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Where Have All the Leaders Gone?, part 3 of 6

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Leadership Role #2: Declaring a Mission

By articulating a vision, a leader opens up certain possible paths to the future while closing others. Using our computer industry example, if software is what will be profitable, then it makes little sense to shift resources into hardware production. Apple also made this mistake, and until the advent of the iPod, the company was relegated to being a small player in a vast market.

Out of a vision, a leader can declare a mission, or in other words, a ‘game.’ His team commits to playing a game that will create the organization’s future. A vision, then, is about the world and the impact we aim to produce, whereas a mission is a declaration of how we intend to position ourselves in this world and the results we are committed to achieving.

In declaring a mission, a leader is requesting that the organization align its actions behind certain strategic roles and objectives. The first requirement for creating a powerful and coherent mission is to ensure these roles and objectives are based on an explicitly stated vision, or interpretation of the world. Lacking this, a mission may degenerate into little more than a cheerleading slogan.

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About the Author

Chris Majer, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of The Human Potential ProjectChris Majer, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of The Human Potential Project, is the author of The Power to Transform: Passion, Power, and Purpose in Daily Life (Rodale), which teaches the strategies corporate, military, and sports leaders have used to positively transform themselves and their organizations in a way readers can adept to their own lives and professions. He may be reached at www.humanpotentialproject.com.

Examining the State of the U.S. STEM Workforce: Today and Tomorrow

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One of the major STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) debates currently underway today in the United States revolves around whether or not there is, in fact, a STEM workforce shortage in the country.

To further examine the myth versus reality discussion, this year’s Bayer Facts of Science Education survey, the 16th in the series, polled talent recruiters at Fortune 1000 companies both STEM and non-STEM alike, about their companies’ current and future STEM workforce supply and demand needs. We chose talent recruiters as the target for our survey because these are the people on the front lines of the STEM shortage argument.

Several trends emerged in the survey.

1. STEM Degree Holders are ‘As’ or ‘More In Demand’ for both STEM and Non-STEM Jobs.

Today, STEM skills are in demand by employers for jobs that are traditionally considered non-STEM, with demand for two- and four-year graduates equipped with these skills exceeding demand for their counterparts who don’t have these skills.

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About the Author

Laurel Rutledge is the vice president of Human Resources for Bayer MaterialScience LLC. She is responsible for providing human resources strategic leadership to meet the challenges and objectives of the business. The Bayer Facts of Science Education is an ongoing public opinion research project commissioned by Bayer since 1995 as part of the company’s award-winning Making Science Make Sense® (MSMS) initiative. For more information about this survey or other Bayer surveys, please visit www.bayerus.com/msms.

The Advisor’s Corner – Does working smarter, not harder apply to leadership positions?

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Does working smarter, not harder apply to leadership positions?Question:

Can “working smarter, not harder” really be applied to leadership positions?

StrategyDriven Response: (by Roxi Hewertson, StrategyDriven Principal Contributor)

Of course! Leaders already work hard if they are successful with their teams and organizations. The heart of the question is not: “how hard to squeeze the orange,” but rather, “how, with less effort and time, one can get as much healthy juice from the same orange – and perhaps even have time left to plant a new tree.”

Time: Your use of time is first on the list because it is a significant choice point. You make many choices about how you spend yours and others’ time. Once you lose your time or theirs, you will never get it back. So pay close attention to choices around time, and make good ones.

We waste a LOT of time in lousy meetings. Make sure you are running effective meetings that actually matter. Have a goal, ensure that 20 percent or less is devoted to information sharing, have a good agenda, get the right people in the room, and plan to have the meeting facilitated well. Get people engaged and working on meaningful things. You know you’ve done well when people ask when they can get together again like this!

Conflicts: Deal quickly and well with issues that arise because unresolved conflicts drain huge quantities of energy out of the system and from you and your team. When people ‘workaround’ each other, they travel a much greater distance and these problems don’t go away, they grow tentacles and spread everywhere.

