KateNasser.com

Businesses, large and small, both want to deliver super customer experience. Two steps can take customer experience from good to great — be plentiful and ready. And it’s the best PR.

The trigger reaction of many leaders to the idea of being plentiful to the customers — “that costs money!” Well, it doesn’t have to be free to customers or expensive for your business.


Being plentiful and ready gives customers:

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Comfort. When people think of a shortage, the feeling is discomfort. In retail, some leaders believe that shortages can wield greater prices and yield more profits. Customers experience shortages as loss and void. Especially in service businesses, having a plentiful supply gives customers comfort.

For business to business, it is critical. Suppliers are invaluable when they deliver plentiful supplies of what you need when you need it. It builds trust.

Ease. Customers love it when you make it easy. On a recent stay in a Sheraton hotel, I asked to have four towels each day instead of two. Yet I had to call and ask for extra towels every single day. Why not just supply the plentiful towels each day when cleaning my room? Be plentiful and ready to make it easy for the customers. Making an exception is great; sustaining it is super!

Success. When your business can handle last minute overages and is ready for sudden needs, the PR is tremendous. You can just imagine referring a catering company to many others if it helped your special event be successful especially with last minute needs.

Conversely, I recently did a team building program with the theme of plug in and adapt. I found a small electrical adapter plug online and needed to buy hundreds. The supplier’s website would only let me order 50 so I called to check on quantities and availability. The customer service rep told me they had plenty but I could only buy 50 at a time with a maximum of 100.

How odd. They had plenty but weren’t ready or interested in selling me a large quantity. Meanwhile the print shop I used for the session handouts was ready. The staff produced and shipped not only the initial 500 booklets but also 50 extra at the last minute when my customer expanded the project. Success!

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For Super Customer Experience Today

Be Plentiful in:

1. Positive, can do, make it work attitudes.
2. Low cost welcoming gifts.
3. Experience.
4. Information and knowledge.
5. Advertised products.
6. Last minute alternatives and solutions.
7. Communication and behind the scenes teamwork.

Be Ready With:

1. Courtesy and care.
2. Culture that considers customer experience as a business driver.
3. Information rich well designed websites.
4. Inter-cultural knowledge.
5. Easy to use self-serve portals that address complete needs.
6. Mechanisms that enable you to quickly adapt to change.
7. Proactive listening, follow-through, and follow-up.
8. Thank yous and gratitude.

Be (P)lentiful today and (R)eady for tomorrow — the best PR for your business!

In what other ways should we be plentiful and ready? What would you add to this list from your experience?


From my professional experience to your success,
Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™

©2011 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. If you want to re-post or republish this post, please first email info@katenasser.com for terms of use. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.

Related Post: Super Customer Experience: Customers & Us in Harmony

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Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™, delivers coaching, consulting, training, and keynotes on customer service experience, teamwork, and leading change. She turns interaction obstacles into business success. See this site for workshop outlines, keynote footage, and customer results.

The word leader used to mean strong, directive, and sometimes unfeeling. That picture has shifted to less directive and more in touch with employees’ needs.


Yet where is the balance between results-focused and people-focused? In tough moments …

Are you too nice to lead?

Image by: SeanbJack via Creative Commons License


There are team members who want, welcome, and will only work for a nice leader — until they see that the nice leader won’t address poor performance and cannot negotiate tough issues with other teams and management.

They feel unprotected and at the mercy of slacking team members and other teams. So much for being nice!


Too Nice to Lead

Leaders, could this be you? How or when is this most likely to happen?

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1. With Fear of Conflict. If you tend to avoid conflict and want people to just work things out for themselves, you may be seen as too nice to lead.
   Alternative: Get a coach to help you develop your conflict resolution skills. Great leaders move past their fear. They know when to step in and even teach others how to work together.




2. In Times of Great Change. In everyday work, your teams think of you as a very effective leader. Then the organization announces a major change and you must lead your teams through it. The tension rises and your teams resist. In this moment of truth, do you lead them forward? If you cave in to their objections and resistance, your boss may see you as too nice to lead.
   Alternative: Have the courage to draw on the good will you have with your team. Show them you believe in them and in the change. If you don’t believe it, why should they?




3. When You Require Emotional Support. Being humble and less directive can be good for your team because the void taps their talent and commitment. Being less confident and needing constant emotional support can scare the bejeebers out of them and earn you the label of too nice or weak to lead.
   Alternative: Learn and understand the interplay between being confident and being humble. Confidence is strength for your team. Humbleness opens the door to growth. Both are valuable leadership traits. Lack of confidence isn’t.




