Author: Stephen Dawson

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Advancing

“Do you hear me? Do you care?” Missing Persons

 

Stephen H Dawson, DSL

The band Missing Persons released a tune in 1982 called Words. The tune considered the value of talking when no one is listening. The music video craze was starting then, and the audio aspect of the music video was almost unheard by many viewers. The point made by Missing Persons is valid. Society sometimes reaches a place where doing nearly anything without listening occurs by the majority of people. It is this condition where the world now finds itself.

Today, the biggest party in decades is in full swing. It has been in motion for a few months and looks like it will go on for at least another year. The party is about feeling human again. Those alive now endured 2020 by dealing with COVID-19, loss of income, and perhaps the loss of loved ones. The party is epic in scale. Those attending this party do not want to hear any more bad news for a long time. They are happy to have whatever they have now, but they want more consumerism. They want their version of the truth and not much else going into their hearts and minds. The Summer of Love is the closest example I can provide for what we are witnessing in 2021.

This non-listening-to-truth party is perhaps the most dangerous scenario a leader could experience. Life has a way of bringing reality to us all, as COVID-19 did in 2020. A leader who has closed their ears, eyes, and mind to truth will find they are deficient as a leader when truth shows up as it does from time to time. Today, let’s look at how you can avoid the pain of this dangerous experience by remembering the pain the world went through for several years after the carefree summer of 1967. Ever notice how these big parties seem to occur after a war concludes?

Let’s look at some research. Then, let’s look at some of the societal and political pressures compressing folks today. Then, let’s look at what can help you to avoid the dangers associated with the impending decompressing. Finally, some considerations of how we can best advance forward together as we say goodbye to one another for now.

I know, there is a lot of material presented today. However, I am not sure when we will meet again. It is best to equip you now with the material we need to address to keep you going forward as a growing leader until we meet again. I will use several examples of imagery during our discussion today to help stitch together the bigger picture. Take your time reading this material so that it will soak into you as deep as possible.

 

PERSPECTIVE

Today, I see a metaphorical spring device compressed under tension below the people of the world. It has been compressed by various forms of societal and political pressures. Share on X The global population stands above the spring. The day will come when the societal and political pressures will shift, causing the spring to decompress. Those who are above or beside the spring will be injured by the spring decompressing. Those that are not above or beside the decompressed spring will also feel some form of pain. It is this exact danger a credible leader will assure the people in their organization do not experience or at least experience minimally.

Now, another way to consider this spring is a trampoline. Imagine the trampoline in this video which set a world record for size. The trampoline looks fun until something crucial to the equations shifts and injuries occur. So, take a moment and ask yourself how interested you are in leading your people for a ride on this trampoline.

 

 

RESEARCH

Molly Baker shared research on what entrepreneurs have learned from the COVID-19 pandemic. Specifically, plan to stay out of danger. Jeremy Howell shared research from the CEO perspective on the same topic, finding the same results. The nonprofit association called Business Roundtable is working the approach to see what is coming in the world of business. They found planning is a valuable contributor to success, as declared in their statement of purpose.

Ron Carucci performed research comprising a 15-year longitudinal study of more than 3,200 leaders on organizational honesty. Carucci found the success factors for building a reputation as a trustworthy leader included making values clear, living up to those values, treating others and their work with dignity, determining when to be open and when to protect confidences, and cultivating a sense of unity across the organization. Remember our discussion about trust? The Carucci findings are supported as credible by this writer.

Harry Dempsey shared the present microprocessor shortage is expected to last until the middle of 2022. Reshma Kapadia stated that Taiwan Semiconductor is the world’s most important chip maker, even though its stock share price is down 15% since mid-February. Remember our discussion on the topic of microprocessors? The 47th G7 Summit is positioned to establish a global minimum tax rate on company profits for businesses that operate internationally. Paul Hannon, Richard Rubin, and Sam Schechner reported that member nations have agreed on global minimum corporate-tax rate rules. John Lyons and Frances Yoon considered the bigger picture of companies choosing to leave Hong Kong, finding the perceived need to be in Hong Kong is decreasing by the day for many individuals and companies. Angela Tan shared the G7’s global minimum tax deal may nullify any tax advantage Singapore offers. Singapore Financial Secretary Paul Chan shared, “The proposed changes to the global tax regime may affect some of the tax concessions the Hong Kong government offers to various industries.”

The action in play now by global governments is to grab big piles of money by way of taxes while the world is having its party. The trend I see playing out is to take money from Asia where the economies are doing great and bring it to the United States and European Union. Things have been down, up, and then down again since 2008 for the US and mostly down for the EU since 2008.

 

COMPRESSION

I said recently, “Trust is the connector of evidence and faith.” I maintain this position. The trust within society is falling apart by the pressure applied to it from the political position combined with a societal position shifting from national to global in many nations, but not all nations. Nationalism is still a pervasive consideration in the majority of nations.

The pattern occurring over history for a constructive society is society does whatever it does, then the politics align with the actions of society’s majority. This turn of events does not last forever. Germany rebuilt powerfully after World War I, then met its demise at the end of World War II after an incredible comeback from defeat just under three decades earlier. This societal-political flow is like a river. The water flows downstream from society to politics. Today, the politics are trying to drive society to do what political positions want to have happen without widespread support from society. The result is the river is trying to flow upstream. This reversed flow is another form of compression, as gravity is pushing against the backward flow.

We are talking much more than who won the 2020 elections in this country or that country, the origins of COVID-19, or when will be the next cyber attack on a company or country. We are also talking about jobs, kids, schools, and the ability to see loved ones both when and as preferred. These topics are timeless and cross all societal and economic levels. These topics are where things get personal for everyone, where the rubber meets the road, where trust in leaders had better be in place if leaders expect followers to be with them willingly.

The release of this compressed spring device has only one assured outcome: determining who collaborated with those that caused the pain during spring decompression. The spring pops, people are hurt, the masses are upset about the harm, and they want justice for their suffering. We have seen this scenario play out many times in history. The most recent vivid example of these events playing out occurred in 1944.

Germany was losing the war after the invasion at Normandy, arguably earlier. We discussed this topic when we considered evil. Essentially, some of the folks in oppressor-occupied nations collaborated with their enemy. Most notably, the horizontal collaboration events. The people of those occupied nations knew who was collaborating with their enemy. When their enemy ran in fear, those harmed by the collaboration paid retribution to those collaborators. They did so in part by shaving their heads, marking their skin with symbols, and casting them out of their society. The message was simple and clear: you made your irrevocable choice, now you are no larger a part of us. The images and video of this payback experience also occurred in the nations where the Japanese and Italians fell in defeat.