Build Your Team: Build a strong team and support them in doing what they do best. It is FAR smarter, cheaper, faster to take time upfront to build strength and skills within your teams – where people feel safe to contribute, know their roles and expectations, trust each other to do their jobs well, and utilize the power of group synergy to create a result greater than the sum of their parts. This is often misnamed the “touchy-feely” work. Wrong! The leader who ignores this reality, ignores it at their own peril. The fact is, and always has been – jumping to task is just not smart. It takes much more time to clean up the messes that arise, and there is far less engagement from the people meant to do the task.

Delegate Well: You can’t do it all yourself, so don’t even try. Get smarter about how and who should be doing what, when. Delegation is about developing your people through giving them NEW work that grows them and liberates you at the same time. You can then apply your time and skill sets more effectively.

Work-Life Integration: Some leaders believe working hard equals putting in long hours and making the job the biggest priority in their lives. Usually one or more of these situations/needs are in play:

  • They don’t want to go home for any number of reasons.
  • They think/assume/know the culture and the boss expects them to be a workaholic and/or think they will impress someone(s) by doing so and that impression will lead to some kind of reward.
  • They waste a good amount of time during normal working hours and have to get the work done after hours.

A truly effective leader knows how to get the job done in a reasonable amount of time AND keep her/his personal life and overall health well integrated. Of course there are special situations we all need to double-down for, but reasonable is the norm.

Founders are an exception. They often live in, through, and with their business; there is little distinction between who they are and what they do at play, work, or home. Life, for them, is ALL about their business and they chose that life consciously.

The rest of us need to take a much closer look at how we can get more good juice out of the same orange, by being smarter, by thinking in new ways, and without killing ourselves or our people.

About the Author

Leadership authority Roxana (Roxi) Hewertson is a no-nonsense business veteran revered for her nuts-and-bolts, tell-it-like-it-is approach and practical, out-of-the-box insights that help both emerging and expert managers, executives and owners boost quantifiable job performance in various mission critical facets of business. Through AskRoxi.com, Roxi — “the Dear Abby of Leadership” — imparts invaluable free advice to managers and leaders at all levels, from the bullpen to the boardroom, to help them solve problems, become more effective and realize a higher measure of business and career success.

The StrategyDriven website was created to provide members of our community with insights to the actions that help create the shared vision, focus, and commitment needed to improve organizational alignment and accountability for the achievement of superior results. We look forward to answering your strategic planning and tactical business execution questions. Please email your questions to [email protected].

Documented and Retained Causal and Action Intelligence

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StrategyDriven Organizational Performance Measures Best Practice ArticlePerformance measures reflect the organization’s successes and shortfalls over extended periods of time. Well-maintained metrics include a periodic performance analysis summary capturing underlying drivers and associated follow-on actions. These summaries, however, are typically overwritten with the next analysis rather than being preserved; robbing leaders of critical lessons learned information that could support future performance improvements and more rapid decision-making.

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About the Author

Nathan Ives, StrategyDriven Principal is a StrategyDriven Principal and Host of the StrategyDriven Podcast. For over twenty years, he has served as trusted advisor to executives and managers at dozens of Fortune 500 and smaller companies in the areas of management effectiveness, organizational development, and process improvement. To read Nathan’s complete biography, click here.

What are you doing this week? Don’t waste the opportunity.

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The week between Christmas and the New Year is the biggest opportunity of your career. And your New Year’s Eve plans are in the way of next year’s success. It amazes me how much “prep time” goes into “What are you doing New Year’s Eve?”

The week after the New Year will be a ‘slow one’ at best.

Below are a few things to ponder, list, write about, and maybe even take action on as you head into the unknown of next year…

NOTE: It’s unknown what will happen in THE world, but YOUR world is a lot more ‘knowable, definable, and actionable.’

And rather than me telling you what to do, let me share with you what I intend to do and you can make your own plan from there.