4. If You Must Be Liked. Needing to be liked can steer you to many poor leadership behaviors. It can drive you to sacrifice results for the virtual hug. This can earn you the label of too nice to lead.
   Alternative: Develop relationships outside of work that can fulfill this deep need. At work, focus on the balance of interpersonal connection and end results.




5. When You Get Promoted. Picture yourself leading your former peers and maybe even being a peer of your former boss. Guilt or feelings of unworthiness can make you seem timid or too solicitous. This can earn you the label of too nice to lead.
   Alternative: Your boss or another leader put their faith in you. You were promoted for a reason. The team you lead needs your courage and talent. Even if some team members grouse in jealousy, the team’s success depends on your willingness to do the job. Embrace the responsibility you were given; don’t trigger the decision maker’s doubt and regret. Believe in yourself, the purpose, and the team. Lead.




6. If You Own Their Behavior. When you mistakenly believe that you are responsible for a team member’s behavior, you are at risk of giving an errant employee too many chances. You may take their behavior as your failure. If you are coaching one of your team members and they are not making progress, would you be able to tell them they are no longer on the team? If not, you may earn the label of too nice to lead.
   Alternative: Afford your team members the adult responsibility of owning their own behavior. Coach, teach, guide — yes. Own their behavior? No.




7. When Your Career is Paramount. When you care about your career growth more than the current position, you may automatically say yes to other teams or management requests instead of using appropriate assessment and thought. You are busy pleasing everyone else and your current team’s success may suffer. If you are lucky, this may earn you the label of too nice to lead. If you are not lucky, it may earn you a different label that isn’t fit for print. Either way, it’s not what a great leader does.
   Alternative: Let current successes, appropriate interactions, and great negotiation pave your career path.

As the definition of leadership has shifted from rough directive behavior to engaging employees, some leaders have veered off course and focused only on happiness.

Rediscover the balance and you foster success for all!

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Leadership is not about telling or asking; it’s knowing when to do each.

Leadership is not about people or results; it’s about people achieving results.

Leadership is not one consistent approach; it’s using the best approach for the situation.

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You can be liked and fail as a leader; you can be disliked and fail as a leader.

You succeed when you balance purpose and people, encouraging and deciding, listening and speaking up.


I wish you courage and strength and the insight to know how to use it.

From professional experience to your success,
Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™


©2011 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. If you want to re-post or republish the content of this post, please first email info@katenasser.com for terms of use. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.

Related Post: Leaders, Are Your Direct Reports a Wart on the Arm of Progress

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Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™, delivers coaching, consulting, training, and keynotes on leading change, customer service, customer experience, and teamwork. She turns interaction obstacles into business success. See this site for workshop outlines, keynote footage, and customer results.

Leaders have leaders reporting to them. If you are a top leader, do you know if your direct reports are fueling growth, change, and success?

Or are your direct reports a wart on the arm of progress — blocking change despite what they are telling you?

5 signs that your leaders are a wart on progress:

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1. They demoralize teams by speaking about the past instead of the future. Example: Why didn’t you or we should have. No matter how this is spoken, it doesn’t fuel commitment to change. It fuels resentment, fear, and guarded behavior. Progress flourishes with learning and confident exploration.




2. They say they will lead change while claiming there is not yet enough data, time, or resources to make a decision. Their wart may be the fear of failure or inability to see ahead from the current picture. Effective leaders know that progress materializes from incremental steps not a complete roadmap.
   
   

3. They seem like star performers yet can’t rally others to star performance. Their wart may be an unwillingness to stand back for others to shine. They are so headstrong, they listen to nobody and block team input. Teams need to have a voice else they sense progress is outside their grasp. Related Post: Is Our Knowedge Too Noisy to Listen?




4. They crush others with the demand for perfection. Their wart is perfectionism. The quest for excellence breeds progress; perfectionism kills it like the disease it is.




5. They are a lid that fits any pot. Their wart is lack of identity. Teams rarely trust them for they feel clueless. Flexible leaders inspire contribution and progress; nondescript leaders leave teams bewildered without a vision. Without vision, progress falters.

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If your organization is not progressing toward the vision, look at the leaders reporting to you.

Are they inspiring teams, communicating, and breeding excellence? Or do they suffer from any of the 5 warts noted above?


Your mentoring or guidance from a professional coach can remove the warts and get the organization, once again, on the road to progress.

From my professional experience to your success,
Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™


©2011 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. If you want to re-post or republish this post, please email info@katenasser.com. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.

