Category Archives: Emotional Intelligence

On the fear of being “found out” at work

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How many of us fear being “found out” in the workplace?  I am not thinking of our fear that any fraudulent activities might be uncovered.  No.  I’m referring to the fear that many of us have that we are not good enough to be doing the job we are doing.  I have heard some people call this the “imposter syndrome”.

If Dr Laurence J. Peter and Raymond Hull are right, it’s likely that the further we travel up the organisational hierarchy the more likely we are to be poorly equipped to do our jobs.  Peter and Hull are the authors of the book The Peter Principle.  Why Things Always Go Wrong.  Their hypothesis – that people rise to their level of incompetence in organisations – has passed into the vernacular and their book, first published more than thirty years ago, is still widely available.

With or without their hypothesis, the fear exists.  As long as we feel this fear it’s hard for us to be authentic in our dealings with others.  Our energies go into wearing a mask which protects us from being “found out”.  Paradoxically, the mask we wear to secure our personal sense of safety inspires fear in others.  The more senior we are, the more this fear spreads throughout the organisations we lead.

I am reminded of Carl Rogers, whose work has been so influential in the world of learning – especially in the field of therapy and coaching.  Perhaps this extract from an article by Rachel Naomi Remen gives insight into the alternatives available to us:

Years ago, I was invited to a seminar given by Carl Rogers.  I had never read his work, but I knew that the seminar, attended by a group of therapists, was about ‘unconditional positive regard’.  At the time I was highly sceptical about this idea, but I attended the seminar anyway.  I left it transformed.


Roger’s theories arose out of his practice, and his practice was intuitive and natural to him.  In the seminar, he tried to analyse what he was doing for us as he did it.  He wanted to give a demonstration of unconditional positive regard in a therapeutic session.  One of the therapists volunteered to serve as the subject.  As Rogers turned to the volunteer and was about to start the session, he suddenly pulled himself up, turned back to us, and said, ‘I realise there’s something I do before I start a session.  I let myself know that I am enough.  Not perfect.  Perfect wouldn’t be enough.  But I am human, and that is enough.  There is nothing this man can say or do that I can’t feel in myself.  I can be with him.  I am enough’.


I was stunned by this.  It felt as if some old wound in me, some fear of not being good enough, had come to an end.  I knew, inside myself, that what he had said was absolutely true:  I am not perfect, but I am enough.

Rachel Naomi Remen, The Search for Healing
in R. Carlson & B. Shield ed. (1989)
Healers on Healing, Los Angeles:  Tarcher, p. 93

I offer you this thought:  that whether you are a man or woman in therapy or CEO of some international corporation you are, like Rogers, human and enough.
I wonder, how does this thought land with you?
   

Losing My Virginity

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Throughout the entire dirty-tricks episode I had been accused of being ‘naive’:  naive to believe that British Airways could behave in such a manner, naive to think that British Airways would ever stop behaving in such a manner, naive to believe that I would ever be able to bring Bristish Airways to court, naive to think for a moment that I could win a court case.  The word ‘naive’ echoed round and round in my head and at some points had almost undermined my resolve to go on.  Sir Michael Angus told Sir Colin Southgate that I was naive to take on British Airways ‘as if it was a Boy’s Own story’;  Jeannie Davis told my parents that ‘Ricky should learn to take the rough with the smooth’;  and even people like Sir John Egan of BAA told me ‘not to shake the money tree’.  Perhaps I was naive in fighting for the justice I wanted;  or perhaps I was just plain stubborn.  But I knew that British Airways’ activities were unlawful and I wanted compensation.  I was determined to make all those people who had dismissed my stance as ‘naive’ eat their words.
Sir Richard Branson
Losing My Virginity 

Lest you’re reeling with horror at the propect of some intimate and personal revelations, let me tell you from the off that I have been reading Sir Richard Branson’s autobiography.  The revelations are his, rather than mine.

