11 Leadership Actions in The Beauty and The Beast of Recognition Part 3 of 3

Dignity does not exist in possessing honors, but in deserving them.   Aristotle

The wrap-up to our discussion of the Beauty and the Beast of Recognition is a list of 11 Leadership Actions for you, the team leader - just to keep it all from turning into a beastly part of your role!

Add these actions to your personal development commitments.

Leadership Actions

1. Encourage team members to set ambitious goals.
   
2. Reward effort and achievement.
3. Give credit where credit is due.
4. Communicate the achievements of your team to higher-level management in a visible and positive way, showing pride in, and support for, your people.
5. Know what aspects of the job excite your team members, and then provide them with the opportunities to pursue these activities.
6. Learn what rewards your team members value that you can provide.
7. Notice the good work people are doing and talk about it to them and to others outside your team.
8. Establish “group identity” and work at building pride in group membership – “esprit de corps.”
9. Give recognition to people who strive for excellence and improve quality.
10. “Go to bat” for your team members.
11. Find ways to enrich the jobs of your team members by increasing their authority or span of control.Adapted from Successful Manager’s Handbook, Personnel Decisions, Inc.

Question for You: Have you decided on any specific actions to improve or implement a recognition process in your organization?

Strong Relationships + Solid Leadership = Success for Everyone

The Beauty and The Beast of Recognition Part 2 of 3

Tips to turn your recognition process into a BEAUTY and avoid the BEAST.

Today's article gives you suggestions for:

1. Opportunities for recognition

2. Forms of recognition

3. Checklist for your own actions

1. What Are Some Opportunities to Recognize an Individual/Group/Team?

· Successful completion of a project

· Consistent performance over an extended period by a team member

· Commitment to team effort, customers, and/or quality

· Significant improvements in performance

· Special efforts to support a project or program or other team member

· Use of innovation, creativity and/or leadership

You could add many more thoughts to this list - sometimes we have to think about the recognition opportunities - they aren't always obvious. (This is a great topic to involve team members in - "What kinds of things should we be recognizing?")

2. If Recognition Isn’t Just Money, What Are Other Forms of Recognition?

·     Acknowledgement: No money, no plaques, just a simple verbal or written expression of appreciation for a team member’s value or contributions. 

·     Verbal expression or personal exchange: Go the extra distance - convey your interest in team members as individuals, e.g., remembering birthdays, inquiring about favorite hobbies or the health of others’ families, progress the kids are making, etc.

·    Reward: This is a tangible expression of appreciation for a job well done; a gift certificate, dinner reservations for the team member and partner, subscription to a publication the person would enjoy, a check…the list is really endless.

·     Inclusion: Not everyone views this as recognition, but an invitation to participate at a higher level in the organization is a demonstration of trust; designate the team member being recognized to sit in a meeting as your representative or attend a conference. This sends a message of your confidence in the team member and supports his/her professional development.

This is another opportunity to involve team members: It’s very cool to invite your team members to identify recognition ideas – involve them and see where the discussion leads! Other resources for recognition ideas:

Try Bob Nelson’s 1001 Ways to Reward Employees – it’s packed with terrific ideas.

Or Nelson's The 1001 Rewards & Recognition Fieldbook: The Complete Guide

If you're a team leader, answer this handy checklist and decide how much attention you pay to this often-overlooked-opportunity for team member satisfaction.

3. Recognition Checklist

P    Am I, as a team leader, taking advantage of all recognition opportunities?

P    Am I correctly identifying what/whom to recognize?

P    Am I giving recognition on a daily basis, not just for the “home run” events?

P    Did I customize the type of recognition so the team member appreciates the gesture?

P    Did I choose a way to present the recognition so the team member will be comfortable?

P    Did the recognition appropriately match what the team member did?

Question for you: How would you answer all of the above!

Strong Relationships + Solid Leadership = Success for Everyone

How Important is Judgment to Leadership?

On the subject of personal growth and the development of leadership skills, I’m suggesting that you have a look at my colleague, Dennis E. Coates, Ph.D., blog posting earlier this week: On Judgment - What John W. Gardner Told Me about Leadership.

Denny’s article highlights one of those personal strengths that can be so critical to our success and provides comments from Garner on others strengths. I think you’ll appreciate what Denny and John Gardner have to say.

(Check out the right hand column of Building Personal Strength, Denny’s blog.)

Question for you: If you checked out the right column, I know you selected one of his publications! Which did you choose?

(If you’ve got teenagers or pre-teens around, you have to read Conversations with the Wise Uncle or Conversations with the Wise Aunt- located in Denny's right hand column).

Strong Relationships + Solid Leadership = Success for Everyone

“You’re hearing, but you’re not listening.”

“You’re hearing, but you’re not listening.” Ever heard anyone say that? It’s true that lots of people don’t actually tune in to what’s REALLY being said – they may nod (while looking at their smart phone), they may make fleeting eye contact, but do they hear the underlying message being delivered by the speaker?

In yesterday's post about customer needs, reference was made to active listening - this of course is one of those people skills that we all need to master as leaders, friends, family members, community participants...everywhere!

Here are some terrific reminders about active listening.

Guidelines for Active Listening and Reflection

(Also known as Empathic Listening) by Don Sharp

As Studies from over twenty-five years of experience with non-directive interviewing in industry have produced a series of guides for emphatic listening. For a manager the most useful of these guides are:

 1. Listen patiently to what the other person has to say, even though you may believe it is wrong or irrelevant. Indicate simple acceptance, not necessarily agreement, by nodding or perhaps injecting an occasional "mm-hmm" or "I see"

 2. Try to understand the feeling the person is expressing, as well as the intellectual content. Most of us have difficulty talking clearly about our feelings, so it is important to pay careful attention.