I am going to continue to expand on my “four words” from last year. My words from last year (posted on my bathroom mirror) were FINISH, WRITE, SHAPE, and YES.

My results?

  • I finished the 21.5 Unbreakable Laws of Selling.
  • I wrote 1,000 words a week and documented hundreds of ideas.
  • My shape is still plus 20 pounds, so that word will remain this year.
  • I maintained my YES! Attitude, but seeing the word every morning and evening in my bathroom mirror helped.

Not bad achievement results – but still being 20 pounds overweight shows a flaw in my self-discipline. Not good.

This year’s words are divided into two categories – achievement and improvement.

On the achievement side:
ADVISOR – DIGITAL – POWER – TIME

On the improvement side:
INSTAGRAM – BLOG – SHAPE – BEST

I’ll define those eight words next week. Hopefully they’ll inspire you to write and define your words for the year. Interestingly, you most likely mentally know what they are, but have yet to bring them to the visual surface as Post-it Notes on your bathroom mirror.

The balance of this week and next will be spent (actually invested) by thinking about, doing, and documenting the following:

  • Making one plan to make a longtime dream a reality. For me, it’s traveling to The Great Wall of China.
  • Solidify one big idea. My big idea for 2014 is the continuation and solidification of the Gitomer Certified Advisor Program. It will emerge in 2014 as the premier independent licensee program in the world.
  • Intensify the improvement of your major strength. More and better writing for me.
  • Celebrate life and plan a few celebrations. Several on the list – follow my Instagram: @jeffreygitomer for continued details – and inspiration for you.
  • Celebrate family and plan a few celebrations. August in Paris! Getting to know my family below the surface. Spend less time in idle chit chat and more time talking about life and intentions.
  • List grateful acts of 2013. My brother’s continued hearing recovery. My health. My partner Jessica for her untiring dedication to the financial health of our business. My children, grandchildren, and extended family. My dedicated staff of smart, real-world people.
  • List cool things that happened. Some of mine were: 50-year high school reunion, lifetime achievement award from Haddonfield High School, the fourth summer trip to Paris in four years, launch of GitomerVT.com, launch of my Gitomer Certified Advisor Program. ACTION: Listing your cool things will make you happy and proud, and provide inspiration for this year’s cool things to be achieved.
  • List intentions for 2014. What are you REALLY gonna do? Beyond goals and resolutions, your intentions are the key to successful achievement outcomes.
  • Read one book a month. Start with these two: The One Thing by Gary Keller and Jay Papasan and The Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell. ACTION: Read on a Kindle app and learn my secret of faster reading.
  • Write 1,000 words a week. My weekly column, Sales Moves, enters its 22nd year. I’ve written and published more than a million words. (The average business book is 50,000 words.) ACTION: Wake up and WRITE.
  • Think by yourself for ten minutes a day. Make a hard appointment for yourself. NOTE: You can combine thinking and writing!

My list of things to do between now and the New Year should keep you busy, productive, and inspired to achieve more this year than you did last year. It’s not just a goal and it’s not just a resolution; it’s your intention, your drive, your work ethic, and your consistency that will create genuine achievement.

Happy New Year!

Free GitBit: My secret for reading faster with greater comprehension is here can be found at www.gitomer.com. Enter the word READING in the GitBit box.

Reprinted with permission from Jeffrey H. Gitomer and Buy Gitomer.

About the Author

Jeffrey Gitomer is the author of The Sales Bible, Customer Satisfaction is Worthless Customer Loyalty is Priceless, The Little Red Book of Selling, The Little Red Book of Sales Answers, The Little Black Book of Connections, The Little Gold Book of YES! Attitude, The Little Green Book of Getting Your Way, The Little Platinum Book of Cha-Ching, The Little Teal Book of Trust, The Little Book of Leadership, and Social BOOM! His website, www.gitomer.com, will lead you to more information about training and seminars, or email him personally at [email protected].