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Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™, delivers consulting, training, DVDs, and keynotes on customer service experience, teamwork, and leading change. She turns interaction obstacles into business success in tough times of change. See this site for workshop outlines and customer results.

Teamwork within one team is quite achievable. Cross teamwork (between teams in an organization) remains the elusive brass ring of effectiveness.

Leaders who want to break through an organization’s performance barriers find the greatest — seemingly unsolvable — obstacles in cross teamwork. Much has been studied and tested yet the obstacles persist.

For this reason, it is worthwhile to look at the issues again.

The Greatest Unsolvable Obstacles to Cross Teamwork

Perhaps listing the seemingly unsolvable obstacles here will bring new focus and insight — especially for new leaders and managers in the thick of it.

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1. Shared Goals With Greatly Opposing Pathways. We can all nod our heads and say yes this happens. Experts will chime in with facilitation techniques and processes that can resolve the differences. Wonderful. Yet when this happens in between teams in great volume, it represents a loss of performance.




2. Individual Preservation. An obstacle that surprises many is a rogue individual acting purely from self-preservation.

   An illustration: In an episode of the old television show MASH, the unit calls for ambulances to take the post-op patients away to make room for the new wounded. A corporal at HQ refuses to send the ambulances because he was told to take care of those Army resources. A general finally says to him, I can see you care about the ambulances. Why don’t you drive them up here yourself to ensure their safety! The corporal then releases the ambulances. The general identified the cross teamwork barrier – self preservation — and turned it into a solution.

   Are any team members so risk averse that they are taking actions that actually prevent cross teamwork and organizational success? The first place to look for this is in areas where leaders have stressed security, monitoring, metrics, and strict processes. Has it gone too far?




3. Too Much Change and Chaos. When high volume organizational change creates a feeling of total chaos, the results on cross teamwork can be disastrous. Each team, struggling to grasp the new direction, closes in a virtual huddle to manage the chaos. Reaching out to other teams would feel like increased chaos.

   How steep is your change curve? It might look great in strategy sessions yet if it puts the teams into preservation mode, it creates a performance barrier instead of solving one.




4. Mistaken Empowerment. Many an organization has dipped in performance as a result of mistaken empowerment. When a leader taps someone who is not ready or capable of key responsibility, many teams shut down in response to the incompetence. If it’s within a team, the leader can more easily correct the mistake. Yet when this mistake affects other teams, it affects cross teamwork and organizational performance.




5. Politics and Hidden Agendas. After a leadership strategy session, does each leader send the same message to his or her team? If leaders, consiously or subconsiously filter the strategy through their political or private agendas, the message comes out differently to each team. The obstacles to cross teamwork are enormous in this case because they may be hidden. The teams nod in agreement over stated goals yet each team is acting on the message received from its leader.

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There are other obstacles to cross teamwork including different occupational perspectives, incompatible technology, time zones, cultural differences and so forth. However, concrete steps tend to remove these barriers.

The 5 greatest obstacles noted above take root and the effects spread like weeds strangling organizational performance. They seem unsolvable even though they aren’t. Awareness, vision, commitment, courage, and action can turn it around. Who will initiate it? That’s the question.


What say you? Would you add to this list of 5? Subtract? Or do you disagree?

From my experience to your success,
Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™

©2011 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. If you want to re-post or republish this post, please email info@katenasser.com. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.

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Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™, delivers consulting, training, DVDs, and keynotes that turn interaction obstacles into business success especially in tough times of change. See this site for workshop outlines and customer results.

As The People-Skills Coach™, I have written before on steps from brutally blunt to helpfully honest. Yet for those who are inspired by logic to change behavior, it bears listing the smart logical reasons why bluntness bombs out.

5 Smart Logical Reasons Blunt Bombs Out

1. No Warm-Up. Picture your bluntness as very cold water. If we push someone into a cold swimming pool, they remember the shock. If we let them wade in, they adjust to the temperature and can function. Thus if we want people to function and use our message, we shouldn’t shock them with bluntness.




2. Punching Dulls the Brain. Punching bags are not known for their performance. They hang and swing. If we are being blunt to effect a change, those we verbally punch may swing away from us yet they are not likely to understand or change behavior.




3. Bluntness builds barriers. Communication is for connection. Bluntness can create a busy signal — a barrier — between communicator and listener. If someone isn’t listening, your message bombs out.




4. Bluntness undermines respect and credibility. The strength of the message is weakened by the rudeness of the approach. Who is going to respect and believe the message delivered by a blunt creton?