The civil aspect of this retaliation occurred by civilian hands. The military aspect is even more strict. The Uniform Code of Military Justice, UCMJ, is regulated by the United States Congress. UCMJ articles 77-134 define punitive punishment. UCMJ article 103b is the law covering aiding the enemy. The penalty for aiding the enemy is death, much worse than a bad haircut. Many developed nations have similar military laws in place.

Things get worse for society as a whole in terms of payback over the past two decades. The effort comprising institutionalized support of non-heterosexuality by the observance of LGBT Pride Month provides no assurance women will be protected from any form of retaliation repercussions from any topic in the future. The lack of assurance comes from the LGBT premise disregarding assigned sex without ambiguity in favor of gender identity by using the personal sense of one’s own gender. The disregard of gender eliminates almost all protection for women from an assault during retribution of collaboration or any other payback reason because there is no female to protect. However, there are still valid reasons for hope.

The LGBT topic is the most significant conflict point between traditional and postmodern culture-based societies. It is the most significant conflict point because of the force applied by each group for acceptance of each worldview through religion, legislation, and commerce to form clear rights. A more concise example of these LGBT events playing out is a storm surge on the boundary of the social groups who hold the propensity for the continuance of the human race versus those who desire to reshape the human race into a form that defies reason for both its survivability and thrive-ability.

The cancel culture phenomenon is not new, but it is unique to our time. It, combined with separation for those who refuse to receive the COVID-19 immunization, are examples of forming distinct groups. The spring pops, people are hurt, the masses are upset about the harm, and they want justice for their suffering. Those targeted by the cancel culture efforts and those who refuse to receive the COVID-19 immunization are further examples of targeted groups receiving retribution.

You see, the spring is more than a single reason. It is any reason that justifies retribution in the minds of the majority who has the power to want their form of justice delivered to them. It is at this point where the rulings of espoused morality occur, rendering whatever judgments they find valid. The members comprising the group named “they,” are those who suffered either perceived or actual harm.

Remember our discussion about love and diplomacy? I made the statement, “Diplomacy without reasoning is lunacy. If there is no room for reason, then there is no likelihood of success in any engagement with people regardless of either using or not using diplomacy.” I maintain this position. Remember our discussion about how ambivalence does not help anyone accomplish love? The reasoning I presented in these discussions about loving people being the only viable answer serves to help resolve the conflict between those who disagree with and those who support LGBT rights. Neither hatred nor ambivalence ever did anything productive in life. So, the only thing we can do is love one another as we work together to try and find the means that will somehow help the disagreeing groups live in peace and not attempt to destroy one another.

 

If the conflict of cultures present today arises to the form of war, then the struggle between person versus person will structure to a clear espoused worldview found in group versus group. There will be little doubt which side, camp, group, or team a person stands with during this conflict. Neutrality by either person, company, or country will not be an option as those who take a side will be the majority of the population, and they will refuse to allow bystanders not to make a choice. We are witnessing this premise play out today in the growing number of calls for resolving supposed injustice to an aggrieved group of either gender, skin color, religion, ethnicity, or some combination of these demographic and psychographic elements. The attributes of conflict, persecution, and payback are again headed to harmful consequences. Just ask those who lived between World War I and II about life during those years. They will tell anyone who will listen to the signs of the times then and how they match up to what we are witnessing today.

My heart breaks considering the events of collaboration with an enemy, as the payback occurs based on long-held anger. Those who collaborate with an enemy make irrevocable choices. Those who provide retribution also make irrevocable choices. The spring pops, and people are harmed.

I am an optimist, but I am also a realist. If love does not take hold of our hearts on a global basis, then I cannot help but believe the conflict we will force on one another will be quite harmful. Again, there is hope. Another spring pops, people are hurt, the masses are upset about the harm, and they want justice for their suffering. However, their justice will be peace and not continued conflict. We have also seen this scenario play out many times in history.

The societal and political pressures compressing this spring device each cry out for qualified leadership. Together, they demonstrate the clear need for qualified leadership. The qualified attribute is the key to this calling. Not everyone will lead, wants to lead, or is even capable of leading. We are in a watershed moment of history now. The future of the next century is being shaped before our eyes, as the traditional and postmodern culture-based societies decide what they will and will not concede for their beliefs. Whatever the answers are from each of these societies will determine how much overlap there is between them. Then, things will be more definite for how they will either coexist or live apart.

Anyone willing to serve in a leadership role at this point has their work cut out for them. How about you? Are you up for serving in a leadership role? Do you need further leadership development? Leadership is not easy, but I never said it was easy.

 

TRUTH

I shared last week the most controversial topic I handle in my work is the concept of truth. I also said last week, “Truth is realized by reason. Reason is manifested in process.” The majority of my work involves helping people see and embrace truth. This understanding of truth is the basis of our work going forward.

I have learned, painfully, there are three states of reality for awareness of truth. I use the term reality as the part of truth that a person realizes, not whatever is or is not true but has no bearing in their life. Remember our discussion on the topic of assessing? Truth is a singular term.

The first reality state is the worst for everyone involved. The second reality state of truth is the scariest for everyone involved. The last reality state of truth is the most difficult for anyone to do, but it is also the most beneficial.

The first reality state of truth awareness is avoiding truth. This condition is practiced by both the ignorant and the sophisticated. The ignorant are unaware of what they do not know. They grab the hot clothes iron with the hope they can learn why the iron makes the fabric flat. The sophisticated is a thespian who practices their avoidance of truth with polished eloquence. This reality state brings those who attempt to lead by way of reason nothing but pain. It is best to not be with anyone in the first reality state, as they are dangerous to all they encounter both directly and indirectly.

The second reality state of truth awareness is indifference to truth. This person is not sure what they feel, think, or believe about a topic. So, they are unable to arrive at understanding the truth of the topic. They are like the animal standing in the road that is killed by the oncoming vehicle. They do not move. They do not do anything. They are scared at the moment before their death. Their fear causes you to be in danger. It is best to put this person to the side of you in a safe spot, if they will go there and stay there, while they hopefully figure out whatever it is they feel, think, and believe about truth.

The final reality state of truth awareness is wanting to know truth. This person has been harmed by both the first and second reality state. They have no desire to live in any condition that will prevent them from holding reason to know truth. This reality state is difficult for them as they work tirelessly to know truth.

Now, it does not matter what the topic is or is not, the aspect of the topic, or the truth about the topic. It does not matter if the topic is understood completely or even at all. What matters is the harm and benefit combination you experience from the topic. Remember our discussions about looking and reading? Those points were made early in our time together to help you mature those skills so you can use them as soon as possible.

AVOIDANCE

I do not broker in sensationalism. I refuse to listen to fearmongering. I spoke against fear several weeks back. My intention now is to help develop you as a leader to avoid the spring device underneath the global society now decompressing as an outcome of musical chairs, considering no one knows either when the spring will decompress or who will be harmed by their not having a chair.

