s exciting startup stories.
- Ask him for the “rest of the story.”
- Take into account how his emotion may cause him to exaggerate.
- Let him see what he lost by not seeing things through.
- If he desires to finish well, develop a game plan.
Leading Excited Eddie:
- Give him a new challenge.
- Keep him focused.
- Reward him for finishing well.
- If he’s a good starter, assign a steady and detailed person to assist him.
Growth plan:
Read Today Matters together.
Do you lead an Excited Eddie? Or are you personally more likely to start strong than to finish strong? Through guidance and effective rewards, you can channel Eddie’s enthusiasm so that it carries his work through to completion.
Leading difficult people: Slumped Susan
Posted by: | CommentsHere’s a truth that I’ve believed for a long time: Leadership is influence. Nothing more, nothing less. If a leader has no one following, he’s only taking a walk.
Of course, not everyone is easy to influence. Some followers are difficult to connect with. Last week we talked about the art of influencing difficult people, with a focus on Fearful Fred. With Fred, the goal was to get him started, to go from no momentum to sustained growth.
But what happens when a follower who had a great deal of momentum begins to fall behind? What does a leader do when this follower stumbles or stops altogether?
Let me introduce you to Slumped Susan. This is the follower who was a good performer, someone who got results and approached her tasks with enthusiasm. But somewhere on the journey, she fell off the tracks. Now, with no momentum or confidence, she’s barely moving.
Just like last week’s Fearful Fred, leading Slumped Susan requires you to understand her, be willing to listen, and give her the tools to grow. If Susan believes that you support and believe in her, she’ll be more likely to start moving forward again.
Understanding Slumped Susan:
- Attitude: Depression
- Motivated by: Coaching
- Strength: Past Success
- Weakness: Pessimism
Listening to Slumped Susan:
- Privately sit down and discuss her slump.
- Let her talk about the good old days.
- List what she did when things went bad.
- List what she did when things went well.
- If she desires to change, develop a game plan.
Leading Slumped Susan:
- Remove her from others while she’s in the slump.
- Reprioritize her workload.
- Remain with her as much as possible.
- Require her to do what is right, not what she wants to do.
- Remember to encourage her as much as possible.
Growth program:
Read The Winning Attitude together
Are you a Slumped Susan? Or do you lead one? With coaching and positive attention from the leader, Susan can regain her confidence and begin to shine again.
Next time: Excited Eddie
Leading difficult people: Fearful Fred
Posted by: | CommentsSomeone once said, “90% of the art of living consists in getting along with people you cannot understand.” Haven’t you found that to be true? I know that if everyone were just like me, then relationships would sure be a lot simpler.
But people ARE different, in wonderfully complex ways. And there IS an art to living together. If you’re a leader, the differences are amplified, because you have to not only get along but also influence the other person. So it’s especially important for a leader to learn how to handle personalities and attitudes that are different from your own.
I’ve led a lot of people over the years, and not all of them were like me. Some were especially difficult to lead. And over the years, through trial and error, I’ve discovered ways to effectively lead most people.
For EVERY person you lead, it’s important to get to know them well. Understanding is the key to success in leading a difficult person. That’s because people don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. For the next few weeks, I’m going to share some tips for dealing with the difficult people that you may lead.
Let’s talk about one type of difficult person today, so you can understand who he is and where he’s coming from. This will make you a more effective leader for him and others like him.
Fearful Fred
Have you met Fred? He’s a nice guy, certainly not trying to be difficult. He’s just a person living under the influence of his fears. And their influence is amazingly strong. What Fred is most afraid of is the unknown. He avoids anything new or different, so it’s hard to lead him where he’s never been before. And his fears paralyze his productivity.
To lead Fred, you need to understand him, be willing to listen, and give him tools to grow. People truly don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. If Fred trusts you and believes that you have his best interests at heart, he can be very loyal and even courageous.
Understanding Fearful Fred:
- Attitude: Low Enthusiasm
- Motivated by: Support
- Strength: Steady Worker
- Weakness Fear of Risk
Listening to Fearful Fred:
- Privately sit down and discuss Fred’s fears.
- Identify his fears and the reasons why he has them.
- Evaluate his desire to overcome his fears.
- If his desire is high, develop a game plan.
Leading Fearful Fred:
- Plan a project together. This gives him Strategy
- Give guidelines to follow. This gives him Structure
- Do a project that is easy. This gives him Safety
- Do a project together. This gives him Security
- Do a project that is winnable. This gives him Success
Helping Fearful Fred Grow:
Read Failing Forward together.
Do you lead a Fearful Fred? Or maybe YOU are a Fearful Fred. I’ve found from personal experience that by attempting to understand and meet him where he is, a leader can successfully influence Fred and help him to grow. And a motivated Fearful Fred can also lead himself through these exercises and find courage.
Next week, we’ll talk about another difficult person: Slumped Susan.
Quitting is more about WHO you are than WHERE you are.
Posted by: | CommentsBack in December, I wrote about the importance of starting well. In the comments, many people agreed with me, but they also pointed out the critical nature of continuing after you start. They were right. Like I said at the time, starting and finishing are the two covers of the book. The main part – the pages – represents the day-to-day labor needed to achieve your goal.
Unfortunately, in many ways starting is the easy part. Ralph Waldo Emerson observed, “The great majority of men are bundles of beginnings.”
What about you? Are you merely a starter? When the enthusiasm for a new idea fades, when the passion cools, when the odds against you increase and the results diminish, when it looks as if success is impossible, will you maintain your intensity and keep going? Are you tenacious?
Consider the fact that Admiral Robert Peary attempted to reach the North Pole seven times before he succeeded. Oscar Hammerstein produced five shows that were flops on Broadway before staging Oklahoma, which had a record-breaking run of 2,212 performances. Thomas Edison failed in his attempt to create a workable lightbulb 10,000 times before creating one that finally worked. To achieve your dream, you need to be able to keep going when others quit.
To develop tenacity, keep in mind that…
Quitting is more about who you are than where you are.
Everyone faces difficulty when working toward a dream. And if someone fails, he can make excuses for what went wrong, how the unexpected happened, how someone let him down, how circumstances worked against him.
But the reality is that the external things do not stop people. Those who achieve their dreams don’t have an easier path than those who do not. They just have a different internal attitude about the journey. The great artist Leonardo da Vinci once declared, “Obstacles cannot crush me. Every obstacle yields to stern resolve. He who is fixed on a star does not change his mind.”
The one who achieves the dream sees the journey differently.
Instead of thinking, “Not enough people believe in me. I’ll never make it,” he says,
“My belief in myself is enough; I can make it.”
Instead of, “It’s taking too long to realize my dream,” she reminds herself,
“Dreams are realized one day at a time.”
Rather than, “Enough is enough! I’ve taken enough hits!” she declares,
“I’ve come too far to give up now.”
Instead of, “I don’t have the strength to hold onto my dream,” he tells himself,
“Hold on a little longer. The darkest hour comes just before the dawn.”
Novelist Harriet Beecher Stowe said, “When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, till it seems as though you could not hang on a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.”
And I love how H.E. Jensen expressed an achiever’s way of thinking: “The man who wins may have been counted out several times, but he didn’t hear the referee.” The only real guarantee for failure is to stop trying.
So when things go wrong, when the obstacles seem too great, when the difficulties get to be too much, when your dream seems to be impossibly far away, your job is to simply keep going. If you stop, it won’t be because of what happens around you. It will be because of what happens in you. Choose to see things differently. Success is probably closer than you think. Just keep moving forward.