5. Bluntness breaks bonds. Unless we each live as hermits, we interact with people to survive and thrive. Many times the same people more than once. Bluntness may get our words out but bombs out by breaking the bonds with those around us. It may even create vengeful feelings and instigate a war (verbal or hidden).

Many people resort to bluntness, out of frustration, when diplomatic honesty hasn’t worked. Others simply lose patience with those of less intelligence.

Yet when we reach the end of the rope, why cut it with bluntness? Unless we need to use bluntness to save a life or prevent death, hold on to the rope!

Take a moment and tap intellect, logic, and smarts to find a way to communicate with honesty and respect.

From my experience to your success,
Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™


Related Post: Leadership & Teamwork: Honesty May Hurt But Blunt Burns Forever

©2011 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. If you want to re-post or republish this post, please email info@katenasser.com. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.

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Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™, delivers consulting, training, DVDs, and keynotes on customer service, teamwork, and leading change. She turns interaction obstacles into business success in tough times of change. See this site for workshop outlines and customer results.

Leaders, managers, and staff — you walk in the door every Monday and with you all comes a simple no cost team building opportunity.

Do you have a new hire? Is there a contractor joining the project today? Has there been a reorganization resulting in a new team mix? Think back to the first day you joined an existing team. How did you feel?

Image Courtesy of:Renaissance Chambara

How do you welcome them?

Most human resource departments do on-boarding of new hires. Many departments have online training modules to get everyone’s knowledge quickly up to speed.

Not so common is a true welcome for those joining and the powerful no cost team building that results!

The Team Building in a Welcome
Change breaks bonds. Change can also build strong new bonds when you welcome those joining on the very first day. The welcome is not fluff. It ignites team productivity.

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1. Introduce beyond the name. A great introduction warms the moment. We introduce keynote speakers, live performers, and guests at a party. We don’t expect them to show up and just start talking, performing, or networking. That would seem odd. Make time for introductions and you will see teamwork sooner than later.




2. Reach out willingly. When you travel and locals offer tips, how do you feel? Lifted up? Inspired to go back? Motivated to help in return? If you want maximum contribution and low turnover, welcome from the start.




3. Build respect and trust. The basis of all teamwork is simple respect that leads to trust. When you skip the welcome and leave it up to chance, the first interaction may be during tough moments, problems solving, or a struggle. Risky for building trust.

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On the other hand, if you initiate basic respect through a no cost team building gesture — like a great welcome — it quickly lays the foundation for communication, interaction, problem solving, and teamwork.

Some argue that these are adults — not children or teenagers — and shouldn’t need this hand holding. A welcome isn’t hand holding anymore than team building is.

The issue is how quickly the team gels for maximum succcess. The sooner people know each other and sense how to best interact, the sooner the productive results from the teamwork.

Whether in person or a video connection, welcome all those who will work together. Go beyond the names and use the welcome moments to establish a culture of respect, cooperation, and collaboration. Morale matters.

Who will you welcome today? How will you welcome them and lay the path for teamwork — at no cost?

From my experience to your success,
Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™

©2011 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. If you want to re-post or republish this post, please email info@katenasser.com. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.

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Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™, delivers consulting, training, team building, DVDs, and keynotes for oustanding customer service and teamwork. For 20 years, she has been turning interaction obstacles into your business success especially in tough times of change. See this site for workshop outlines and customer results.

And 6 Tips To Quiet Noisy Knowledge!

Most leaders and teams hope their knowledge and experience will serve them well. We listen to it for guidance during uncertainty. Yet in times of change, is our knowledge too noisy to listen to new ideas?

How can knowledge serve us and our teams well if it screams inside when new ideas don’t fit it? Consider that:

Knowledge and experience are on a list of common listening barriers.


Interesting recent study results from the University of Pennsylvania suggest people are biased against creative (new) ideas.

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So what does it matter?


Key Concerns About Noisy Knowledge

Is timely innovation in the workplace possible with bias against creative ideas that challenge existing knowledge?

When knowledge and experience are a buoy during times of change, will people ease their grip on that buoy — early on — to listen and consider creative, innovative ideas?

What are the risks of allowing noisy knowledge to slow or stop innovation? It happens and often in the shadows.

Quiet Noisy Knowledge With Awareness

1. Bring the issue into the light with your teams. Start using the phrase “noisy knowledge” as a cue with yourself and anyone in the room who is not listening to new ideas.




2. Position new ideas as new knowledge. If knowledge is the buoy, you can add more to the buoy instead of letting go of it. New knowledge is the buoy of security for continued success.




