Joelle K. Jay

leadership

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Turn Before You See the Island

If you truly mean to attain the vision you have set for yourself and your organization, you can’t just be organized. You’ve got to be strategic.

It’s the Second Practice of Personal Leadership: Find Focus.

Joe Pinto, Senior Vice President–Technical Support Systems at Cisco, explains.

“It’s important that leaders sit back and plan. My leadership team and I get together every three to four months. We sit down, and we have a couple of key stakeholders sit down with us, and we plan out where we’re going. We spend probably one fourth of the time looking back over the last three or four months, and three-quarters of the time looking forward to what decisions we’re making to run the business. [Our organization] is such a big engine that if we decide to turn the ship when we see the island, it’s too late.”

Planning ahead like this is critical, whether it’s for work (like when you’re planning your team’s direction), professional goals (like your own career advancement strategy), or a personal desire (like the way you want to experience the new year). It’s a commitment. It’s a sacrifice. It’s also a leadership “best practice.” So if you want to be a great leader, you’d best practice.

Again, here’s Joe’s three-part formula for finding focus:

1. Every three or four months, schedule a planning session.
2. Look back over the previous quarter.
3. Look forward to the decisions ahead.

I’ve created a guide that you can use every time you use this process. It’s called the Focus Areas Planning Guide, and it’s available (completely free!) at www.TheInnerEdge.com. Just click here.

Did you enjoy this profile? You may be interested in the eCourse, Getting an Edge: 21 Ways World Class Leaders Share Their Secrets for Leading and Living Well. The eCourse includes a set of brief leadership practices illustrated with the words and experience of a real business leader who exemplifies the practice. Each of 21 profiles just like this one comes in a separate email – once a day for 21 days. Email joelle@pillar-consulting.com now for more information.

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SMART Goals vs. WISE Goals

In the business world, we’ve been trained to set SMART goals. But are SMART goals always WISE?

SMART Goals are:
• Specific
• Measurable
• Action-Oriented
• Realistic and
• Time-Bound.
There’s value in that. “SMART” goals have helped many people move from vague unattainable goals to clear, specific action, leading to the attainment of powerful goals.

The problem with SMART thinking is that it has a tendency to limit instead of inspire.

SMART goals can work against you.
• They can work against you if you neglect to write them and keep them fresh.
• They can work against you if they’re isolated from other important parts of your life.
• They can work against you if they conflict or compete.
• They can work against you if they lack spirit and conviction.
To avoid these pitfalls, make sure your goals are both SMART and WISE.

‘WISE’ stands for:
• Written,
• Integrated,
• Synergistic, and
• Expansive.
WISE goals supplement the clear, specific action of SMART goals by connecting them to a grander vision of who you are and who you aspire to be.

Here’s an overview to guide you in setting WISE goals.

Written

The “W” in “WISE” stands for “written.” Writing your goals is a critical step – and one many people miss. Writing forces you to be clear in your thinking. It allows you to look at your plans with objectivity. It instills commitment and puts your thoughts in a durable form you can revisit again and again.

Integrated

The “I” in “WISE” stands for “integrated.” Integrating your ideas means bringing them together in the same place so you can look at them all at once. Allow your personal and professional lives to intermingle. It’s okay if right under “increase profit share” you have “get a kitten.” They both improve your quality of life. They both contribute to your definition of success. You get to have it all. There are no rules. You make it up.

Synergistic

The “S” in “WISE” means “synergistic.” Whereas integrating your goals means bringing them together, synergizing means making them work together. Synergy happens when one idea advances another. Keeping a vision of what you want in mind when you think about your goals will help create that synergy. You really lose something when you decouple your goals from your vision; they become just another prioritized list.

The most powerful and peaceful way to think about your efforts is to see how they can coalesce into one complete vision for your life.

Expansive

The “E” in WISE stands for “Expansive.” Think big. Your goals should inspire you to stay on the path to your dreams, not lock you into a pattern of ticking off bite-sized action items from here to retirement.