Over the years, I have conducted many, many interviews of leaders at senior levels in organisations – for research purposes, to assess people for jobs – and reading Branson’s autobiography reminds me of these interviews.  Why?  Because it’s been my experience that when I interview (or read an interview by a colleague) with someone who is outstanding in what they do, my heart gladdens and some of the individual’s magic rubs off on me.  That’s what I experienced in reading Losing My Virginity.

Branson demonstrates many of the attributes – the competencies – of the successful entrepreneurial leader.  This should come as no surprise, for that’s just what he is.  One passage in the book stood out for me, in which Branson highlights the response of many people around him as he became aware that British Airways were undertaking a whole series of actions to undermine Virgin Airways and took action to bring this “dirty tricks campaign” to a halt.

With the benefit of hindsight and a legal victory in the bag, it’s easy to imagine that Branson’s decisions – the actions he took to invite BA to cease their campaign, his decision, David and Goliath style, to take them to court – were without risk.  Reading Losing My Virginity, however, it’s abundantly clear that this was not true.  Branson showed confidence and conviction in the face of higher and higher levels of risk to his business.  It is also interesting to note that he was driven not only by business imperatives but also by his strong values and on behalf of all the airlines who had also suffered at the hands of this particular Goliath and lost.  Along the way, Branson sought the counsel of some and received the unsolicited counsel of others but in the end, he knew he had to make the best decision he could and live with the consequences. 

The passage at the beginning of this posting captures this for me.  I wonder, what do you notice when you read it?  And when have you acted in line with your values, even when the risks were high?

Real conversations – choosing values that support your chosen communication paradigm

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On Friday, building on my recent article for Discuss HR, I talked about the need to stand close to the fire in the conversations we hold with others.  It is the most difficult conversations, in my view, that test our way of communicating with others.  In this article, I explore some of the values that underpin an approach to communication in which power is shared – what Roger Schwarz, in his book The Skilled Facilitator Approach:  A Comprehensive Resource for Consultants, Facilitators, Managers, Trainers and Coaches calls a mutual learning approach.

Especially when the communication going gets tough – when we address issues that are in some way difficult or sensitive for one or more of the parties involved – we need to root our communication in values that facilitate effective communication.  We may seek to do this as a matter of organisational policy, promoting values across the whole of our organisation.  We may simply choose values for our own communication, knowing that even where certain values are espoused (in organisations, in communities, in families and so on), we do not, ultimately, have control over the choices of others.

One of the most important values, in my view, that underpins the ability to hold real conversations, is compassion.  I view this as the willingness to hold oneself and others as human and to accept everything that this involves.  When I think of John, for example, whom I mentioned in the first blog posting of this series, I am guessing that my e-mail triggered strong emotions in him – what Goleman calls an amygdala hijack.  It was from this place that he responded.  This can be a bit like getting drunk at the office party.  You did it.  Everyone involved knows you did it.  You wish you hadn’t done it.  You all have the choice to ignore it and pretend it didn’t happen, though this is not without consequences over time.  At the same time, restoring trust requires being able to speak about what happened in ways which honour everyone’s needs.  These include needs which are deeply human, such as John’s need for dignity and my own need for empathy as the recipient of John’s e-mail.  Sharing these needs can stimulate feelings of vulnerability unless we have a shared value of compassion.

There is a paradox inherent in holding the value of compassion.  Strip away compassion and it’s hard to hold people – yourself and others – accountable.  For without compassion the message becomes “it’s not OK for you to be this way” or even “because you have been this way, you are not OK”.  Compassion facilitates a value of accountability by saying, I will be present to you and to whatever is alive in you, and I will accept you as you are – and still, I will hold you as capable of taking responsibility for your actions just as I, too, commit to take responsibility for mine.