3. Note aloud the emotional reactions to the new ideas. Then put aside the emotion to consider the substance of the ideas. By separating the emotion from the thinking, new ideas have a chance! “My emotional reaction is …, now let me consider the idea.”




4. Ask yourself and others, how is my/your noisy knowledge impacting others, the business, and success? We are each responsible for the energy we bring to or drain from a workplace, a meeting, or a moment.




5. Leaders, consider having everyone take a social styles indicator (Amiable, Expressive, Analytic, Driver) so that everyone can own their type and understand how others communicate. Communication styles affect listening!




6. In advance of any major change initiative, help yourself and team members identify everyone’s change reactions. The KAI (Kirton Adaptive Innovation Inventory) is a great instrument to help each person see how open s/he is to change. Once known, then owned and managed!

The need for comfort and security is understandable. The need for timely change, inevitable. The pathway for both, around the noisy knowledge, is awareness, ownership, and communication.

What else would you add to overcome the barriers to listening to new ideas? What’s your #7 for this list?


With belief in everyone’s change-ability,
Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™

©2011 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. If you want to re-post or republish the content of this post, please email info@katenasser.com. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.

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Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™, delivers consulting, training, DVDs, and keynotes that turn interaction obstacles into business success especially in tough times of change. See this site for workshops outlines and customer results. Lead change with vision, courage, and communication.

On more than one occasion as an organizational consultant, I have detected hidden workplace change resistance long before the leaders and managers. They asked me later, how did you know?

It got me thinking about how I spot change resistance lurking in the cubicles.

I detect clues much like Sam Spade.
I spot …

1. Words that are contradicted by actions or inaction.
2. Words or actions that seem forward focused while anchoring everyone in the status quo.
3. Questions that are actually saying no. These are resistance statements in disguise.
4. What doesn’t fit or make sense given incentives, choices, and conditions.

How can you become the Sam Spade of change resistance?

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Give yourself permission. It’s both OK and essential that you see the reality. Sharpening your sight doesn’t make you a tyrant or a cynic.

Be ever present and conversational. Your conversations, formal and informal, will produce more clues. Presentations where you ask for questions are only a small piece of the picture. To see a more detailed picture, get a closer view.

Trust your ability to handle change resistance else you might overlook a clue that’s right in front of you.

Overcome any fear of conflict otherwise you may block from your mind what you find undesirable. As leaders, your inner strength will guide you through discomfort and give your teams a beam of support during the change.

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Your detective skills help all involved in the change. They unearth obstacles, concerns, and energy drains that everyone can address once out in the open.

Contrarily, overlooking resistance, avoiding conflict, being distant during the angst and stress, tells your teams you don’t believe in the change. If you don’t believe in it, why should they?

Lead change with vision far and near. Like a detective you will unearth both obstacles and success — with and for your teams.

From my experience to your success,
Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach


How have you detected hidden change resistance? What specific clues got your attention and how did you handle them?

©2011 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. If you want to re-post or republish, please email info@katenasser.com. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.

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Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach, delivers workshops, keynotes, and consultations that turn interaction obstacles into organizational success. Leaders have been booking Kate for 21 years to fill the gaps of diversity with action and teamwork. See this site for customer results and book Kate now.

A great definition of teamwork includes a call to action to build and exercise change-ability skills for optimal teamwork in any situation.

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Picture your organization using this new definition of teamwork:

Growth and change within team members to achieve a common success.

It’s applicable to changing environments, is very clear, and defines teamwork as adapting to reach the common goal instead of working to reach the common goal. 

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This definition of teamwork creates startling results when you use it with these four precious gems.

RUBY. Passion for learning. When you create a learning (not training) culture, the team exercises its change-ability muscles. Learning is change and one that most people welcome since it enhances their careers and no one can fail. 
The startling result is a stream of new contributions because all are involved in continuous improvement.

Creativity increases and critical thinking improves. Athletic teams regularly exercise for improved performance and theater troupes explore new ideas for this same reason. Unfortunately teams focused on production often get locked in daily routines. Create startling new results with a learning culture.

Action Item: Pick one topic related to business, teamwork, service, sales, or technology. Have each team member Google/Bing on the topic and collate those results online.  At a virtual team meeting, take 15 minutes for team members to identify aloud what info they can use and how.  Make this a weekly event and watch the teams create, collaborate, and flex to changing needs.

 

 

EMERALD. Leader with a confident ego. If you have a learning culture, the leader must feel confident even with constructive dissenters and creative strategic thinkers on the team. This confident leader is the emerald gem of teamwork — reminding us all of The Wizard of Oz. Toward the end of the movie the curtain is drawn back to reveal there is no all-powerful wizard. He is instead a wise caring person.  His insights flow from there.