We would be wise to cover many more topics to develop you as a leader further, regardless of your mastery of each topic now. The need for this additional work on our part is formed by your need for more power as a leader. Remember our discussion on power sourced by servitude? Remember our discussion on power sourced by humility? I will now share a list containing some of the items we need to cover to further develop you as a leader and address each item briefly. There are many more items on the list, but here is a glimpse of what we have for the work ahead of us.

The quest for any status is an example of evil. Remember our discussion about the excusability of evil? Remember the story of Michael Hingson from last week? The way to overcome the need for a particular status is to serve humbly. Your actions will assign you the status you need for the moment.

There is endless preparation work involved in any aspect of leadership. A plan may hold a good idea, but it is not a plan without a schedule. A plan is matched with a schedule. All talk without supporting evidence is cheap, and so is a plan without an executable schedule.

There is endless work involved in data management. Remember our discussion several weeks back about leaders not having sufficient data analysis skills? The ability to understand the lifecycle of data in your organization is paramount for any leader, particularly those at the executive level. Understanding and accomplishing calculations by hand, spreadsheet, or any other mathematical tool is non-negotiable for a successful leader.

Truth is absolute, not relative. Remember our discussion a few weeks back on The Stuff? I can spend several hundred pages addressing the topic of truth alone. The topic of truth was a part of my doctoral dissertation work. There is no process, no strategy, no plan, or anything else defined as accurate apart from truth.

We have only scratched the surface of succession planning during our time together. Anyone who holds thoughts of impunity as they believe they are a sheep of your shepherding is not a person you need in your organization. Remember our discussion about organization antibodies? Our effort to find new people for your organization applies directly to the work of succession planning. It involves moving people up in your organization, not out. The need to evaluate people during the succession process must be based on reason to avoid the appearance of impropriety through favoritism bias to maintain your credibility as a leader.

CLOSURE

We started off our time together discussing a destination that was unknown. We knew that people at the time were mad enough to fight about how things were going for them. I shared several weeks later how “I both have fought and will fight tooth-and-nail to defend those who I love.” We then went on to discuss love in a deep study. We have accomplished much together. We are off to a great start. You are in much better shape now than before we started our work.

I am going to take some time and rest before I begin work for some new customers. I urge you to contact me by email when you are ready to pick up our effort to develop you as a leader. I have enjoyed our time together. My sales pitch includes the line, “Applying my consulting and educational knowledge to an organization is a unique experience for both myself and the organization.” Our time together has been unique for me. I hope it has also been unique for you.

I trust we will talk again, soon. I look forward to hearing from you. Take care of yourself until then. I will do the same.

 

The sky above us, the unknown.

 

Dr. Stephen H. Dawson, DSL
Executive Strategy Consultant

Dr. Stephen H Dawson

Stephen Dawson is an executive consultant of technology and business strategy, serving significant international organizations by providing leadership consulting, strategic planning, and executive communications. He has more than thirty years of service and consulting experience in delivering successful international business development and program management outcomes in the US and SE Asia.

Dr. Dawson has served in the technology, banking, and hospitality industries. He is a noted strategic planning visionary. His pursuit of music has been matched with his efforts to lead by service to followers. He holds the clear understanding a leader without followers is a person taking a long walk alone.

Stephen has lived his life in the eastern United States, visiting most of the United States and several countries. He is a graduate of the Regent University School of Business & Leadership. Contact him at service@shdawson.com.

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Jim Weber – Managing Partner, ITB Partners

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Success

You plan a tower that will pierce the clouds? Lay first the foundation of humility.” Saint Augustine

Stephen H Dawson, DSL

You have found the person you need to serve in the role you need to be filled. They have agreed to serve in the role. You have solved your strategic planning problem by resolving your people problem. You have realized success. I congratulate you on your achievement.

We have covered much ground in this commentary series. It is the ground from day one, not only the assessing, matching, and interviewing work. Today, we need to review some of what you could have done as you made your decisions over the past several months. It is not my position to either criticize, condemn or complain about your actions. It is my intent to further develop you as a leader by considering where you stand after your recent events of dealing with the people problems in your organization.

I shared several weeks back we still need to discuss physical impairments resulting in a disability when you consider selecting members for your organization. I held off on discussing this topic with you until after you made your hiring decision for a reason. I maintain the position the first requirement for any applicant is for them to hold the skills necessary to fill the role where they would like to serve. Let’s talk now about the risk you incur by being blinded from reason. Think about all we have covered in our time together to help you with your strategic planning problem and how it developed you as a leader.

SUCCESS

The concept of success means many different things to everyone. You had a specific objective. We walked out on how to accomplish your objective. You made your decisions. You took action. You met the requirements you assigned to your objective. This combination is what I call a clear success.

If you are like most folks I have met, then you are experiencing some degree of fear now. You are wondering if you made the right staffing choice, the best staffing choice, the most reasonable staffing choice you could have made. Share on XWe talked about being scared. You will never know these answers about your choices for certain. What you can know is you did the best you could with what you had to work with inside of you at the time. Now, that combination may not be enough to succeed in all objectives. However, for the objective we undertook, you have enough proof to demonstrate you are on the side of reason to prove your success in this effort.

What we cannot prove is if you were humble enough during your work to locate a replacement member of your organization. We discussed the power of humility several weeks back. What I can tell you is my heart knows when I have not been humble enough toward others. I know it by my being uncomfortable to be around them after I take action. How about you? Are you feeling good about how you acted recently around your people?

Wondering

BLINDNESS

I discussed several weeks back how you need to leverage general counsel and human resources. Their work is outside of your expertise. You need their input, but you run the business. It is reasonable to feel as though you would like to have more and less of their input at the same time. This feeling results from the combination of your staffing choice having a significant impact on your organization, the new member, and the impact of using their skills to your maximum benefit.

How about unconscious bias? Did you make your staffing selection based on an affinity for a group of similarities? Are you feeling good about how you acted recently around your people?

I intend to use the following story to connect as much, if not all, of the material we have covered in this commentary series. I hope the story hits you square in your chest as it did for me when I first read it. I hold this hope for you as the chest is where we seem to measure how we know right from wrong.

Hingson and Flory tell the story of Michael Hingson. Hingson went to work on September 11, 2001, as he had for a long time. He worked on the seventy-eighth floor of the World Trade Center in New York City. A plane crashed into the building fifteen stories below him that day. His thoughts after the crash were to call his wife and inform her he was alive, then see to the safety of his coworkers as part of a building evacuation process. Hingson shared many people he worked with, along with people he did not work with on the same floor, were scared to the point they could not evacuate. Evacuation meant overcoming the obstacle of the horrific damage on the sixty-third floor. Hingson did what needed to be done at the moment. He started walking to the stairwell, asking those around him to follow him onto the stairs. The people, one by one, moved to follow him. They crawled over demolished concrete, beside raging fires, and around those who died during the plane crash. Hingson led several, then dozens, then hundreds of people out of the World Trade Center, gaining new followers floor by floor before the building collapsed less than five minutes after he exited the building.