I have recently experienced this in my own life, having made multiple requests of someone close to me to talk about some behaviours that I have not enjoyed over an extended period of time.  Each time, my request has been met with a “no” and, since I believe in free choice and would not wish to force her to the table, I have had to come to a decision in which I hold myself accountable for meeting my needs.  Am I meeting my needs by choosing to be around someone who behaves, consistently, in ways which do not meet my needs?  No.  Equally, in reaching the decision to spend less time with this person, and to share my reasons with her, I am holding her as capable of making her own decisions (choosing her behaviour towards me, choosing whether or not to discuss our difficulties with the aim of building understanding) and of living with the consequences of her own choices.  It has been important, too, to hold us both in my heart with compassion following this decision.

Roger Schwarz also offers a value of informed choice.  By the time I make a decision like the one I describe above, I expect to have had a number of interactions such that I know certain things for sure and could, with reasonable confidence, infer a number of others.  The value of informed choice invites us to gather and test information before taking decisions.  In your own life, for example, you may be gathering information from a number of conversations about your prospects for promotion – do you have political sponsorship, for example, or is it becoming clear that – no matter your capability and levels of high performance – you are unlikely to be chosen for the role to which you aspire?

The value of informed choice implies asking questions.  For this reason, Schwarz offers a value of curiosity.  Curiosity implies testing assumptions by asking questions and this, in turn, implies a level of self accountability.  To put it another way, curiosity implies testing the mental maps we hold in the world against the territory itself.  This is not only about the “facts” of a case (what the profits in x, y, z region actually are, for example) but also about our views of other people.  If ever you have held a view of another’s hidden motive, for example, without testing it out, you have not exercised the kind of curiosity to which Schwarz refers.

This in turn leads us to a value of transparency – sharing openly and honestly information that you have including information about your own thoughts and feelings.  Transparency is essential in collaborative relationships, since decision-making depends on information and information is shared when we are open, honest and transparent.

Our values are highly significant in our communication with others.  At the same time, it is not only our values that supply the hidden fuel for our personal approach to communication.  Our ability to hold real conversations also depends on holding beliefs that support us.  This is my next area of exploration.

Real conversations – standing close to the fire

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In this posting, I talk about those conversations we have in which we stand close to the fire.  These are the conversations in which we address the most challenging issues that face us.  As I write I am building on my recent article for Discuss HR.


It’s one thing for Sarah to suggest to her CEO that some extra resource might move forward the IT project more rapidly.  It’s another thing for her to share with the CEO that his decision to use his friend as a consultant to the project has proven to be a disaster and has put progress back by three months.  At the same time, sharing this information might be precisely what’s needed to get the project back on track.


Real conversations require a willingness to share and discuss information which may be sensitive for one or more of the participants in the conversation.  It implies being ready to discuss the undiscussable issues that are holding the organisation back.  At the same time, it implies having safeguards in place which make such discussions possible.


The example of Sarah and her boss is just one of many, for we all face the prospect at times of holding conversations which are sensitive for one or more parties.  I am guessing that, as you read, you are readily able to identify times when you are faced with the need to hold a conversation which is uncomfortable for you or which, you anticipate, will be uncomfortable for the other party.  Perhaps you are the manager of someone whose performance is not hitting the mark.  Perhaps you are concerned about the approach your boss is taking to a central problem at work.  Perhaps you face the prospect of making your case to the Board, knowing that the views of Board members are diverse and they have a poor history of collaborating effectively with each other.


Of course, those conversations that require you to stand close to the fire are not confined to the workplace.  Perhaps you want to discuss with your spouse what boundaries you both set in your relationship with your parents-in-law and you know how likely it is that this will stimulate high emotions for you both.  Perhaps you want to discuss boundaries of another kind – the physical boundaries between you and your neighbour – and you know that, whatever the outcome, you will both still be neighbours and will have to live with the consequences of your conversation.  Perhaps you want to talk to your teenage son about the way he is treating his mother whilst still maintaining positive relationships all round.


Standing close to the fire involves addressing issues which are difficult or sensitive, knowing that you cannot predict or control the response of others.  In addition, you bring your own sensitivities of which you may or may not be aware.  To hold the conversation carries, inevitably, an element of risk:  you risk the response of another, you risk the relationship, you may risk your job… in some way, you take the risk that the outcome of the conversation may be worse than the outcome of not holding the conversation.  At the same time, you know that the outcome of choosing not to hold the conversation is, in itself, not a good outcome.