This may be the biggest differentiator between SMART and WISE thinking. Spending too much time and energy boxing your objectives into a hard and fast formula can squeeze the life right out of them. Some examples:

SMART GOAL– Schedule team-building and strategic planning off-site by end of January
WISE GOAL –Transform my staff into a team of inspired, empowered partners

SMART GOAL – Leave work by 6:00 p.m. three times a week, organize my office and work with my assistant to find new planning system within one month from today
WISE GOAL – Feel in control of my life

SMART GOAL – Go on a date with my wife at least twice a month and tell her why I appreciate her at least once a day starting August 3rd
WISE GOAL – Fall in love again

The best goals are both “smart” and “wise.” SMART thinking gives your goals specificity. WISE thinking gives them heart.

To summarize, although SMART goals make sense, your goals must also be WISE. In the words of Abraham Maslow, “When we free ourselves from the constraints of ordinary goals and uninformed scoffers we will find ourselves ‘roaring off the face of the earth.”

In The Inner Edge: The Extension, you’ll find a complete review of SMART and WISE goals, along with a worksheet to transform your current goals into powerful commitments. Click here to see a preview or to purchase The Extension. Or, go to www.TheInnerEdge.com and click on The Extension.

Please join us for The Inner Edge Book Club! This month we will be working with SMART and WISE goals so that you will approach your life and leadership with better focus – and better results. For more information, click here or email info@TheInnerEdge.com.

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Cycling Your Way to Clarity

Patrick Byrne, the CEO of Overstock.com, is a leader I’ve come to admire. He contributed to the book, The Inner Edge, and in fact, endorsed it. (To read his review, click here.)

In my workshops, I often use Patrick as an example for the First Practice of Personal Leadership: Get Clarity.

I like to distinguish between clarity and vision. Vision is the desired, ultimate end result; clarity is the ability to keep that vision alive day after day. Both are essential to succeed in any endeavor.

Patrick once told me he has had cancer three times, and each time he recovered, he has ridden his bike across the United States, from California to New York.

Think about the vision Patrick must have had for these cross-country trips. Arriving on his bike in New York. Finishing the ride. Maybe symbolizing beating cancer. Or celebrating life.

Now compare that to the clarity Patrick needed to get through the ride. Imagine what must have gone through his mind when the road got long. Or cold. Or hot. In the middle of the prairie and through every little town, every flat tire, every hungry mile. Why am I doing this again? Oh yes. Celebrating life. That constant reconnection to the vision is what we call clarity. It’s a different process than getting a vision. It’s pulling yourself from wherever you are, no matter how distant or disconnected it may seem, back to that vision once again. It’s that process of reconnecting, reconnecting, reconnecting that got Patrick through those rides.

And although he didn’t say it, I imagine the same was true for the cancer.

Clarity takes time to cultivate; sometimes we come by it easily and sometimes it takes a little more effort. Patrick once said to me, “Bicycling, I used to think about the Atlantic Ocean. I thought, as long as I’m pointed east and I’m still pedaling, I have to be getting closer.” When you have clarity about what you want, even if you don’t know exactly how to get there, you will be getting closer to your ultimate vision in every step.

I like to learn from leaders like Patrick. If you do, too, you may be interested in a series of leadership profiles I offer called Getting an Edge: 21 Ways World Class Leaders Share Their Secrets for Leading and Living Well. Each of 21 profiles just like this one comes in a separate email – once a day for 21 days. For more information email Info@TheInnerEdge.com.

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The Inner View

Have you ever lost clarity on the way to your vision? You feel like you need the answers. Before you can gain they clarity you want, you need to take a preliminary step: you need to ask the right questions.

Your ability to ask yourself powerful questions will allow you to uncover thoughts and feelings that influence your ability to be successful. You don’t just answer the questions; you explore them. Exploration is not an interview. It’s an inner view.

There are three steps to exploring your “inner view.”

Step 1: Identify the Topic

As your first step to getting clarity, you identify the topic. What do you need to get clear about? What’s the issue, challenge, desire or goal that’s worth exploring now? What is your purpose for seeking clarity at this time? It could be a decision about your career, a particular outcome for a project, or a new way to approach a goal. You are going on an exploration; think of this step as defining the territory.