Now, the context. Hingson is blind. He lost his eyesight years before this 2001 event. Hingson accomplished crisis communications, succession planning, agile project management, phased project management, and the preservation of life that day. Hingson did have his guide dog with him. Hingson is what I call a leader, a servant, a hero.

I urge you to contextualize your efforts to lead given Hingson and evaluate if your executive leadership abilities, your willingness to serve your followers, your commitment to do what I called right during our many discussions of morality matches what your organization needs to accomplish. What I do not know is what you call right. Your organization may need to accomplish in the next few minutes something it did not plan to accomplish. Our discussion of market sector stability, along with the acquisitions and mergers listed daily in the newspapers over the past several years, means your organization is most likely going to face something they need to accomplish outside of your planning. The need may not be a crisis, but it will probably be a substantial turn of events for you and those you lead. My intent is not to scare you. My intent is to focus you on the importance of not leading from an isolated perspective. Hingson had no perspective of eyesight, but he had the perspective to lead followers regardless of the nature of the circumstances by contextualizing the circumstances. This combination is called strategic vision.

The message of the Hingson story is simple. Do not let your leadership work be outside of your organization but an integral part of your organization. Otherwise, you probably would do well not to pursue either your project or serve as a leader. The more profound point here is your organization is not static in construct.

I first read the story of Michael Hingson in the newspaper on September 14, 2001, during breakfast. I was living in the Washington, D.C. area at the time. I was trying to make sense of what happened over the past few days. The part of the building where I used to work did not exist anymore. I reflected on the choices I had made over the past 72-hours. It was a difficult week for me.

The events I experienced 20 years ago are similar to the effort you are trying to achieve now: make more sense of how you solved your strategic planning problem by resolving your people problem. The context is different, but the needs and objectives are the same. You are trying to know if you did what you needed to do to the best of your ability at the time.

A close look at things when they happen is a sound approach to getting a good perspective on things. Then, stepping back and reviewing events later to see how things look after the dust settles. If it helps you understand things now, I still have the Michael Hingson story article I tore out of the newspaper after breakfast that morning.

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NEXT

This commentary series on the topic of strategic planning will conclude next week. I will share with you next week some guidance on the next steps you would do well to consider in your leadership development journey. I hold the position development is a journey, not a single destination known as destiny. Development is a series of destinations comprising the journey.

We will discuss next week the most controversial topic I handle in my work. It is the concept of truth. The truth scares people. Truth moves people. Truth is not discussed much in public circles today. If you desire to serve as a leader and realize anything close to the concept of success, then you cannot avoid the truth. Truth is realized by reason. Reason is manifested in process. Needless to say, my work has me helping people who are struggling to gain a good grip on truth. This understanding of truth is the basis of our work going forward. Our basis has been prepared by the foundation we have established together.

Next Steps

So, I ask you: where do you want to go? I hope your answer is to develop the plans necessary to accomplish the strategy you know you need to achieve to arrive at your desired destination. If this is the case, then let’s get to work. If not, then I wish you the best of everything.

I hope we will see each other here next week. Email me if you need to talk before then.

COMMENTARY CATALOG

http://www.shdawson.com/commentary/

Dr. Stephen H. Dawson, DSL

Executive Strategy Consultant

Dr. Stephen H Dawson

Stephen Dawson is an executive consultant of technology and business strategy, serving significant international organizations by providing leadership consulting, strategic planning, and executive communications. He has more than thirty years of service and consulting experience in delivering successful international business development and program management outcomes in the US and SE Asia. His weekly column, “Where Do You Want To Go?,” appears on Thursdays.

Dr. Dawson has served in the technology, banking, and hospitality industries. He is a noted strategic planning visionary. His pursuit of music has been matched with his efforts to lead by service to followers. He holds the clear understanding a leader without followers is a person taking a long walk alone.

Stephen has lived his life in the eastern United States, visiting most of the United States and several countries. He is a graduate of the Regent University School of Business & Leadership. Contact him at service@shdawson.com.

Thank you for visiting our Blog!

Jim Weber – Managing Partner,  ITB Partners

Jim Weber – Managing Partner, ITB Partners

I hope you enjoyed our point of view and would like to receive regular posts directly to your email inbox.  Toward this end, put your contact information on my mailing list.

Your feedback helps me continue to publish articles that you want to read.  Your input is very important to me so; please leave a comment.

 

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Interviewing

“A house divided against itself, cannot stand.” Candidate Abraham Lincoln

Dr. Stephen H Dawson

I first stood at the Lincoln Memorial the day of Live Aid. It was my first trip to Washington, D.C. I almost kept going to Philadelphia to stand outside the concert event and hear the music. I decided to stay in D.C. and watch the concert from a new technology called jumbotrons staged on the National Mall. I realized I was experiencing history and that it was best I stop and take in the events.

I shared previously about Lincoln. I wondered what would be the outcome of the Live Aid effort that day in D.C. I wondered if Abraham Lincoln realized in 1858 when he explained how a divided house could not stand he would be dead in less than seven years by assassination. I stood at his memorial in 1985 and wondered why he was not buried in D.C. I concluded it did not matter where he is buried. Death is death. The best that can be done going forward is to honor the memories, the actions, and the contributions of the dead.

You, as the leader of your organization, have selected job applicants to be candidates for each role you need to be filled in your organization. You do not need to spend any more time considering the end of the tenure for those you need to move out of your organization. You have stepped through assessing each applicant’s application package, identified what seems to be a match between their application package and your role opportunity, had the screening call conducted by way of your direction, read the call outcomes, and have decided to speak with a candidate yourself. You now must decide how much freedom you will give your candidate to accomplish their work in your organization through the role they serve. You are considering death and life simultaneously as you move to care for the organization. This decision is similar to a shepherd and the flock they supervise.

A sheep has no fangs or claws. They are dependent on the shepherd to protect them by leading, guiding, and directing them. They lead by being out front of them. They guide by being beside them. They direct by being behind them. The shepherd leads them to grass to eat. The shepherd does not mandate which tuft of grass a sheep must eat. Each sheep has some degree of freedom in its relationship with its shepherd.

You are convinced bringing an antibody into your organization is a bad move. You are convinced it is bad because you do not have organization antibodies in your organization now and do not want to have your proverbial house divided by an organization antibody causing such harm. You are hoping to find out during your assessment process if you have a candidate that matches your worldview and the worldview held by your organization but not eradicate diversity from your organization. Share on XThis combination is a tall order for anyone to fulfill.