If you want to hold real conversations about real issues – if you want to stand close to the fire – your chosen approach to communication needs to be underpinned by values and beliefs which facilitate this kind of sharing.  This is the subject of my next posting.

Real conversations – choosing the focus of your communication

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On Monday, I wrote about two fundamentally different paradigms of communication, drawing on the work of McGregor, Schwarz, Rosenberg and Goleman and expanding on an article I recently wrote for Discuss HR.  Today, I continue this series of postings by discussing the focus of each communication paradigm.

Two different paradigms of communication.  Two different sets of underlying values and assumptions, strategies for execution and ultimate outcomes.  If you want to adopt either one of these approaches, you need to know how the underlying values and assumptions translate into practice.  One area in which the difference is starkly visible, in my experience, is in the focus of attention adopted by users of each approach.

Let’s begin with McGregor’s Theory X;  what Roger Schwarz (in his book The Skilled Facilitator:  A Comprehensive Resource For Consultants, Facilitators, Managers, Trainers, and Coaches) calls a Unilateral Control Model and Rosenberg calls a domination approach.  The aim of the user is to win and not to lose and the user is not concerned about the experience of others.  Implicit in this approach is the belief that there is a single right answer and that all other answers are wrong.  It follows, then, that the user of a domination-based approach to communication will tend to focus on who or what is right or wrong and to gather data which supports the case.  He or she will often favour some kinds of data and dismiss other kinds of data though there may be some internal inconsistency here.  For example, the user of this approach tends to favour objective data and dismiss data concerned with the feelings of others.  At the same time, he or she may take the view that his or or her feelings are justified, especially when they are concerned with judgements about the other person or people.

Marshall Rosenberg, in his book Nonviolent Communication:  A Language of Life, identifies judgements as a key area of focus for the user of this unilateral, domination approach.  This is not about discernment, for the user of this approach often lacks the ability to discern, conflating his or her beliefs, for example, with the facts and confusing observations with conclusions.  Rather, it is about being judgemental.  This is true even when the person concerned is giving positive feedback, which is given in the form of praise and which implies that it is the giver of praise who is the ultimate arbiter of what is right and what is wrong.  In this sense, the emphasis is on what the communicator thinks and believes.

In making the case for a particular approach, the user of the domination approach is likely both to emphasise the use of data and to be keen to control its use.  This might include avoiding scrutiny of his or her own data and ignoring or dismissing data which does not support his or her particular way of thinking or forward path.  Parties to communication become opponents, seeking to prevail, galvanising their arguments in order to win.  This approach may be explicit (in the request for a presentation to support a proposal, for example) or implicit (in the way we think about our colleagues behind the scenes).

What, then, is the focus of a Mutual Learning Model?  This is McGregor’s Theory Y – what Rosenberg calls Nonviolent Communication (or NVC).  This approach is about collaborating in order to achieve a variety of outcomes, including business and personal outcomes.  This paradigm has as its central focus desired outcomes, underpinned by needs or – to use the language of negotiation – “interests”.

What is meant by needs – or interests – in this context?  I tend to favour Rosenberg in the way he clearly differentiates needs from the strategies by which we meet them.  This is something that we often confuse.  The leader who says to a member of staff that “I need you to get that paper to me by 5pm today” is not talking about the need itself but about the strategy by which he expects it to be met.  Nor can we infer his needs directly.  Perhaps, for example, he has a meeting the following day for which he wants to prepare – but not by staying late at work and at the expense of his family.  In this case, his needs might be for connection and intimacy and he plans to meet them by spending time with his wife and family.  Perhaps, though, he knows his own job is on the line if he doesn’t get this paper to his boss in good shape by 9am the next day.  In this case, he might be trying to meet some fundamental survival needs – for food and shelter, for example – by taking action to secure his ongoing employment.

