The Asshole Pill

Normally I wouldn’t use any course language or obscenities in my writing, but for this story to make sense I must, hence the title “The Asshole Pill”!  Before I get into the heart of telling this story, I want to say thanks to those of you who take the time to read my material.  I have been truly overwhelmed by the text messages, Facebook comments and the amount of face-to-face conversations on how people have been helped by these stories.  For that I’m truly grateful and you inspire me to keep going!

About 10 years ago, as I was progressing nicely through a high-level leadership position, I was introduced to the concept of taking an “Asshole Pill”.  I should mention that this was a great place to work, and provided me and my family some amazing opportunities. For that I’m always grateful. However, there were some true challenges with our direction and how we should work with people.

It was during my annual performance review when I first heard the term “Asshole Pill’.  The review itself was going well, and I felt that I had made some awesome gains over the past year.  As part of the review you openly discuss upcoming opportunities and what I was looking for in terms of my next advancement.  I had my eye on moving into the next position which was one down from the Plant Manager, and this was no secret.  Early on in my career I learned that you should dress for the job you want, not the job you had. I wasn’t shy in doing this and letting my ambitions be known. As we were wrapping up the last part of the feedback, I was told that I was just too nice of a guy and if I wanted to better my career one thing I should do was, “take an Asshole Pill”.  So, I asked, “what exactly does that mean??”. I was told that basically I should be harder on my leaders which in turn would make them harder on their teams.  This type of Leadership is more of an authoritative approach and unfortunately it is one that gets practiced way too much.

So of course, I gave my Mother a call since I pretty much told her everything (as you read in my “Suit Yourself” article) and we discussed the “Asshole Pill” concept. She said “that’s not who you are Mike. The opposite of being nice is being mean and you’re just not that guy.”  So, I listened to my Mother’s words and stuck to my beliefs on how to lead and connect with people.  I didn’t get that promotion, which was okay, because I really loved the position I was in at the time. What made me even more happy is that I stuck to what I believed in and the leaders and teams under my guidance became stronger, fostering great relationships.

A few years later, even though it was one of the scariest decisions I ever made, I left that career to pursue my passion within my own business. I’m proud to say this is my 4th year of Coaching and Developing Leaders at Simply Advanced.

Being true to yourself regardless of positions, status, titles and money is the only way to truly be satisfied in your work or personal life.  It is good to adapt and be flexible to the never-ending changes in our world as this helps us all grow and be better, but never become someone you’re not, no matter what.  It’s not good to sacrifice who you are and, in this case, swallow an “Asshole Pill”. 

Suit Yourself

“Suit yourself” was a saying my mom used when we were growing up. When I was young, I never really understood the meaning of it. I recall mentioning it to my sister and discovering at one point we both thought it had something to do with us getting ourselves dressed! I never really got the meaning of the expression until many years later and it took me awhile to understand exactly what she was trying to do.

Mom didn’t see the value in yelling or threatening us. She was never comfortable with that type of environment and felt it would only make matters worse. She believed in talking things through, always taking the time to listen and be empathetic. Her way was truly a way of teaching and promoting openness by asking good questions, taking the time to listen and provide guidance… even when the choices we made at times were not such great choices.

I know ‘suit yourself’, was Mom’s way of saying, “I wouldn’t do what your about to do, but you need to decide for yourself”. She would try to help us understand the consequences of our choices, but at times we didn’t listen, and she would say “suit yourself”. When things backfired, which was almost every time, Mom was there. Never saying ‘I told you so’, or giving us a stern lecture, but to support us and talk through the situation, always being very open and honest about what we did and what we learned. We didn’t need to be yelled at or grounded. It was punishment enough knowing we let her down. It was enough to make us think harder about our choices next time. However, I still made bad choices… it took me a little longer to catch on, but she always stood beside me!

In my business, I spend time working with all levels of leadership, coaching and influencing each leader to truly show up and be the best possible version of themselves. Always fostering an environment of honesty and transparency even when mistakes are made. Always understanding and practicing empathy as we all have things that affect us in different ways. Being the leader who creates accountability through fostering and learning from failures. The ‘suit yourself’ type of model can easily be applied to leadership. A good leader’s job is much like my mom’s. She allowed me to venture out places I had never been before to help my growth and development, without fear of punishment or reprisal, always coaching and helping me along the way.

When a new person starts, take your time to teach them, promote an environment of learning, where mistakes are opportunities. When your kid comes home with a failed test, you don’t decide to put them up for adoption, you work with them to do better and learn. It’s no different when someone on your team is struggling, you take your time to help and coach them to do better and learn. Focus on what went wrong rather than who went wrong.

Some may have thought Mom was too easy on us and maybe we got way with too much. We like to think Mom stayed true to her belief in allowing us to make our own decisions and was never really concerned with what others thought. Mom passed almost two years ago, and like any loss it requires time, reflection and a whole lot of sharing of memories to help ease the pain. Mom’s passing personally saved my life…but that’s a whole other story!

