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We-centric leaders lift people out of fear, frustration and anger, which cause
people to disengage from each other. They create a culture than enables
colleagues to be connected, involved in living the values and vision.
When people feel disconnected, they become reactive, project their anxiety onto
others, create more fear, blame others for what is missing in their lives,
reject first to avoid being rejected and disengage.
When colleagues work in concert, they learn from each other, develop
higher-level skills and wisdom, meet performance goals, and turn breakdowns
into breakthroughs. When leaders turn to others for suggestions and value them,
they create a community that looks forward to coming to work.
Learn to manage three dynamics:
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First, learn to manage your own reactions - bullying,
intimidating and micro managing don't get results; inspire others to higher
performance.
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Second, put your ego behind you - what matters is what "we can
do together" not what "I" can do.
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Third, let go of the past; focus on the challenges facing you
and build healthy, mutually beneficial relationships.
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Mastering these three dynamics changes everything. Your ability to lead will
increase exponentially, and you will enhance your ability to create inspiring
environments where people work together for mutual gain, growth and
understanding.
Rather than get tangled up in conversations about blame, fear and frustrations
about what is not happening at work, you establish a positive context for
transformation by engaging people in ongoing conversations about what has, can
and will work to create a transformation. In doing so, you focus on what needs
to happen to address the challenges and with that focus and commitment, you
develop into the best company possible. Rather than trying to fix the past, you
create the future with others.
As a leader, you can shape the experiences people have at work by reducing fear
and inner focus and creating cultures that facilitate enhanced sensitivity,
mutual support, vital communication and engagement in the strategy. When we
live in toxic fear-based cultures, we become unhealthy in mind and spirit. We
can react like cancer cells - like cells that stop communicating with the
immune system designed to protect the whole body, these cells start to grow all
over because they have lost their sensitivity to other cells and these cells
create roots and lock themselves in isolation, drawing nourishment from the
body and weaken it.
When we live in fear, we withdraw, build our own "story" of reality, imagine
others are out to get us and react accordingly. We stop turning to others for
help and stop taking feedback and advice from others.
Universal fears include the fears of
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Being excluded - so we create networks and exclude others first.
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Being rejected - so we reject first.
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Being judged unfairly - so we criticize and blame others.
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Failing - so we avoid taking risks and making mistakes.
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Losing power - so we intimidate others to get power.
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Feeling stupid - so we either don't speak up or speak too much.
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Looking bad in front of others - so we save face.
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Universal desires include the desire to be included on a winning team, be
appreciated, successful, powerful, creative, smart and influential; to have a
leadership voice and meaning and purpose; to learn, grow and explore.
When we perceive the world through a lens of fear, our egos drive us into habit
patterns of retention. Over time, we incorporate defensive behaviour patterns
into our daily routines. We turn away from others when we are coming from
protective behaviours, rather than turning to others for help in making vital
changes in our lives.
Leaders create cultures where all team members can contribute their talents and
potential. Potential is often invisible - yet to be discovered. It's born out
of the healthy interactions of one person with another. As we interact, we
trigger responses.
Once you learn new strategies and techniques for rewiring your life,
relationships, and workplace from those that are focused on fear to those that
are focused on achieving outrageous results, your life (and the lives of others
who work with you) will radically shift. When we live in a positive, inspiring,
inter-dependent, catalytic, expressive workplace, we all share the power for
turning a toxic culture into a healthy, we-centric, inclusive workplace. From
this new vantage point, you gain a new perspective about what you can create
with others.
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When we perceive the world through a lens of fear, our egos drive
us into habit patterns of retention. Over time, we incorporate defensive
behaviour patterns into our daily routines.
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When colleagues work together to discover Best Practices, they shift from
focusing on the negative, refocusing on looking for the positive practices that
help the organisation grow to its potential. Best Practices represent what is
good and what works, and it defines what it means to be a world-class company
that attracts customers. Sharing Best Practices is a way of elevating the
skills and talent of everyone.
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When colleagues work together to discover Best Practices, they
shift from focusing on the negative, refocusing on looking for the positive
practices that help the organisation grow to its potential.
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Create a Best Practices forum to change the focus from loss to gain.
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Bring a team together to discover and share Best Practices.
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Choose people who work in different ways can raise the IQ for
everyone.
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Use the Best Practices framework to catalyze cooperation and
teamwork among colleagues who come from different areas and work in different
ways.
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Ask team members to think of things they do that have a positive
impact.
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Ask the team members to describe what they are working on, what
approaches they are taking, what impact they are having and how to transfer
this knowledge to others.
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Each member of the team presents these Best Practices to
colleagues.
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The facilitator captures what each person is doing to create
success.
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Participants ask questions to clarify the Best Practices and to
learn how to transfer them to other situations. The end result is that people
feel heard and valued.
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The hardest part of leadership is that everyone wants to play an important role
and be recognised for their contributions. Sometimes leaders find it difficult
to manage the relationships, the competing demands and needs and the lack of
resources - and so territoriality arises. Sometimes we lose our sensitivity to
others. We become so enchanted with our own notoriety and entrenched in our own
successes that we forget to honour others for their contributions.
Leaders need to create a feed-backrich culture so that everyone is open to
feedback on their ideas and behaviour. This way everyone grows. As a leader,
you can promote mutuality by tapping into the vital instinct of growth. You can
encourage everyone to be sensitive to personal and group boundaries, while
helping them to see how personal growth can best be achieved by expanding
opportunities for growth of the enterprise.
We often turn to turf wars, silos and territoriality when we fear we are losing
what we hold dear. Fear drives us into our I-centric behaviour, and we protect
rather than partner.
Health comes from creating environments that honour the seven universal desires
we all have for making contributions, for expressing ourselves:
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Audit yourself and see if you are creating environments that
acknowledge the seven key universal desires.
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If you are not creating environments that encourage mutuality
and support, are you open to feedback?
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Identify your areas of strength. Continue to do this, because it
creates healthy environments.
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Identify your developmental opportunities. - leader behaviours
that you have not been practicing that create a supportive, healthy culture.
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Create opportunities daily to experiment with the leader
behaviours that you have not been practicing.
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Monitor your impact. Notice how you can reduce territoriality
and increase positive energy and support.
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Nancy Snell and Judith Glaser are professional coaches,
based in New York, offering career coaching to corporations, individuals and
business owners. Do you have a leadership challenge? Do you have trouble
staying organized and getting each day's tasks completed? Do you feel
overwhelmed? These coaches can help.
www.nancysnell.com and www.creatingwe.com
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