Step 2: Ask Open-Ended Questions

Once you’ve defined the territory you want to explore, you mentally walk around in it, allowing your mind to wander around as you find out what there is to know. You do this by asking open-ended questions.

Perhaps the most obvious place to start is with the all-powerful question, “What do you want?”

Here are some more questions to help you see what else there is to learn as you explore.
• What are the biggest challenges you face?
• What’s the best-case scenario? What’s the worst-case scenario?
• How would you like to see this play out?
• What else is there to know?
Open-ended questions like these help you find what else is important to you to keep in mind.

Step 3: Explore the Answers
After you have an idea of what you want and some questions to stir your thinking, give yourself time to explore your ideas. This could take the form of journaling, discussion with a trusted friend, colleague or advisor, or quiet reflection. Exploration (especially self-exploration) is a process. Give it time.

Remember: You don’t have to have all the answers. But you do have to ask the questions.

And for a free resource to guide your thinking, use the worksheet, Your Inner View. A copy of this worksheet is also available on the website (www.theinneredge.com).

Please join us for The Inner Edge Book Club! This month we will be taking a more in-depth look into of Your Inner View as one powerful strategy for gaining better clarity in your life and leadership. For more information, click here or email info@TheInnerEdge.com.

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Don’t Throw the Oars out of the Lifeboat

Adapting to a new reality is hard work. It involves loss and risking incompetence and disorientation and discomfort. People need support to do that.

Those words come from one of the principals of Cambridge Leadership Associates, Marty Linsky, and he should know. He’s an expert in Adaptive Leadership.

During the economic crisis of 2009, Marty noticed that many leaders in failing companies were just trying to survive. Trying to bail themselves out, they frantically threw things overboard. They cut overhead. They fired employees. They cancelled travel. In some cases the things they threw out were the very things they needed to survive.

I’ve noticed the same trend among individual leaders and executives. Frantically trying to do (or keep) their jobs in a tough time, they neglected the support systems that could help them succeed.

Marty was talking with a senior administrator in a large foundation one day. The administrator reported, “The first thing that was cut was professional development for the senior people in the foundation.” In his view, it was “crazy.”

This is the time they really need coaching. Those folks need a structured opportunity to step back from what they’re doing and adjust their skills and adapt their orientation. They need the learning and the strategy. But when people are looking at where to save money, that kind of coaching feels like a frivolous expense.

Sometimes in our haste to manage change, we change the wrong things. We throw the oars out of the lifeboat. That doesn’t lighten the load, it makes you sink.

What do you need to be your best? What keeps you strong? What helps you think? What are the elements of your life that buoy you up?

No matter how busy you are, no matter how crazy life gets, hold onto those oars. That way even if it’s hard you can keep rowing in the direction you want to go.

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Make it Happen – Let it Happen: Experience the Possibilities

The 9th Practice of Personal Leadership, which we’ve been discussing this month in The Inner Edge Book Club, takes us on a path where our action-oriented business ideals almost seem to clash with a spirit of possibility.

But the ability to see possibility is how we often find the greatest opportunities in life.

When we’re going down the road to success in our culture, we often adopt the mindset of “Make it Happen.”  Our thinking in this mode (the “active” mode) is rational, strategic, goal-driven, and with it, we push forward at all times, relentlessly pursuing our goals. We’re focused and logical.

There’s another option – the mindset of “Let it Happen.” Our thinking in this mode (the “receptive” mode) is open to possibilities at all times. We’re not giving up our place at the front of the pack, but we’re allowing space there for possibilities to emerge. In this state, we’re accessing our intuitive natures — our optimism and insight.

Where these two modes converge is where the magic happens. It’s where new possibilities emerge. These may be business opportunities you’ve never considered or noticed. They may be solutions to problems you’ve been working through. They may be terrific insights.

We’re exploring the convergence of Making it Happen and Letting it Happen this month in The Inner Edge book club. And we’re learning strategies (“invitations” as I like to call them) to “let it happen” more easily and with better results. If you’d like to join us, please email me.

