Tag: leadership

Job security depends on what?

I have a friend, who moved to a new and an executive position of a medium company. She was excited with this opportunity and worked very hard for the first a few months to learn and adapt to the new environment.

Nine months into her position, she was screwed by a senior colleague. And the fears from the new colleagues regarding the changes brought by her did not help. She suddenly had to face a challenge that most of her middle management members wanted her out by signing a petition letter.

She was mad at the surprise – not knowing what’s going on, where went so wrong…

Many meetings and tough conversations later, it turned out that the senior colleague played a crucial role to stir the pot which he had been adding explosive ingredients. Long story short, most of the colleagues eventually realized that my friend is a reliable, kind, trustworthy, wise person. They have accepted her after all.

This is lucky for her, you may say.

I was curious about her feeling during the tough period.

“Did you feel unsafe about your job?” I asked.

“No.” She said.

“Why?”

“Because I was true to my self for everything I did. I did not feel I need apologize for anything or anyone for what happened, What frustrated me was why did it happen? Why I was so blinded?…” She explained.

Later I learned that she had fears, fearing that she could not do her best, fearing she could not accept by her teams… of course, she makes mistakes has this imposter syndrome as well. However, she never had the concern about her job security.

I know her well enough to understand her security about herself. Because she is the kind of indispensable person I know of. She does things with her heart and soul with generosity. She is the kind of person I would call Linchpin, as Seth Godin stated in his book. She has vitality and longevity for what she does. She does not have much time or room to worry about her job, because she has too much fun and curiosity towards life and work.

Job security comes with dedication, devotion and love towards to what you do.

Job security comes with initiatives and creation.

Job security comes with clarity about what you do.

When you are indispensable, job security is not in your way.

Dance with fear

We encounter fear often if we are growing – grow personally, grow our work, grow our family… this is normal.

Fear is usually telling us the very thing we need to do, to get to do, to grow out of it.

It is how we deal with fear that boosts, deters, and ultimately measures our growth.

Dance with fear is the way moving forward.

Dance with fear means we face it. We see it. We are aware what intimidates us. We know where it comes.

Dance with fear means we are going to move forward with it. We can’t get rid of it. But we can still go, go, go while being with it.

Dance with fear means leadership. We know we are vulnerable, yet we get to do it any way. We know we might not be right, yet we do our best anyway.

Dance with fear is how we can make one step at a time, little by little we can be better. Therefore, we can do better things.

Ask for help…

Asking for help is not a easy thing to do. It does not come naturally to many people.

When we ask for help, we expose our weakness to others. We put ourselves at a vulnerable position, in case we get a refusal, an unfair judgement, or even a destained comments or looks…

However, asking for help also provides opportunity for us to learn, to make connection, to help others clarifying things… And the most important one is that this helps us grew stronger, more connected with others and the world we live.

Asking for help is to build our community, to form our team, to grow our leadership.

About alignments…

Very often I hear that many companies, departments, working groups seek for alignments before a decision is made. We all know that this is a typical culture for many Japanese companies. Consensus decision making is working in Japan.

Obviously there are advantages for aligned decision making approach. Such as, it can reduce the potential risks, it makes everyone throughly understood the approach therefore everyone has a clear goal in mind, it may get the best outcome with many round’s of discussion… this works better in a context of seeking stead growth.

And the disadvantages are also evident. It takes too much time, less flexible, not agile, and may kill productivity… this slows down a company’s development in a fast paced context.

Currently, we are in an environment more or less like the second scenario. We need to respond the demands from marketplace quickly with agility. Therefore, quick decision is needed more and more.

Decisions related to housekeeping matters are more suitable for aligned approaches, while those decisions related to company’s growth and development are required quicker responses, may not need to be aligned from time to time.

Starting to take lead and responsibilities to make decision is not a easy thing. It calls for courages, determination and wisdom.

Go with the flow

A close friend who has a typical type A personality, came back from a trip to Bali. She told me that the trip has big impact on her. The biggest one is to remember or remind herself from time to time to go with the flow.

“Why is that?” I asked her.

“Because I feel going with the flow relaxed me. I feel myself again, peace, happy and also become more energetic…”

She is right.

Flow is a energy. Going with flow is to go to the direction of energy. You give the way to the energy, not block the way of the energy. Of course you will feel better, because you are riding with the energy!

These are the moments when you are absorbed into doing your work, realizing your dream and making a difference with sweats.

What is being professional?

It does not matter what you do for living, you often hear the term – being professional.

What is exactly being professional? How does the person being professional look like?

She may be wearing suits, or dressing semi-formal. She speaks with knowledge and pleasant manner. She respects others. She delivers her results. She is herself: disciplined, works hard, emotional mature…

What else?

Is she a leader or a follower or both?

Will these roles change her behaviors as a professional?

One thing for sue is that as a professional, you create and produce values for what you do. Therefore, from time to time you will face situations where you will need break a structure, a system, a rule, or you face challenges to yield, bend your principles, even give up…

what will you do?

Do you need spiritual support, psychic power to beef it up?

Being professional calls for ethics, principles. This is the essence being a professional.

With your values, ethics and principles in mind, they empower you being professional.

Eyes on the goal

When I was walking on the glass ceiling of Toronto TV tower, I was fine until I looked down through the glass ceiling… I felt immediately dizzy, panic and could not walk any more.

I stopped, had a couple of deep breath. Then I raised my head, looked forward towards where I wanted to go. I felt fine again and walked across the glass ceiling to the other side.

We set up our goal and are pumped up to execute it. During the journey, we get busy. Then we are buried into meticulous matters, can’t see the end of the tunnel. We begin to loose our momentum, get lost on the way…

Just like walking on a glass ceiling, if we take a pause, review our goal and direction, we will regain our sense of clarity and our vision. We can then recharge and move forward to our goal. When our eyes on the goal, we are courageous.

There may be many “glass ceiling” sections in our life. This is normal.

The good news is that when we feel panic, it is a good signal for us to stop and take an inventory for where we are and where we are going. This is the wisdom of our physiology telling us to make a choice, to put our eyes on our goal.

Do my best…

I hear people saying “do my best” very often. Actually I used to say this very often as well.

Then one day, I suddenly realized that when I said “do my best” I was trying to use it as a shield – which gave me a shelter for hiding.

Because when I said “do my best” people left me alone. There is no measurement for “do my best”, therefore I could goof around, did not care the consequence of my behaviors. I could hide from my inaction and incapability. And it also could become my excuse when I failed to accomplish something.

So be careful when you say do my best next time.

And also check whoever says do my best.

“Do my best” works for people with motivation, ambition, and goal-minded people. “Do my best” works with creditable people. “Do my best” works in a context of common understanding of the ground rules. “Do my best” works for the people embracing the same culture.

You also can breath and give others’ benefit of doubt when they say this… Do my best is pleasant to hear after all!

Goal is for action

We set up goals for work, for life.

We make dreams for work, for life.

We have visions for work, for life.

Have you stopped and assessed the progress you’ve made for your goals, dreams and visions? How far are you progressing from the time you set them up? How long will you get there?

If you haven’t done anything for your goals, dreams and visions, they are bad ones. Redo them, get some good ones.

Good goals, dreams and visions are those that bring your action, make you excited to do something about, keep you pumped and continued going forward, and recharge you when you are in a dip.

Jack Ma said something about the goal and vision he has for Alibaba… I am paraphrasing here: Because I believe, therefore I can see the realization of my goal and vision.

Goal is the daily drive to get us out of the bed.

Dream is the direction to keep us go, go, go!

Vision is for us to use for verifying them in reality, not for challenging other’s statements.