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Letter from the Editor
Spring has hit New England like a brick. First the rain, now the heat. I LOVE it!
The changing of the seasons always puts me in a pensive mood. (Wine puts me in a pensive mood. A nice meal puts me in a pensive mood. Sometimes the Geico commercials put me in a pensive mood….) My wife, the Kindergarten teacher, ends her school year and looks to summer plans. My younger daughter ends a semester at college and prepares for a new year. Seasons bring change.
There are some things that DON’T – and SHOULDN’T – change, however. Core values, for example. Despite changes in the work environment, despite increasing pressures to increase profits and reduce costs, despite competitive pressures, core values shouldn’t change. Core values are our anchor in a changing world. They help us make decisions in the absence of all the information – or maybe in the face of all the facts. Values are what we spend a lifetime shaping and become who we are – regardless of the corporate season.
I had the pleasure of meeting with Bill George, former CEO of Medtronic and currently professor at Harvard Business School. I had planned on talking about his new book,
True North, and instead talked about me. At least it FELT like we were talking about me. The concepts Bill was relating about a leader’s “true north” – the leader’s internal value compass – resonated with me and, most importantly, got me to think about my own values.
A good book makes me pensive. Like a mirror, a good book causes me to examine myself and see how I measure up. Bill’s new book,
True North, like his previous best seller, Authentic
Leadership, is a focused look at leadership values – and what happens to leaders and companies when leadership values are less than authentic. The book is cause for reflection, introspection, and renewal of purpose and values.
Go pour a glass of wine, read True North, and reflect on your personal true north.
Terry
Entelechy Speaks to Bill George about True North
 I’ve had the pleasure and honor to meet some of the world’s greatest leaders and
leadership gurus, from Sir Richard Branson, General Tommy Franks, and Captain Mike Abrashoff to Dr. Warren Bennis, Dr. Henry Mintzberg, Marshall Goldsmith, Jack Welch, and Tom Peters.
I recently had the opportunity to interview Bill George, former chairman and chief executive of Medtronic, Inc. turned Harvard Business School professor, and author of the best-selling book,
Authentic Leadership: Rediscovering the Secrets to Creating Lasting
Value. I met to talk about his newest book, True North: Discover Your Authentic
Leadership, co-written with Peter Sims.
First, a brief overview of the book.
Unlike many leadership books (and I’ve read my fair share), True North is more than simply a good read. The activities and exercises at the end of each chapter are designed to actually help you discover your leadership style and your underlying beliefs and passions: what makes you YOU. Bill believes that for leaders to be effective, they must first know themselves. He believes that you can’t read a book about leadership to become a leader; you can’t simply emulate other great leaders; you can’t review a list of leadership traits or characteristics and simply select those you’ll adopt.
Bill George and Peter Sims interviewed 125 leaders to shape the chapters and lessons in this book. The authors asked leaders to define their True North – what is most important to them, their most cherished values, their passions, their trials and tribulations – and how they came to find their True North, their “fixed point in a spinning world that helps [them] stay on track as a leader.”
Sara Lee CEO Brenda Barnes agrees that leaders need to discover their True North:
If you are guided by an internal compass that represents your character and the values that guide your decisions, you’re going to be fine. Let your values guide your actions and don’t ever lose your internal compass, because everything isn’t black or white. There are lots of gray areas in business.
True North is not a “how-to” techniques book in helping prospective leaders learn how to create meaningful mission statements or passionate visions, or how to lead teams through troubled waters.
True North is an inward-looking book, one that helps you discover the leader within.
True North is a book that will make good leaders great.
Now the interview.
 I met with Bill at his office on the beautiful Harvard Business School (HBS) campus. I was a bit early so I reviewed the two main questions that I wanted to ask:
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How do you “discover your values and passions” when you’re young (knowing that many of Bill’s students are in their twenties)? I remember being fairly clueless about my passions when I was in my twenties.
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Bill – and our mutual friend, Warren Bennis – refer to crucibles as key to shaping leaders. Crucibles are life-altering events – the death of a loved one, a big business deal that soured, or personal tragedy – that make us stronger (if, as the saying goes, they don’t kill us outright). I’ve led a pretty crucible-free life and wanted to know: Can I create my own crucibles (that doesn’t sound like a smart idea) so I can learn from them? Or can I learn vicariously through others’ crucibles?
As a trainer, I believe that many/most skills – including leadership – can be taught. Bill would argue that while many of the behaviors of effective leadership – effective communication, clarity of vision and purpose, soliciting and processing input, decision-making, etc. – can be taught, the essence of effective leadership – your True North – has to be discovered/developed. My quest was to see if there wasn’t some middle ground.
Bill is in his fourth year at HBS where he is currently teaching
Leadership and Corporate Accountability, a course that integrates ethics, law, and economics, and is a direct response to the corporate scandals that have plagued the country in recent years.
This fall Bill is teaching Authentic Leadership Development, a course that parallels the structure and lessons in
True North. Integral to the course are six-person support groups, which allow participants to explore more deeply the concepts of internal values, personal passion and motivation, and beliefs.
When I asked Bill how a young person – one who has relatively few experiences from which to draw – might identify values and personal beliefs, he pointed to the power of the support group where others can ask you questions that you wouldn’t think to ask yourself – answers to which reveal elements about you as a person and as a leader.
This support group concept was modeled off of the men’s support group that has shaped Bill’s life and, he believes, has played a significant role in his success. “I can go to the group for any issue from business to personal, from current issues to discussing what kind of legacy we want to leave. I’m a big advocate of having a support group and I think it can be very advantageous for people.”