You can also learn more about how the book club works by clicking here for a description of The Inner Edge Community.

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Your Inner and Outer Edges – Your Möbius Strip

People are often curious about the large yellow image on the cover of The Inner Edge. Is it an 8? Is it the sign for infinity? Actually, it’s neither. That mysterious image is actually a geometrical shape, a Möbius Strip.

What’s unique about a Möbius strip is that as you trace your finger along its sides, you will find that where you may start on the outer edge, as you move your finger you will end up suddenly on the inner edge. Keep tracing and you’ll be on the outer edge again.

I chose a Möbius strip as the cover illustration for The Inner Edge: The 10 Practices of Personal Leadership, because it symbolizes for me the inner and outer aspects of your leadership. As I studied the Möbius strip, I was struck by the continuous movement, from inside to outside and back again to inside — what a perfect metaphor for the infinite value of our inner and outer harmony!

When you delve further into The Inner Edge, you’ll find that I focus almost all of my attention on the personal, internal aspect of leadership, and I do that intentionally because I know that that’s the core of any outer success you’ll find, either in your business or at home.

The Möbius strip reminds me that effectiveness as a leader is intimately related to personal thoughts and feelings.

As you work on your Inner Edge, developing clarity, focus and vision, you’ll find these personal strengths correlating with your team management, planning and business leadership. In fact, you’ll find that they are one steady stream.

This is leadership from the inside out. It’s creating a continuum from your inner world to your outer. When these two are humming on the same Möbius strip, you’re in alignment, and great things happen.

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Leadership is for Everyone: You Are a Leader

Leadership does not live solely in the corner office anymore, and it’s not just for business executives either. Everyone is a leader in some way. You are a leader.

When I began to speak about leadership, I met some people who truly believed that leadership was not relevant to their lives. They didn’t manage an office, didn’t lead a construction crew, and didn’t have children. How could leadership be applicable to them?

My intuitive answer then is the same as my well-studied answer now: leadership is relevant to each and every one of us. Think of all the ways you interact in life, whether some of those are in a business role or not. I’ll wager that you’ll find that you are a leader in some of your roles.

Here’s something from The Inner Edge that I’d like to share with you: Beyond business leaders, professionals, teachers, and other obvious leadership roles, you’ll find leadership in many aspects of life. Look for it in community activities, families, amongst friends, and in categories such as inspirational and thought leaders.

Look around you, and think of how you are spending your day. You’ve been a leader for others at some point today, and beyond that, you’ve been a leader of your own life all day.

No matter who you are or what you do, you get to take the lead in your life. No one else will do that for you. No one else can. You may or may not have a fancy suit, a nameplate on the door, and an assistant just outside. But every single one of us is leading a life, which may be the most exciting kind of leadership of all.
Excerpt from The Inner Edge: The 10 Practices of Personal Leadership by Joelle K Jay

Lead your life well: lead it from your Inner Edge.

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Your Leadership Shapes Your Life

In The Inner Edge: The 10 Practices of Personal Leadership, I talk about something that I passionately believe: The way you lead shapes your life. By this I mean much more than simply creating life-to-work balance. I’m talking about leading from the inside out.

I explain this concept in The Inner Edge. We work together on it in our Inner Edge Community, and I’ll be blogging about it over the coming months right here, with you as my partner. I invite you to submit your thoughts, discoveries, experiences, successes and challenges as you familiarize yourself with the practices in The Inner Edge.  I encourage you to experiment with the practices described in the book, the workbook and other materials, and I hope you’ll share your ups and downs with us here on The Inner Edge blog.

Join us on our Facebook page, too, as we do our utmost to connect Inner Edge readers and participants. Also, I invite you to sign up for the free Inner Edge Newsletter. I want to make sure you have all the tools you need to help you find your Inner Edge.

Your leadership is a gift. Your world – whether it’s your personal sphere of influence, your business organization, or the world at large – will be bettered by you being your best. I’m here to support you in that effort. So, please join me, and we’ll work together for your greatest success.