Let’s look at a formula I have studied for years to help me evaluate the possibility someone would want to purchase something from me as a means to guide your interview conversations. A buyer may want to purchase a product I am selling or my labor in the form of services. The formula has three parts to it. Each part must have enough value in the eye of the buyer to purchase whatever it is I am selling. You also need these three parts to have enough value in both your eyes and in the eyes of the candidate to proceed through your evaluation process.

INTEREST

You are selling a job by way of a compensation package. There may be fame as an outcome of the job, but no one can guarantee fame. The exchange of money in your labor budget for the total services delivered from a worker is the deal. Is this deal interesting to you as the service buyer? Is this deal interesting to the candidate as the service seller?

Now, the candidate has the same thoughts in mind but is reserved in their perspective. They see you are selling your compensation package, and they are the buyer through their services currency. How do I know this is true? Because they would be talking to a better deal for their services currency than talking to you about your compensation package. You have the best offer that has come to them. They most likely are always looking for a better deal. You most likely are always looking for a better deal. A better offer could come at any time. So, the offer from you has a boundary to it called time.

Here are some clear indications of interest on both your part and on the part of the candidate. Are they looking you in your eyes to listen to what you are telling them? Are you looking into their eyes? Are they taking notes during your discussion with them? Are you taking notes about their discussion performance? Are they able to repeat back to you any of the statements or points you make to them? Are you able to repeat back to them anything they shared during the conversation that is new to you? Are they able to provide a meaningful answer to a question you ask them about the information you have shared with them? Are you able to provide a meaningful answer to a question they ask you about the information you have shared with them? Are they involved with social networking during your conversation with them? Are you multitasking during the conversation with them?

Interest Level

TRUST

A buyer may want what is sold, but they do not trust the seller. If a buyer does not trust what is being sold, then they have no interest in what is being sold. Trust is the connector of evidence and faith. Evidence is clear proof. An example of evidence is the paycheck arriving to the worker every pay cycle. Faith is the assurance the evidence will arrive. An example of faith is the time between paydays. An example of trust is the inability to prove the paycheck will be delivered to the worker on payday but convinced the paycheck will come as agreed.

You, as the interviewer, may conclude the candidate has the skills, but you do not trust they will deliver those skills to you for the compensation you deliver to them. You also may conclude they are interested in doing the work you want them to do for you, but they also have an interest to go and fix parts of your organization they believe need fixing beyond the work you want them to do.

They, as the candidate, may realize you are not a person they want to walk with now. You can protect, lead, guide, and direct them, but they do not want to eat the grass you have provided for them. They may have a worldview that does not overlap suitably with yours or the organization.

Any of these reasons and more cause the candidate to stop being a candidate. You are unable to provide them the trust necessary to do their role in a manner they prefer that is also acceptable to you. Their candidacy is dead. Move on without remorse. Do not be concerned with what may occur with them tomorrow as a future applicant to another role you need to be filled.

Trust is the connector of evidence and faith

MONEY

You have what you define as a great job opening. You do not have enough money to pay someone to do the work. Stop what you are doing. You do not need to interview anyone. You need to find a budget to spend.

Asking anyone to work for less than what the work is worth demonstrates poor judgment. Your trust as a leader would be damaged by such a choice, perhaps beyond repair. It is not worth the hassles of asking anyone to take work that is not funded fairly.

Now, what is fair? That answer is between you and the service supplier. If you are convinced you have a fair compensation package, then this is all you need to know for fairness. If your candidate does not agree that what comprises your compensation package is fair to them, then you are still at a stopping point with their candidacy.

What you are seeing at this point in your evaluation process is the concept of equal pay for equal work in terms of economic equity. You do not have a pay gap, as the candidate is not being paid because they are not a member of your organization. Your best and final offer is what it is. I am not talking about job promotions, pay raises, or any other role modification. I am only discussing bringing a new person into your organization. What happens to them after they are brought into your organization is an altogether different thought construct based on the linear connection of your worldview, ethics, morality, and virtue. My hope for you is you walk out the linear connection of worldview, ethics, morality, and virtue with those you lead in a fair and clear manner. I hold this hope as I prefer you to be a credible leader.

Fair Pay

RECOMMENDATIONS

I recommend you take time this week to practice your interview methodology and cadence. Go so far as to prepare the meal menu you will eat before the interview to have all parts of yourself ready to hold the discussion.

I also recommend you do not multitask during the interview discussion. There is nothing good that comes from multitasking during a crucial discussion. All that is demonstrated by multitasking during a crucial discussion is chaos is present in your organization. If you need to communicate to the candidate you have chaos in your organization, then you can do so effectively by way of a single sentence, either verbally or in writing. Then, stop multitasking and focus on having a productive conversation.

Finally, gain a commitment from the candidate during the conversation. See how interested they are in joining your organization by putting actions to their words. Ask them to write something and email it to you. Write, in the form of a researched-based effort. This action is a great way to learn quickly how interested a candidate is in joining your organization based on all they have learned to this point about you, the role, and the organization.

So, I ask you: where do you want to go? I hope your answer is to develop the plans necessary to accomplish the strategy you know you need to achieve to arrive at your desired destination. If this is the case, then let’s get to work. If not, then I wish you the best of everything.

I hope we will see each other here next week. Email me if you need to talk before then.

COMMENTARY CATALOG

http://www.shdawson.com/commentary/

Dr. Stephen H. Dawson, DSL

Executive Strategy Consultant

Stephen H Dawson, DSL

Stephen Dawson is an executive consultant of technology and business strategy, serving significant international organizations by providing leadership consulting, strategic planning, and executive communications. He has more than thirty years of service and consulting experience in delivering successful international business development and program management outcomes in the US and SE Asia. His weekly column, “Where Do You Want To Go?,” appears on Thursdays.

Dr. Dawson has served in the technology, banking, and hospitality industries. He is a noted strategic planning visionary. His pursuit of music has been matched with his efforts to lead by service to followers. He holds the clear understanding a leader without followers is a person taking a long walk alone.

Stephen has lived his life in the eastern United States, visiting most of the United States and several countries. He is a graduate of the Regent University School of Business & Leadership. Contact him at service@shdawson.com.

Thank you for visiting our Blog!

Jim Weber – Managing Partner,  ITB Partners

Jim Weber – Managing Partner, ITB Partners

I hope you enjoyed our point of view and would like to receive regular posts directly to your email inbox.  Toward this end, put your contact information on my mailing list.

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Matching

“But pattern-matching doesn’t equal comprehension.” Peter Watts

Stephen H Dawson, DSL

The thought of finding a perfect job applicant to fill any role in any organization seems impossible. It seems impossible because it is impossible. It is impossible because people are imperfect. They are imperfect as they tend to change over time.