Why is this distinction important and how does it facilitate successful communication?  Because when needs are shared it becomes much easier to reconcile the irreconcilable.  Knowing that the writer of his paper can’t start her final read through until 4.30pm, for example, gives the leader the opportunity to make different arrangements.  If his concern is to spend time with his family, he might choose to take his lap-top home so that he can take delivery of the revised paper on-line or asking another colleague to check the paper whilst its author is in her meeting.  If his concern is to hold onto his job he might be more inclined to stay late to review the paper after his colleague has got it to him or even to ask her to prioritise the paper over the meeting she was planning to attend.  This is essentially a “win, win” approach:  one which aims precisely to achieve outcomes which meet the needs of everyone involved.

It follows, then, that data is seen and handled very differently.  Instead of using data to make a case, users of this second model of communication share data and test it carefully in order to build understanding and to open up new ways to achieve desired outcomes.  Data, in other words, is seen in relation to needs rather than in relation to who or what is right or wrong.


The idea that communication might seek to identify and respond to diverse needs tends to gladden the hearts of many people in the workplace.  Until, that is, they realise that holding real conversations means standing close to the fire.  I’ll be writing about this in my next posting.  Meantime, I wonder:  where are you placing your attention in your communication with yourself and others?  If you’re willing to share, please leave a comment below.

Real conversations – choosing a communication paradigm that supports your aims

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In this posting, I write about the most fundamental area of consideration when it comes to communication – that’s your communication as well as communication in your organisation:  the paradigm that underpins your approach.  This posting expands on my posting on 3rd March, 2011 for Discuss HR.


Whilst it may seem simplistic to look at just two styles of communication – two paradigms of communication – a number of deep thinkers in the field of leadership and communication do just this.  Douglas McGregor’s Theory X and Theory Y, for example, outlined in his classic book The Human Side Of Enterprise, relate essentially to two different paradigms of communication. One of them (Theory X) is based on the idea that management control is required because employees need to be “coerced, controlled, directed and threatened with punishment to get them to put forth adequate effort toward the achievement of organisational objectives”. This communication paradigm is based on the idea that some people know better than others and have, as a result, the right to dominate and control. (In practice, this belief often translates as “because an individual is in a more senior role than his team he should know better than others”, a belief that is as likely to be held by his team members as it is by the leader him- or herself).  As an alternative, McGregor offers Theory Y, which is based on the assumption that employees are worthy of trust and respect because they are intrinsically motivated to do a good job.


Roger Schwarz, in his book The Skilled Facilitator:  A Comprehensive Resource for Consultants, Facilitators, Managers, Trainers and Coaches, refers to what he calls our Theory in Use and identifies two theories which broadly align to McGregor’s Theory X and Theory Y.  He takes the work of Argyris and Schön, 1974 and Action Design, 1997, to outline his Unilateral Control Model.  This is what Marshall Rosenberg, author of Nonviolent Communication:  A Language of Life refers to as a domination approach – McGregor’s Theory X.  Schwarz maps very simply the core values and assumptions held by the user of the Unilateral Control Model, the strategies which derive from those beliefs and their consequences.  The aim of this Theory in Use is to win and not to lose, for example, and assumptions include the belief that “I understand the situation;  those who see it differently do not” and “I am right;  those who disagree are wrong”.  It’s easy to see how such beliefs limit communication, discouraging an open dialogue about different points of view, and lead in time to misunderstanding and conflict, defensiveness and mistrust – before, in turn, leading to limited learning and reduced effectiveness.  Schwarz also outlines a Theory in Use which he calls the Mutual Learning Model.  This is characterised by assumptions which value the contribution of all parties, recognising that “I have some information;  others have some information” and “each of us may see things that others do not”.  The strategies that derive from these assumptions tend to lead to increased trust and understanding, on the one hand, and reduced conflict and defensiveness, on the other.