 

 

 

SAPPHIRE. Human bonding on diverse and distributed teams.  The evil of isolation due to distance or differences undermines the full potential of teams. Picture world-wide technology rollout teams who have never met, come from different cultures, and rotate team members. If no bonding is addressed, the teams will fall short of full success. Use video-based virtual meetings to introduce team members. Build understanding on topics of personality type, generational differences, cultural norms, learning style, and pet peeves!

 

 

 

DIAMOND. The I’s in Team. There are several I’s in teamwork – individual initiative and identity committed to the team. Respect and acknowledge individual talents contributed to the whole. It inspires greater contributions and willingness to share and teach. Some organizations call this the essential piece culture where each person knows how s/he contributes to the whole success.

©2011 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. For permission to re-post or republish, please email info@katenasser.com. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.

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Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach, delivers team building workshops and innovative solutions for startling team results. See this site for more info and 21 years of testimonials.

Can you think of someone who would not want to be called the best? Most business leaders and professionals would beam at this honor. Being the best means you have an extreme strength. It emerges from a natural talent or intense study, practice and development.

Yet there is a weakness to every extreme strength. That weakness is the undeveloped counter-strength you might need today or in the next step of your career.

For self-development, traditional wisdom says:
#1 Be aware of your weakness
#2 Know how to change
#3 Have the desire to change


Why does the weakness often persist?

1. The organization taps you for your strength. More of your time is spent using a strength than developing a counter-strength.
2. Using the strength feels better than the struggle of developing a weakness. We yield to the positive feelings.
3. Being called the best can create overconfidence and block growth. Consider, when are you too confident to learn?
4. Believing that the counter-strength is inconsistent with the extreme strength. Picture a strong analytic who relies heavily on data and looks down on those who don’t. How likely is this analytic to develop and use big picture thinking necessary in a leadership position?
5. Fearing that it will weaken the extreme strength. For example, strong driver personalities who push for the end results are afraid that learning participative leadership will undermine success.

Overcoming the grip of extreme strength:

1. If the organization is the block, ask for a short project where you can learn a counter-strength.
2. If the positive feelings are holding you back, picture the negative feelings of being unprepared for the next skill set needed.
3. If overconfidence is trapping you, find a trusted friend or mentor to snap you out of it with honest feedback.
4. If are stuck in one belief, search for examples to test the accuracy of it. Is it a feeling or a fact? If it is a feeling, you can stretch past it and develop a counter-strength.
5. If fear of failure is stopping you, find people who have your strength and the counter-strength you need. Their balanced success can move you past your fear.

How have you developed counter-strengths to balance your greatest strengths? What success have you had that will help others? Please share your story below.


©2011 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. For permission to re-post or republish, please email info@katenasser.com.

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Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach, turns change obstacles into your professional success with inspiration to action. See this site for workshop outlines, keynote features, footage to view, and customer testimonials.

Authenticity is touted as critical to success in leadership and business in the 21st century. Authenticity is the spirit of the day with young entrepreneurs and new generations in the workplace. It is the ever present success formula from brand strategists and marketing experts.

Meanwhile adaptation is also critical to success. Leaders, teams, and businesses that cannot adapt to change, fail in the long run. Adapting to market conditions, generational differences, cultural diversity, customer expectations, and the mindset of venture capitalists brings success.

There are many who see authenticity and adaptation as mutually exclusive and at war with each other. This view drives their extreme behavior.

Some think adaptation defines a chameleon so they cling to authenticity. Those who crave acceptance constantly adapt and lose authenticity as they meld into the crowd.

Extremes like this lead businesses, leaders, and individuals to unnecessary mistakes. Authenticity & adaptation are partners, not enemies, in success.

Authenticity:
Builds clarity & customer trust in your brand
Prevents groupthink on teams
Inspires and engages employee talent
Develops trust between leaders & team collaborators

Adaptation:
Keeps your brand current and competitive
Builds bonds for teamwork
Develops your versatility to capture possibilities

The extreme view can grip anyone or any company during tough times. Consider Coca Cola’s historic move to crush Pepsi Co. so they adapted Coke to taste like Pepsi — with disastrous results. Or IBM’s refusal in the early 90′s to adapt and embrace outside influences until the stock price plummeted. Witness online rudeness, labeled as authentic and necessary for honest discourse. Yet honesty and civility can coexist.