We are working on developing your leadership skills by working on the need you have to swap out some people in your organization. The need is formed by your strategic planning work being behind schedule where you identify it is neither a workspace nor worker skills problem. We discussed last week how to approach the assessment work of job applicant credential packages. We discussed a few weeks ago the linear relationship between worldview, ethics, morality, and virtue. Today, let's talk a bit about determining if a suitable match exists between a job applicant you have and each role you need to be filled in your organization. Share on X

The matching work at hand involves much more than only considering a suitable match between the job applicant and each role you have to fill. It also involves considering the match between the job applicant and the organization. Remember, your organization includes any matrix-supplied folks involved in doing work with your people, your customers, your strategic partners, and your supply chain network. The job analysis we discussed last week may not have included these attributes. However, they need to be in there. If they are not, then the job analysis must be revised to include them as applicable.

OK, let’s proceed from the point of having a satisfactory job analysis as we consider job applicants to see if you have a viable candidate for each role you need to fill. We need to first look at some terms before looking at applicants. These facts may seem harsh, but they are a crucial part of your assessment work.

ORGANIZATION ANTIBODIES

An antibody does the work to neutralize either a pathogenic bacteria or virus. The intent of the pathogenic is to help, but it instead causes harm. An organization antibody is a person who does not want to follow your leadership. They resist your leadership either passively or actively.

Nicholas Evans described how an antibody could suffer the pursuit of innovation. Evans cited an article by Mitra Best, who described antibodies in a corporate setting. Both Evans and Best provided recommendations about how to remediate each antibody form. What they did not do address in their writings is why an organization antibody has so much power over their boss.

Think about the folks in your organization who have been there a long time. They have not been promoted to a senior role because they have either a character deficiency, a skills deficiency, or both. They hold the belief they know it all and tell anyone who will listen to them they know it all. This person is an example of an organization antibody. Deep down, they believe they are running the organization. They believe they are doing what is best for the organization. They refuse to listen to reason. Therefore, they have no ability to have cognitive awareness to know they are causing harm. They are as cancer is to the body.

Antibodies

CANCER

Cancer is a disease defined by abnormal cell growth. It is possible cancer could be misinterpreted as a nodule, a small bump. A small bump could occur due to one of several conditions. The indication of a cancer being present does not appear until cancer grows to be a problem. Untreated cancer spreads in a condition known as metastasis. Early testing for cancer helps to overcome cancer unawareness. The value of proper testing here is beyond measure.

I shared several weeks back, “I cannot say a person is evil, as I do not believe it is possible. I can say their actions are or are not evil.” I maintain this position. I shared a few weeks later about evil. The attributes of organization antibodies and cancer have considerable overlap with one another. They both have no ability to have cognitive awareness to know they are causing harm. They both consume a massive amount of resources as they spread. They both spread through the host, either the body or the organization, in a progressive manner. The rate of spreading is inconsistent, so not relative to objective analysis. They both have a high mortality rate, both literally and figuratively.

An organization member allowed to mature into an organization antibody is an event that does not occur overnight. It is without question the presence of an organization antibody is the result of a failure by leadership, human resources, and learning & development. Note I do not identify either a manager or a team leader as responsible here. I hold this position because their roles are not able to have an overarching view of the organization. The reasons for such failures are endless, but the leadership, human resources, and learning & development staff hold collective responsibility for the damages caused by an organization antibody.

I hold the position the only way to treat an organization’s antibody is to remove them from the organization and place their leader on a rapid performance improvement plan. If I do not see substantial adherence to the performance improvement plan by their no-longer leader in my eyes, then their no-longer leader is no longer a part of my organization. The corrective action to address the human resources poor performance is to replace the human resources business partner serving my organization immediately. The corrective action to address the learning & development staff performance is to replace their leader serving my organization and place all learning & development staff on a rapid performance improvement plan. All activities and I mean all activities, performed by the learning & development staff for my organization cease until there is credible evidence they are each qualified to perform learning & development work. The support necessary for the human resources and learning & development staff corrective actions may require support from your boss. You should be able to get it without difficulty since you have credible proof of the harm caused to the organization by their respective failures to deliver quality work.

SKILLS

The term credential is the combination of work experience, education, degrees, certifications, and licenses earned and held by an individual that each has relevance to each role you need to fill in your organization. These individual credentials then feed into forming organization credentials. All aspects of any credential must be validated during the job application process by your organization. You must hold, without a doubt, a clear understanding of the abilities each job applicant holds today. What credentials they held in the past may be nice to know, but that was then. You are evaluating now.

Gaining credentials from a source that is not accredited is possible, but the validation process becomes much more costly to accomplish. It may not be possible to validate a credential that is not from an accredited source. A non-validated credential is termed as hope but not a credential.

No alt text provided for this image

PERSONALITY

We discussed last week the value of third-party testing. The cost of testing each applicant may not be worth the expense. The need is still present to know the personality of each applicant. If you do not have the ability to fund personality testing a job applicant you advance to candidate status to know if they are a viable candidate, then your ability to advance applicants through your evaluation process is reduced. How much of a risk can you afford to take at this point in the assessing-to-matching process?

You have rooted out those job applicants who do not hold the skills necessary to fill each role you need to be filled in your organization. You know you cannot afford to interject harm to your organization by bringing in an organization antibody. You are wondering if you can afford to measure a personality without an objective third-party test. The answer is you cannot. You will have to bear the risk of going forward without measuring personality should you chose not to use third-party personality testing. This risk will have to be managed as any other risk.

WORLDVIEW

We discussed worldview a few weeks back. You are wondering how the applicant’s worldview matches both your worldview and the worldview held by those in your organization. You can get this information from the screening call. I addressed last week how to go about this action during the interview you conduct with them. Specifically, you are looking for their position on social and political matters. You must follow fair employment laws to be a credible leader. So, how do you get this information?

You get this information by asking three questions. One question focused on a social aspect. One question focused on a political aspect. Then, one question overlapping both a social and political aspect. Use three different aspects in these three questions. Write the questions to be as figurative as possible. Look for timeless topics common across all cultures, present in all points of history, having reasonable belief they will be present in the future. These answers will provide you enough information to know if you have an applicant that can advance to a candidate.

RECOMMENDATIONS

If you are matching applicants without a third-party personality evaluation, then you must accomplish this evaluation in the next step of your interviewing process. You cannot experience success in finding a suitable candidate without performing a clear personality evaluation. Prepare for the costs of third-party personality evaluations.

Record all screening calls. Have the calls transcribed. Read the entire transcript. Listen to the parts of the audio recording you find interesting by way of the transcript.