Schwarz’s model illustrates one aspect of McGregor’s research that is often overlooked:  that both theories appear to be “right” in the sense that they constitute self-fulfilling prophecies. If you want motivated staff, choose and cultivate an approach to communication which is rooted in acceptance and aspires to mutual learning (Theory Y). If you want mistrust and mediocre performance to proliferate, choose a domination-based approach (Theory X).  This finding is echoed more recently in Daniel Goleman and colleagues’ The New Leaders:  Transforming The Art Of Leadership Into The Science Of Results.  In it, the authors identify six different styles of leadership and highlight that each style has its place:  the most effective leaders are able to select different styles to meet the needs of different situations as they arise.  At the same time, they caution against the over-use of certain styles, highlighting how this can create dissonance in the workplace.  In short, a leader’s choice of leadership – or communication – style significantly affects the climate across his or her team or organisation and this in turn has a measurable impact on business results.


In practice, few people use one paradigm or the other exclusively.  Some people, for example, view some members of their team in one way and other members in another, so that they are likely to use the Unilateral Control Model with those staff they least trust and a Mutual Learning Model with a few select members of their team.  Other people aspire to use one model – often the Mutual Learning Model – and find that, at times, they slip back into the other model, perhaps because it’s the one they grew up with.  I wonder:  what is your experience?  And are you willing to share it here?


Both approaches differ in where they place attention. If you’re serious about choosing motivation and engagement, you need to choose MacGregor’s Theory Y approach to communication and, in turn, to choose to focus your communication in a way that supports it.  I shall be writing about what this means in practice over the next few days.

Real conversations – what are your aims for communication in your organisation?

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In this posting, I write about one area to which we need to attend if we are to learn to have real conversations in the organisations we lead.  This posting builds on my posting of 3rd March, 2011 on Discuss HR.

So much has been done to study the effects of different styles of communication that it’s possible to choose your approach to communication based on a clear understanding of your aims. Choose one style of communication, for example, and you increase levels of mistrust which, in turn, makes it hard to get to the root of and to resolve problems. The more this style of communication is endemic across an organisation the more it leads to mediocre performance, poor morale and low levels of engagement, increased sickness and high staff turnover – and that’s before we even start to think of the impact on our customers.

Choose another style of communication and you build trust even whilst making it easier to have some of the most challenging conversations which face us (and, let’s face it, as a leader in your organisation or an HR practitioner you are charged with your fair share). This second style of communication gets to the root of problems so that they are addressed fully and effectively. It also facilitates the conversations that generate the most creative and effective solutions.

Once you have a clear understanding of the outcomes you would like from your chosen approach, you can choose a communication paradigm that supports you in making progress towards your aims. This is relatively easy given the amount of research available in this area.

In my next posting, I’ll be writing about the different paradigms that underpin different styles of communication, and which lead to some of the outcomes I’ve described above.  Meantime, in case you are interested to explore your aims and aspirations for your communication and for communication across your organisation, I encourage you to take time in a place in which you will be undisturbed to explore the questions below:

  • Take time to connect with your aspirations for your business or organisation in the next 12 months, 24 months and 5 years.  Notice the outcomes to which you aspire in 5 years’ time.  Notice the milestones your organisation needs to achieve along the way in order to move smoothly towards your five-year plan;
  • Notice the challenges that you and others will have to overcome in order successfully to achieve your plans for the next 12 months, 24 months and five years.  Take time to imagine what it will take successfully to meet those challenges;
  • Notice the role that communication will play in overcoming challenges, in meeting milestones and in moving smoothly towards your five-year plan.  Who will need to communicate with whom?  What will be the most critical conversations along the way?  What will be the most challenging conversations along the way?  As you consider these questions, take time to notice the full range of relationships and conversations that will contribute to your organisation’s progress during the coming five years;
  • What are the critical outcomes as you see them from communication within your organisation and between your organisation and its key stakeholders?  I invite you to think not only about the business outcomes themselves but also about those areas of outcome that contribute to business outcomes over time.  What areas do you see as important?  What outcomes do you want in those areas?