Thwart the power of the extreme view:

1. Evolve and test your purpose regularly. An up-to-date mission gives you clarity when the cloud of stress and tough times move in.
2. Gather and consider quantitative and qualitative information. Seek other views.
3. When you are comfortable, stretch. When you are uncomfortable, question your motives before you act.

When adaptation is driven purely by fear, greed, or insecurity, stick with authenticity.

When comfort, arrogance, ignorance, selfishness or fear of change masquerades as authenticity, it’s time to adapt.


How have you found the balance between authenticity and adaptation in your leadership, or business, or teamwork?

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Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach, is known for taking corporate teams from inspiration to action during times of great change. Her workshops on teamwork, transitions, and customer relations continue to deliver stellar results.

Leaders, do team members in your corporation or business speak up soon enough?  Long standing teams often answer yes to this. The comfort of knowing each other fuels, what I call, the voices of success in teamwork and business.

This is no little feat.  Social research in America shows that people often speak up less in groups – even in a crisis (When Will People Help in a Crisis).

The common response to this challenge is to get new teams to know each other more quickly and engage the voices of success faster. It’s a start. Yet it still traps success in the time it takes to know everyone.






It also fails in today’s environment of constant change and sudden (ad hoc) teamwork. Can you imagine the business wins possible with the voices of success working in every meeting and encounter — globally? In other words during every instance of sudden teamwork?

Encourage the Voices of Success
Why not spread these messages with signs throughout your business, with your prime vendors/suppliers, and in your new hire orientations? Add these to your performance reviews and see employee engagement soar.

1. “If you think of something possible, say something!” For people to speak up with ideas they have for success or with cautions of dangers to avoid, they must feel it’s OK to do so. Throughout airports and train stations, they now announce “if you see something, say something” — to get people to report possible dangers.
2. “You are getting paid to deliver success. Speak up!” People must feel that they are expected to sound their voices of success. It’s not self-evident in a group setting.
3. “An idea is a terrible thing to waste. Speak up!”
4. “For us to succeed, we must all risk and commit. Speak and listen.”
5. “Respect ideas, even when we disagree.” People fear responses to their voices of success. Reduce the fear by restoring civility and building respect for diversity. Nothing creates silence and lost potential more quickly than rude disrespectful responses to new ideas or key concerns.

If you want true success in your business, encourage your customers to speak their minds too and of course be ready to listen to their voices of success.

Great listening and expressing harvests full potential.

What do you think? What other ways can we tap the creative and innovative ideas of business and corporate teams? Add your voice in the comments section below!

©2011 Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach, Founder & President, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. If you would like to re-post or re-publish the content of this post, please email info@katenasser.com for permission.

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Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach delivers keynotes, workshops, consultations, and DVDs to turn interaction obstacles into interpersonal success in business, teamwork, customer relations, and leading change.

Leadership theories have changed over the years. Today we read a great deal about humility being a key leadership trait. Certainly a break from the touted leadership traits of years past.

Is it just a fad or truly the future of leadership? It is an important question especially for those new to leadership. Their performance might depend on the definition of humility.

Websters offers this definition of humble/humility:
: not proud or haughty : not arrogant or assertive

Comfortable so far with the idea of leaders being humble?

What if we add this definition of humility and a few synonyms:
: reflecting, expressing, or offered in a spirit of deference or submission
: lowliness, meekness, submissiveness

How about this definition tweeted on Twitter by @OpenRoadMedia: Humility means accepting reality with no attempt to outsmart it.

Once the definition turns to submissiveness and accepting reality with no attempt to change it, there are many who become very uncomfortable with humility as a leadership trait.

Not arrogant or haughty – a welcome trend.
Submissive, non-assertive, and accepting reality – a serious void.

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My definition of humility in leadership especially for new leaders:

Continuous learning to improve your imperfections for the benefit of all …

It inspires all to avoid arrogance and more importantly to keep growing for the benefit of all they work with and for the organization. Work on your imperfections; don’t let them stop you from working and leading.

What say you? Yes to humility as a leadership trait? And if so, what definition would you recommend?


From my experience to your success,
Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™

©2011 Kate Nasser, CAS, Inc. Somerville, NJ. If you want to re-post or republish this post, please email info@katenasser.com. Thank you for respecting intellectual capital.

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Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach™, delivers consulting, training, DVDs, and keynotes on leading change, customer experience, and teamwork. She turns interaction obstacles into business success especially in tough times of change. See this site for workshops outlines and customer results.

Leaders, in the corporate and government spheres embraced the concept of best practices and certification with great ardor based on the alluring part of the definition.