 3. Restate the person's feeling briefly, but accurately. At this stage you simply serve as a mirror. Encourage the other person to continue talking. Occasionally make summary responses such as, "You think you are in a dead-end job", or "You feel the manager is playing favorites." In doing so, keep your tone neutral and try not to lead the person to your pet conclusions.

 4. Allow time for the discussion to continue without interruption and try to separate the conversation from more official communication of company plans. Do not make the conversation any more "authoritative" than it already is by virtue of your position in the organization.

 5. Avoid direct questions and arguments about facts; refrain from saying, "That is just not so", "Hold on a minute, let's look at the facts", or "Prove it." You may want to review evidence later, but a review is irrelevant to how a person feels now.

 6. When the other person touches on a point you want to know more about, simply repeat his statement as a question. For instance, if he remarks, "Nobody can break even on his expense account", you can probe by replying, "You say no one breaks even on expenses?" With this encouragement he will probably expand on his previous statement.

 7. Listen for what is not said, evasions of pertinent points or perhaps too-ready agreement with common clichés. Such an omission may be a clue to a bothersome fact the person wishes were not true.

 8. If the other person appears to genuinely want your viewpoint, be honest in your reply. In the listening stage, try to limit the expression of your views since these may influence or inhibit what the other person says.

 9. Do not get emotionally involved yourself. Try simply to understand first and defer evaluation until later.

 10. BE QUIET. Let the other person talk. Actively listen to what THEY have to say.

Question for you: Are you an active or passive listener?

Strong Relationships + Solid Leadership = Success for Everyone

Personal Strength on Mt. Everest

A late January weekend and one WHOLE day spent in front of the TV! Seems like a waste, but we tuned in Everest: Beyond the Limit(three season’s worth!) – and it wasworth it. This Discovery series had everything: stimulating, edge-of-the-seat examples of leadership, teamwork, individuality, compassion, perseverance, fortitude, failure, astonishing success, humility, courage, self-confidence, gratitude, effort, tolerance, commitment, responsibility, patience, decisiveness and more.

Discovery filmed teams making the Mt. Everest summit approach from the famous south side, but also from the north side of the mountain. These people invested months – and a great deal of money – in the dream/obsession/goal of summiting the world’s tallest peak. Their reasons for taking this on were different, the people themselves were very different, but each was determined to make it. One man was 71 year old, others live daily with physical disabilities, one man was raising money for a cause close to his heart, most were “regular” folks who had determined this was something they had to accomplish!

While summiting Mt. Everest wouldn’t be my particular dream at any age, it’s always mightily inspiring to watch others working toward something they really want – what they’re willing to contribute, how they’re willing to devote themselves and how they endure unspeakable hardships. Each person also learns something about him/herself through this process; after all, you’re facing yourself in some grueling situations, it’s life and death, so how do you behave?

I could stop here; just watching the series impressed me so much I woke this morning reliving some of the climbers experiences. But I also found myself thinking about the expedition leaders – these were the experienced climbers whose job was to “see the big picture” and manage communications, weather forecasting, coordination of sub-teams, guides and Sherpas. The leaders didn’t actually make the climb – they’d done that many times, but they oversaw all aspects of their teams’ experience; in fact their leadership was vital.

Climbing Mt. Everest has changed dramatically from the phenomenal feat accomplished by Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay in 1953 – today there are hundreds of climbers in any one short season and those who plan to survive usually use a commercial outfitter who provides the radio communication, climbing guides, indispensible Sherpas, safety ropes, ladders and weather forecasting from a base camp. As I said, the leader is below the climbers to see the big picture – lots of tension, nerves and finding a balance between “allowing” a team to continue or recalling a team or members for any number of reasons.

The leader is in charge, he’s there to provide expert advise, but after all, he’s not on the climb and cannot force climbers to do as he recommends.

As I thought about all the strengths we saw exhibited in this series, I mentally tallied the Personal Strengths ProStarCoach has built into it - strengths any one us can work to improve whether we ever climb Mt Everest of just deal with the daily challenges life throws our way. We all need the strengths I listed earlier: leadership, teamwork, individuality, compassion, perseverance, fortitude, failure, humility, courage, self-confidence, gratitude, effort, tolerance, commitment, responsibility, patience, decisiveness (and more!) and that’s the beauty of ProStar – it’s an online development system that structures exercises and provides resources for each of us to select and work on our personal growth – check it out here and use the 15 day FREE pass to explore the system. You  never know what challenge you’ll decide to take on in this life – get yourself prepared!

How Could This Be Handled? Issue #2: Motivating Team Members

Sometimes it seems impossible to reach certain team members – you may even wonder why they get up to come to this job each day because they seem so uninterested and removed.

But…they work here and you have to unlock the door that gets them turned on about working here!

Volumes have been written on this topic, yet the bottom line always comes back to “you can’t motivate others, they’re motivated by their own desires”.
 

If that’s the case, what are you, the team leader, supposed to do to light the fire in some team members?

Well, you CAN - and as an effective leader, you MUST - address the situation!

Read more here…

Are Fortune Cookies for Real?!

I want to encourage you to learn more about ProStar Coach, the creative virtual gym for your personal and professional growth. This is leadership development at its very best!

Let me give you one example now of what's inside ProStar.

If you have explored ProStar Coach, you've discovered Fortunes Cookies, one of the creative learning-exercises within the system.

The touching story of how Fortune Cookies was created is one you’ll want to read - you will be moved!

When you read Denny Coates' blog, you'll find yourself reading for a long time! He's provacative and inspiring.