You might like to take a moment to notice how confident you feel when you think about your organisation’s ability to deliver the quality and effectiveness of communication needed to achieve your aims and aspirations.  What is this telling you about your experience of communication right now within your organisation?  If your heart is sinking right now, I hope you’ll return to read the remaining postings in this series.

Either way, I’d love to hear about your aspirations for communication across your organisation.  If you’d like to share any of your thinking here, please leave a comment below.

Real conversations – talking in ways that work

Emotional Intelligence
And because we are human and the leaders we serve are human 
I would want to see us make the mother of all our investments in learning how to hold
what I call “real conversations”. This would require an examination of the beliefs
that underpin our chosen approach to communication and a commitment
to replace a unilateral (“domination”) approach with an approach which is
rooted in acceptance and aspires to mutual learning.


In January, I wrote the inaugural blogpost for Discuss HR, in which I laid out some thoughts about my aspirations for Human Resources in 2011.  In it, I shared my aspiration – no surprise to you, I’m sure, as a regular reader of this blog – that we learn to hold what I call “real conversations”.  This led to a request that I use my next blog posting to outline what I mean by real conversations.  My posting will be published on Discuss HR on Thursday, 3rd March, 2011.

My goodness, I found it hard to distill into just one posting, the essentials of a real and meaningful conversation!  So, I decided to enlarge on my initial thoughts in a series of postings here on my own blog.  This first posting positions communication.  I’ll be following up with a series of postings on different areas to which we all need to attend in our communication with others.

Recently, when a valued friend and colleague (let’s call him John) wrote in response to an e-mail I sent that “your tone towards me in your email is inappropriate and not appreciated”, I knew immediately that the spirit in which I wrote had got lost in translation.

Communication, it seems, is something we all recognise as important and, at the same time, find difficult. Many organisations continue to invest in training in many aspects of communication. There is no surprise in this: we all know that poor communication skills can lead to any number of outcomes which, in turn, lead to poor business results. Improve communication and we reverse this trend. How is it, then, that even with the level of investment that many organisations make in communication, few organisations boast of their prowess in this area?

Perhaps one reason is this: that few organisations, and few organisations that consult to organisations, have taken any systematic view of what it takes to hold a real conversation, let alone what it takes to make such conversations an ongoing part of an organisation’s culture. In the next two weeks, I shall identify and briefly explore seven areas which need to be addressed as part of any systematic approach to communication in a series of articles here on http://dorothynesbit.blogspot.com/.  I hope that you will find these article interesting both as you consider your own approach to communication and as you consider the prevailing culture of your organisation and its common communication practices.

Meantime, I am interested to hear your questions and I also have some questions for you. Some of these questions are organisational:  to what extent, for example, do you see HR as guardians of effective communication in your organisation? How desirable is it – and how realistic – to have a communications policy which identifies the aspirations of your organisation?  Some of these questions are for you as an individual seeking to communicate:  what are the situations in which you find communication most difficult?  And what is it that you find most difficult about communication in those situations?

Please share your thoughts and questions here on the blog.  This is invaluable for me as I seek to write about the issues that are most pressing for you in your work.