Best Practice

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A technique or methodology that, through experience and research, has proven to reliably lead to a desired result. (Source: WhatIs.Com).

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Experience – proven — desired — results!  What leader can resist that? It lowers risk, sounds efficient, and breeds success right?  Hold on just a minute.

Success in today’s world requires initiative, innovation, and learning. If we grip onto what’s been proven we increase the risk of falling behind by staying behind with the proven. We squelch learning.

If you are wondering what got me, The People-Skills Coach, started on a post about best practices and certification, here’s the quick story.  

I was running a people-skills workshop in a large global corporation.  The first workshop was for the leaders.  As we started to dig into certain people-skills issues one of them said — “my people are certified in people-skills.  We already follow the best practices.” Grip, grip, grip. He was resistant to change. He justified it by gripping onto the simplified definition of best practice noted above. He squelched learning.

A fuller definition of best practice (Source: WhatIs.Com) disagrees with his resistance and hints at a more successful approach:

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A commitment to using the best practices in any field is a commitment to using all the knowledge and technology at one’s disposal to ensure success.

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Success in my field, professional people-skills, requires ongoing learning and adaptation. If we use certification, best practices, and proven ways to squelch learning, they become silent killers of success.

Leaders, it is worth asking yourselves: What message am I giving my teams about best practices and certification? Do my teams see it as an end goal or a starting point? Are my teams using best practices and certification to shut out information and resist change?

Your messages to them can overcome the misuse of best practices. Encourage the use of all the knowledge at your disposal to innovate and ensure success. Give your teams and your organization one of the greatest gifts you can — success through learning, innovation, and action. This is the truly the best practice.

One sure way to encourage this:

Regularly ask them – How can we improve the best practice? What is all the information we have at our disposal to innovate and do better? What is different about this situation and how do we reach success?

End each week with: What have we learned and innovated this week?

Please share: What other ways are you encouraging innovation and learning? This blog is a learning zone! I welcome your insights in the comments field below.

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Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Change, delivers improvements in teamwork, customer service, and communication, through her energetic, straightforward, and thought-provoking keynotes, workshops, and DVDs. See this site for footage and more information.

Often new leaders, especially those moving from being a peer to being the boss, struggle with feelings vs. results. Some new leaders struggle with feelings vs. results more than others depending on personality type. Nonetheless, a clear focus on the mission, goals, and results is essential — for the leader’s success and especially the peers’ job security.

In fact, a leader’s excessive focus on feelings can cost the peers’ their jobs.

As a coach and consultant, I have seen teams fall short of the required results because leaders put feelings above results.

In two recent cases, the functions of the teams were outsourced because they didn’t show results. How unfortunate that the leaders confused a focus on results with heartlessness. There was no need to choose between results and feelings. Effective leaders breed great results from inspiring team members to care about the results while respecting them as people.

Moving from Peer to Boss

1. From day one as leader, a)Speak clearly about the mission/goals and your passion for the success of the team and b)Listen to their ideas and concerns on reaching those goals.
2. Highlight your former peers’ untapped talents and discuss their development as you all work toward results.
3. Handle jealousy straight away. If former peers are envious of your promotion, let them know that you welcome all positive contributions.  This is not cold. It is truthful.  It helps your former peers move past the envy and on to developing their strengths and talents.  It protects the entire team from a disastrous side trip to the world of fake choices — like the one between feelings vs. results.
4. “You used to complain about things when you were one of us. Now you have changed.”   This plea from former peers is not about you. It is about resisting change. Do not take this to heart or feel guilty.  The answer is quite simply, “Yes, of course. I see a bigger picture now that I am doing this job.  I still care about the issues and welcome your solutions.”
5. Spend time thinking about the type of team you want to lead. Inspired? High Achieving? Respected? If these adjectives do not describe it, what words do? Do your words also describe a team that will reach the needed results? They must gel in order to succeed.
6. Read and learn about inspiring different personality types. Even if your new job description outlines mostly tasks and tangible results, your ability to do those things depends on people-skills and communication.

Honor your promotion and your new position with courage, insight, and knowledge. Honor the mission and business with your clear focus. Honor your team by treating them as adults who will live up to the obligations and responsibilities of the job.

I am here to help you as The People-Skills Coach. Your first consultation with me is complimentary as my gift and congratulations for your promotion. I also continue to learn. What suggestions would you add to the list above?

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Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach, is well known for her ability to inspire teams to great commitment and success. Whether she is delivering a keynote, a workshop, or a one-on-one session, Kate taps your ability to succeed through incisive questions, humor, truths, and practicality. For more information, email Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach.

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