Match the notes of the person conducting the screening call to the call transcript. Identify any mismatch in what the caller observed in comparison to the response of the applicant. This mismatch will help you understand if there is a personality or worldview mismatch with your organization. It will also help you qualify the work of the person conducting the screening call. This collective understanding will arrive because you have a satisfactory job analysis, you wrote the questions for the screening call, and you placed boundaries on the screening call. This reasoning is found in the plan we discussed last week.

I recommend you take time this week to consider the impact of an organization antibody in your organization. Prepare your screening call questions based on the material we covered this week. Finally, look for providers of counseled results interpretation to assist you in selecting applicants to become candidates based on the plan we discussed last week.

So, I ask you: where do you want to go? I hope your answer is to develop the plans necessary to accomplish the strategy you know you need to achieve to arrive at your desired destination. If this is the case, then let’s get to work. If not, then I wish you the best of everything.

I hope we will see each other here next week. Email me if you need to talk before then.

COMMENTARY CATALOG

http://www.shdawson.com/commentary/

Dr. Stephen H. Dawson, DSL

Executive Strategy Consultant

Stephen Dawson is an executive consultant of technology and business strategy, serving significant international organizations by providing leadership consulting, strategic planning, and executive communications. He has more than thirty years of service and consulting experience in delivering successful international business development and program management outcomes in the US and SE Asia. His weekly column, “Where Do You Want To Go?,” appears on Thursdays.

Dr. Dawson has served in the technology, banking, and hospitality industries. He is a noted strategic planning visionary. His pursuit of music has been matched with his efforts to lead by service to followers. He holds the clear understanding a leader without followers is a person taking a long walk alone.

Stephen has lived his life in the eastern United States, visiting most of the United States and several countries. He is a graduate of the Regent University School of Business & Leadership. Contact him at service@shdawson.com.

Thank you for visiting our Blog!

Jim Weber – Managing Partner,  ITB Partners

Jim Weber – Managing Partner, ITB Partners

I hope you enjoyed our point of view and would like to receive regular posts directly to your email inbox.  Toward this end, put your contact information on my mailing list.

Your feedback helps me continue to publish articles that you want to read.  Your input is very important to me so; please leave a comment.

 

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Power

“Don’t be afraid to give up the good to go for the great.” John Rockefeller

Let’s talk today about you as a leader. You seem to be a good leader who is looking to become a great leader. You are not operating in fear. You are working to accomplish your strategic planning, but it is not going so well. We have discussed at length you have decided you need to swap out some of your people to have the work finished with excellence. Your power as a leader is about to be challenged in a way that you may not be prepared to handle. It will be challenged because you are implementing a construct to your leadership style that involves loving your followers. My friend, prepare to be soon hated by more people than you realize now.

Love, hate, power. These are big words that will take many conversations to cover appropriately. Today, let’s focus on the term power.

There are many types of power. You know this is true, or you would not be in a leadership role now. The essence of power is possessing some form of harnessed energy. We need to focus our conversation about power on the aspects of social combined with political and then economic. Let’s have a conversation today based on the power attributes of supply, demand, and outage.

You have plenty of room in this landscape to realize success even though others around you may not be operating in either humility or love. Share on X

SUPPLY

You supply leadership to your followers through three components. First, whatever higher power you may have helping you do whatever it is you do to live this thing called life. Second, you possess concise, tangible, relevant skills transferable to many roles to do endless amounts of work. Finally, the enablement assigned to you by your boss is commensurate with your role in your organization. You then take these components and do your work as a leader. All components are not equal among all people, as not everyone has the benefit of the same higher power, obtained the same skills, and have the same enablement assigned to them. Therefore, all leaders are not able by this construct to be as effective. Some leaders may be more effective than others, while other leaders may be less effective.

Note I did not say you need an office, telephone, a budget, or any other tool necessary to accomplish your role as a leader. These items are conditional based on the state of your work environment. What you need is a suitable combination of skills and choices applied to your leadership role. The higher power and enablement parts are not from you, as they are delivered to you.

The doing part of your role is the manifestation of your leadership components. Doing your leading by way of humility encapsulates the power components in a manner greater than any combination I know of to accomplish leadership. There may be a more effective combination out there, but I have not found it.

How does humility fit into the power aspect of leadership? Compare the definition of humility with the definition of power. They are both nouns. A noun is accomplished through a verb. So, what verb to use to accomplish both humility and power? I recommend doing what we discussed in the verb of love. There is no prideful act of love, only a humble act of love. So, our conversation today will match power, humility, and love in accomplishing your role as a leader.

Preparing your humility to deliver love could be a larger effort than a single discussion will suffice to accomplish. You need to tell me about your humbleness for me to know how to best equip you for success. I leave it to you to tell me about your humbleness.

Power Supply

DEMAND

I shared a few weeks ago you are now in organization design mode as you move to replace some of the people in your organization. You will find out quickly who in your organization wants to do their work by way of the plan you have shared with them to use love to accomplish the strategic planning work, along with all of the other work performed in your organization. I make this statement based on the social and political power struggle present in many nations today. If you need me to cite some examples of this struggle, then I doubt you would be in the leadership role you fill now.

The demand for your leadership by followers could come as acceptance, rejection, or conditional acceptance. The acceptance-rejection-conditional combination is the same layout as the love-hate-ambivalence combination we discussed a few weeks back. You will find leading and loving people are an inseparable pair. Note I did not say leadership. A leader may be successful or unsuccessful in their leadership. A successful leader always leads. An unsuccessful leadership effort means the leader is not leading.

Your leadership power supply is being refused by two of these three options. Take the actions I shared with you recently to resolve any refusal by your followers. The rest of your folks want the leadership you are supplying, as they have accepted your Love Action Items list. Furthermore, they processed effectively your communications involved with you teaching your people the four definitions of love. This group is now your organization. The folks who have either rejected or accepted conditionally your new construct to your leadership style that involves loving your followers are on the way out of your organization. They are trying to usurp your leadership with their power, per their choice not to follow you any longer. This condition does not exist in a productive organization. It is at this point your hope of finding suitable applicants for the roles you wish to fill becomes larger than it was before you realized who else must leave your organization.

Sure, it is great to look for replacement people without telling anyone. This approach is both unrealistic and not advised. The power held today by text messaging, instant messaging, and social networking is greater than any individual ability to stay ahead of such communications. Do not try to overcome either of these powerful forms. I encourage you to execute the plan we covered last week.

Finally, be prepared to have healthy demands placed on your leadership that you did not expect to occur. The demands could come from either your people or people outside of your organization. Preparation for this likelihood is best accomplished by having a qualified executive leadership team ready to assist your leadership efforts. Remember, you may need to be more humble during this unexpected demand to help those needing your leadership to be sustained while you move to supply them the leadership you did not expect you would need to deliver.