 This belief carries over to his married life; Bill and his wife, Penny, get together monthly with three other couples as they have for the last 23 years. “We talk about what really matters in life, what’s really important. It’s also good to have a group of people who really know you to give you feedback and help you talk through decisions.”
Authentic leaders are self-aware. It’s not that authentic leaders possess some innate ability to see themselves more fully than others, authentic leaders seek and listen to feedback from others. A support group provides feedback that is honest and sincere.
Most leadership gurus – including Warren Bennis and Marshall Goldsmith – agree that honest and open feedback becomes an increasingly scarce commodity as one advances in the ranks. Bill states:
Getting feedback anywhere in an organizational setting is useful, especially from people who worked for me – 360 degree feedback. When I was CEO of Medtronic, getting feedback from my board was far less important than the feedback I got from my subordinates.
Getting feedback from sycophants – from people who are trying to curry favor from you – is the worst kind of feedback and is extremely dangerous; it’s like you start to believe your own press.
Surround yourself with people who shoot straight with you. You need to encourage that communication. It’s easy to shoot the messenger, so I tried to surround myself with people who would challenge me and who cared about the organization.
Bill encourages all leaders to solicit feedback, and to encourage anonymous feedback. “The blind feedback that you get in a 360 is valuable because people who may not otherwise have the courage to come tell you what they really think can express themselves.”
Getting feedback and guidance from others is key to authentic leadership as is self-awareness. Authentic leaders take self-awareness one step further and examine not only WHAT they learned, but they reflect on HOW they learned. Bill calls this “framing”. How do you frame your experiences? Do you ignore them: “I’m glad THAT’S over.”? Do you tend to normalize them: “Oh, everyone has that experience.”? Or do you excuse them: “That was just a freak thing.”? Authentic leaders leverage the situation as a unique learning experience. They not only examine the experience and extract lessons from the experience, they also examine themselves in the experience and learn more about themselves in the process.
The experiences don’t have to be life-altering – answering my final question of Bill: How do you create the crucibles that build leaders? Bill explained:
It’s important to have those experiences. Don’t shy away from experiences. Don’t take the safe route. Otherwise, you’re likely to get a lot of responsibility and not be able to handle it. We all need to learn how to fail and how to come back. You have to learn that on the playing field. You can’t learn it as an observer at the scene; you can’t learn it strictly observing other leaders.
You also need to learn to frame the experience. Framing sometimes requires a different perspective, to see the experience from another angle or in another light. It is difficult to be objective when emerging from another less-than-successful project; important lessons will be overlooked. Who can help you frame situations? Bill says, “Almost anyone – your significant other, a mentor, a spouse, your best friend. That’s what I use my support group for.”
Almost any situation, therefore, becomes an opportunity for you to discover more about yourself, and to grow as an authentic leader.
Bill states about True North, “I want the book to change leadership.” If any book can accomplish such a lofty goal,
True North can. The lessons from 125 business leaders help frame the activities that – if completed – will help YOU find your True North and discover your authentic leadership.
For more information about Bill George and his initiative to “build a culture of leadership,” go to his website at
www.truenorthleaders.com. (This article is featured at
http://www.truenorthleaders.com/news.htm.)
Coaching: Is it a Question of Time? Or Priorities?
In the previous issue of The Key, I asked, “Why – despite the overwhelming evidence that points to the value of coaching as a way to develop talent, encourage growth, engender loyalty, generate commitment, and demonstrate leadership – don’t many people coach?”
A number of folks weighed in with responses (See my BlogSpot at
http://coachingforperformance.blogspot.com/).
Time seems to be the big issue, but I think I'm hearing most everyone saying that lack of time is a
symptom, not the real problem explaining why managers/supervisors don't coach more.
Lack of time – from my perspective – equals shifted priorities. When managers believe that their responsibilities are to get out the reports, prepare the budgets, manage the expenses, respond to customers, sign the paperwork, prepare the strategy, communicate up, etc., there’s no perceived time for coaching.
For the sake of argument, let's assume that we all agree that managers/supervisors don't recognize coaching as a priority. How can we reshift the priorities of managers so that they make coaching a priority? (I think there's an intrinsic side and an extrinsic side to this.)
I'm looking for lots of ideas because I'm thinking of putting together a survey of best practices and this would be one area on the survey.
Please share with me your thoughts and specific examples and read what others have to say at http://coachingforperformance.blogspot.com/. (If you prefer, you can also email your ideas to me at
ttraut@unlockit.com.) Stimulate. Be stimulated! Invite your colleagues and bosses to join the discussion by pasting the following into an email:
We’re talking about coaching – something that I know you have a passion about. Share it with the rest of us on BlogSpot at
http://coachingforperformance.blogspot.com/.
Training’s Role: Moving
from “Do the Work” to “Get the Work Done”
According to a new report entitled “The 2007 Chief Learning Officer Business Intelligence Industry Report”:
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Nearly 60 percent of organizations predict spending increases on learning and development in 2007.
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Many organizations are experiencing inadequate staffing levels, including 59 percent that do not have sufficient staff to support their learning initiatives.
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The prevalence of outsourcing has increased from 62 percent in 2005 to 68 percent this year.
I’d like to add an observation that ties these three findings together: Training professional who are constantly asked to do increasingly more with increasingly less are turning to outside vendors like Entelechy to achieve theirs and their business’s goals. Training’s role is evolving from “do the work” to “get the work done,” and those who know which resources to tap when will continue to add value to their companies. (Put Entelechy on YOUR list!)
And Now, Something Completely Different
Math Test Blues
I don’t think the student received any points for the answer on the following math question:
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Terence Traut, President of Entelechy "unlocking potential"
ttraut@unlockit.com
phone: 603-424-1237
fax: 603-424-6361
http://www.unlockit.com
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