Integrity – a different form of leadership

Developing as a leader, Emotional Intelligence, , , ,
What counts is for a man to dare to be entirely himself,
standing alone, one single individual alone before God,
alone with that enormous effort and responsibility. 
Søren Kierkegaard
Working with client organisations to create a model of the competencies they wish their staff to demonstrate – that is, the competencies that differentiate high performance – I have noticed over the years how quick commissioning clients are to ask for the inclusion of Integrity.  This competency is concerned with acting in a way which is consistent with what one says is important – some call it congruity.
In practice, though, I find that organisations want this from their employees – up to a point.  Leaders want their employees to speak openly and honestly, for example, as long as the message is one they want to hear.  They welcome employees who act in line with their own values, as long as their values are congruent with the values of the organisation.  Perhaps, even, they want their employees to be open and honest with customers or clients, as long as they still get the deal.
I have been reminded of this in recent days as I reflect on Uwe Timm’s book In My Brother’s Shadow.  Born in Hamburg in 1940, Timm was 16 years younger than his brother and had few memories of the young man who lost his legs, and then his life, as a member of the German Army.  Timm’s book is both an intensely personal memoir of family life during and after the war and an exploration of the difficult questions that surround the Germans’ involvement in World War II.  How is it, for example, that the Germans asked so few questions about their Jewish neighbours as they gradually disappeared from view?  Of his own brother, he wonders how he could speak of the British bombing of Hamburg as inhumane whilst never making the same judgements of the killing of civilians by soldiers in the German army.
Surveying the literature Timm highlights the case (from Wolfram Wette’s book The Wehrmacht) of a German officer who walked down the street in his home town in uniform together with a Jewish friend, at a time when Jews were branded by the Star of David.  The man, who, in this way, demonstrated the highest level of integrity, was dishonourably discharged from the army.  He also highlights, drawing on Christopher Browning’s book Ordinary Men, how few soldiers took the opportunity that was freely given to them to ask to be withdrawn from duties which included killing their Jewish compatriots.
I want to add that I share Timm’s reflections with the clear understanding that we all face challenges when we seek to act with integrity – to make choices in line with our values in the face of increasing levels of personal risk.  In this sense, leadership has nothing to do with the official role in which we find ourselves.  Rather, it has everything to do with our willingness to make considered choices – and to own those choices – in line with our most heartfelt values, knowing that we cannot control the responses of others to the choices we make.  I believe that this remains a challenge for us all.  And I am grateful that I have not yet had to face the level of challenge faced by Germans during World War II and by many around the world today.
Returning to Timm, I note his awareness of the values that fuelled the choices of his parents’ generation including a strong sense of community and of obedience to community values.  It was in adherence to these values that many men, brought to trial after World War II, said:  “I was only obeying orders”.
No wonder, then, that Timm chooses to quote Kierkegaard, as part of his explorations.
PS  Just to let you know, as a member of Amazon Associates UK, I shall receive a referral fee for any books you buy using the links in this posting.

What’s your Monday morning story?

Emotional Intelligence,

Monday morning.  The alarm goes off to signal the beginning of the working week.  As a lover of sleep my first alarm goes off ten minutes before I intend to get up and in this time I take time to come round and to ponder the week ahead.  Almost without exception, I work from home on Mondays, and enjoy my full schedule of coaching by telephone.  So, as much as I love my sleep, I come round to the prospect of a day I am confident I will enjoy.

Over the years, my Monday morning story has been a gauge of the good – or otherwise – health of my working life.  Sometimes, the sinking of my heart as I wake signals a week to which I do not look forward.  Too many Mondays like this and I know it’s time to take stock and ask:  what needs to change?  Sometimes, it has been my understanding that the time has come to change jobs.  Sometimes, I have seen the need for me to change in order that I might open my heart and mind to a greater measure of fulfilment in my work.

The moment of waking on a Monday morning is also a good time to catch my hidden and limiting beliefs.  Do I believe I am deserving of a job I love or do I see it as the fate of man (or of this woman) to experience work as toil, a means to an end?  Do I see myself as the victim or the creator of my working life?  Do I believe I can take action towards my dreams or do I believe they will always be just out of reach and beyond arms’ length?  Do I believe I have what it takes to succeed or do I believe that I shall be forever wanting?  Do I see work as struggle or do I enjoy work as a sense of flow, of synchronicity, an unfolding adventure?

Whatever my early Monday morning thoughts, they are a powerful indicator of the experience that lies ahead, since – unless I catch them with my awareness and make changes to them immediately, or over time – they dictate the nature of my experience during the week ahead.  More than that, they send signals to others who, in turn, are influenced by my thoughts.

I wonder, at this stage in your life, what is your Monday morning story?