Thanks Mom, for believing in me and always being there!

Empathy

The ability to understand and share the feelings of another.

When we talk about empathy, we often refer to the term ‘walking in the other person’s shoes, but it’s much more than that. Empathy and Leadership go hand and hand, the better the Leader understands and embraces empathy the stronger the connection he or she has with their team. Empathy comes in 3 different forms of attention and each one of these holds a very important part within Leadership.

Cognitive Empathy enables the leader to explain themselves in meaningful and sincere ways, a skill essential to getting the best performance from their team. Applying cognitive empathy requires leaders to think about feelings rather than to feel them directly. Being inquisitive and curious about people fuels cognitive empathy.

Emotional Empathy is effective for mentoring, coaching and understanding team dynamics. Accessing your capacity for emotional empathy depends on combining two kinds of attention: a deliberate focus on your own opinion of someone else’s feelings and an open awareness of that person’s face, voice and other external signs of emotion (AKA body language).

Empathetic Concern, which is closely related to emotional empathy, enables you to sense not just how people feel but what they need from you, it’s what you want in a leader. We intuitively experience the distress of another as our own. However, in deciding whether we will meet that persons needs, we deliberately weigh how much we value his or her well being. Those whose feelings become too strong may themselves suffer. In the helping profession, this can lead to compassion fatigue, it can create distracting feelings of anxiety about people and circumstances that are beyond anyone’s control. But those who deaden their feelings may lose touch with empathy. Empathetic concern requires us to manage our personal distress without numbing ourselves to the pain of others.

We all have some level of each type of empathy. Contact me to learn more about empathy and how Simply Advanced can provide your leaders with tools and methods to help them foster each type to strengthen relationships, personally and professionally.

Active Listening...

There’s a Reason We Have 2 Ears and 1 Mouth!

Active listening is much more than being silent while the other person speaks. The best listeners periodically ask questions that promote discovery and insight that gently challenge old assumptions but do so in a constructive way.

Active listening is a cooperative conversation. Conversation flows smoothly with neither party becoming defensive. Poor listeners are usually competitive, pointing out errors in reasoning or logic and turning the topic of interest into their own.

Here are some key points to help with active listening:

• The listener creates a safe environment in which difficult, complex, or emotional issues can be discussed.

• The listener clears away distractions like phones, laptops, focusing the attention on the other person and making appropriate eye contact (60% of the time).  This behaviour not only affects how you are perceived as the listener; it immediately influences the listener’s own attitudes and feelings.  Acting the part changes how you feel inside.  This in turn makes you a better listener.

• The listener seeks to understand the substance of what the other person is saying.  They capture ideas, ask questions and restate issues to confirm that their understanding is correct.

• The listener observes non-verbal cues, such as facial expressions, perspiration, respiration rates, gestures, posture, and numerous other subtle body language signals. It is estimated that 80% of what we communicate comes from these signals. It sounds strange but you listen with your eyes as well as your ears.

• The listener increasingly understands the other person’s emotions and feelings about the topic at hand and identifies and acknowledges them. The listener empathizes with and validates those feelings in a supportive and nonjudgmental way.

Active listening includes interactions that build up a person’s self esteem. The best listener makes the conversation a positive experience for the other party.

Contact me to learn more about Active Listening and how Simply Advanced can provide your leaders with tools and methods to help them continue to grow.

Increasing Employee Engagement

5 Strategies for Leaders…

Strategy 1: "I WILL SHOW YOU HOW YOU AND YOUR WORK MATTER TO ME" BY...

• being clear about your expectations and the values of the organization

• talking about the meaning of our work and what we do here

• finding ways to acknowledge your contributions to the bigger picture

Strategy 2: "I WILL ENABLE YOU TO BE MORE EFFECTIVE IN YOUR JOB" BY...

• asking you for feedback, providing guidance and coaching when needed

• giving you choices in how to do your job, involve you in improvements

• recognizing your good work in a way that matters to you and motivates you

Strategy 3: "I WILL ENCOURAGE YOU TO BE MORE INNOVATIVE" BY...

• encouraging you to try new approaches and take risks, mistakes are promoted as opportunities

• asking what "can we learn from this situation?"

• talking about the possibilities of the future

Strategy 4: "I WILL ENCOURAGE YOUR GROWTH IN YOUR JOB" BY...

• providing challenging opportunities for you to test new skills

• supporting decisions that you make and learning from our mistakes

• being clear on our goals, plans, and milestones

Strategy 5: "I WILL BE A LEADER YOU WANT TO SUPPORT AND FOLLOW WILLINGLY" BY...

• treating you with dignity and respect, together building a “bridge foundation” of trust

• following through on promises and commitments and holding each other accountable

• seeking ways to celebrate accomplishments

Simply Advanced can provide your leaders with tools and methods to help them continue to grow.

Contact me to learn more.