Power Demand

OUTAGE

The loss of your leadership supply by demand for anything more than you can supply in terms of either quantity or quality results in a leadership power outage. An outage can be either intermittent or sustained. Your people during a leadership power outage are unable to work because they have no leader supplying them the power they need to do their work, all while doing it humbly through love. The means to overcome this outage is to add more power to your Love Action Items list. This outage condition could occur for several reasons. It is not a skills problem, as you acquire the skills you need before you need them to serve as a qualified leader…don’t you?

I am not saying a leadership power outage means you are bankrupt as a leader. Neither am I am saying your leadership is unequivocally a toxic debt held by your followers, your organization, or your investors. I am saying that those in demand of your leadership power are having to wait to take delivery of your leadership power supply. They may be able to work for a while in the absence of your leadership power supply, but they will not be productive for long without your leadership power supply to them. If they could last without your leadership power supply, then you are no longer needed in your leadership role.

I discussed the topic of leadership power with my strategic partner David Daniels. Dave shared judicious insight on the topic. “I have been in situations where over half of my leadership team needed to go. Now, I didn’t feel that it was prudent to let them all go at the same time, so I had to prioritize my decisions and approach. I rarely found that demotions worked, so I tried avoiding this tactic at all costs. However, I did find some people a fit for other positions if they shared my values and goals.” Dave went on to say, “I would insert strong external leaders who share my vision and values. I would not place them in any position right away, as I would want them going through a thorough onboarding process over a couple of months that would allow them access to every aspect of the business. The input that you would receive from this group will prove to be invaluable when assessing your final executive leadership team make-up.” Dave and I agree the executive leadership team is a crucial resource for any leader of an organization.

JUDGMENT

Sure, the best-case scenario is to have your leadership power supply in balance with the demand for follower leadership power consumption. We see this balance in just-in-time manufacturing, teaching, and learning. The Wall Street Journal reported recently the automotive industry has abandoned this half-century methodology due to present economic climate turbulence. However, this balancing is rare in the practice of leadership. It is best to plan for leading an organization that needs help to stay balanced due to unforeseen obstacles introduced to your organization.

The realization of fame and fortune by leadership occurs after doing the work of leadership, as do all forms of payment for accomplished work. The social and political power struggle present in many nations today not only impairs your ability to lead by adding more voices to consider, but it also makes your work much easier to accomplish. It is easier to accomplish because love delivered through humility during the practice of leadership encapsulates the three identified power attributes of supply, demand, and outage in a manner greater than any combination I know of to accomplish leadership. You now have greater clarity of your leadership work than in recent years due to this social and political power struggle.

The world is forming to a great struggle of one side versus the other for the acquisition of power for almost all aspects of humanity. Humanity has seen this before, and it will most likely see it again. This time it is a different struggle, as there is the presence of significant information technologies assisting each side. This struggle is not going to be an easy experience for anyone. Use the energy concept we covered a few weeks back to leverage the social and political struggle to your advantage. You have plenty of room in this landscape to realize success even though others around you may not be operating in either humility or love. If you are sold this combination is the best means for you to succeed, then now is the time to use them as the form of power you need to wield to realize success as a leader. Finally, since there is no reason to stop being humble or to stop loving people, this combination comprises the bulk of your leadership strategy henceforth.

I encourage you to spend time this week completing your materials summary, your Love Action Items list and schedule the first meeting with your boss based on the plan we covered last week. Also, spend some time thinking about how those both in and those working with your organization want to gain power over you as a leader. Finally, think about how you can defeat such attempts to overcome you by responding with love. Remember, there are four definitions for the term love. Use all of them as appropriate to lead with excellence.

Balancing Power Supply and Demand

So, I ask you: where do you want to go? I hope your answer is to develop the plans necessary to accomplish the strategy you know you need to achieve to arrive at your desired destination. If this is the case, then let’s get to work. If not, then I wish you the best of everything.

I hope we will see each other here next week. Email me if you need to talk before then.

COMMENTARY CATALOG

http://www.shdawson.com/commentary/

Dr. Stephen H. Dawson, DSL

Executive Strategy Consultant

Dr. Stephen H Dawson

Stephen Dawson is an executive consultant of technology and business strategy, serving significant international organizations by providing leadership consulting, strategic planning, and executive communications. He has more than thirty years of service and consulting experience in delivering successful international business development and program management outcomes in the US and SE Asia. His weekly column, “Where Do You Want To Go?,” appears on Thursdays.

Dr. Dawson has served in the technology, banking, and hospitality industries. He is a noted strategic planning visionary. His pursuit of music has been matched with his efforts to lead by service to followers. He holds the clear understanding a leader without followers is a person taking a long walk alone.

Stephen has lived his life in the eastern United States, visiting most of the United States and several countries. He is a graduate of the Regent University School of Business & Leadership. Contact him at service@shdawson.com.

Thank you for visiting our Blog!

Jim Weber – Managing Partner,  ITB Partners

Jim Weber – Managing Partner, ITB Partners

I hope you enjoyed our point of view and would like to receive regular posts directly to your email inbox.  Toward this end, put your contact information on my mailing list.

Your feedback helps me continue to publish articles that you want to read.  Your input is very important to me so; please leave a comment.

 

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Assessing

“Truth is like the Sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain’t goin’ away.” Elvis Presley

Dr. Stephen H Dawson

Ah, the search for truth. I see the term truth as a singular term. There are parts of the truth we understand, but never all of the truth. If someone understood all truth, then they would be omniscient. We covered our understanding of truth last week when we considered the linear connection of worldview, ethics, morality, and virtue. Today, let’s talk about how to assess the folks who have applied to work in your organization to help accomplish the strategic planning work that you need to be accomplished by your organization.

I have encouraged during our time together that appropriate research be accomplished when considering all things. I shared research is part of how I have worked for years in a research-before-action mode. I provided examples of this belief. I cautioned against analysis paralysis. I described the differences between looking and reading. You now need to read through the applications submitted by the folks who want to come work for you. Let’s go through some of the facts you face, and see how you can best identify some qualified candidates.

ROLE CONSTRUCTION

The means to define a role in your organization begins with the job analysis. Work is performed to understand what each role needs to accomplish, how each role needs to accomplish the work, and the resources used by each role. The job analysis work is then finished and termed as the job analysis asset. A subset of the job analysis asset then forms the job definition asset. A subset of the job definition asset then forms the job announcement asset. A person is then sought to fill each role in your organization to do the job required by each role.

APPLICANT TRACKING

An applicant selected for consideration to fill a role you have in your organization is then called a candidate. The applicant tracking system is valuable for keeping track of applicant information. It alone is not valuable to evaluate applicants for their match to any role. A resume or CV can be padded with loads of terms, matched with a fake cover letter, only to waste much time. I have found no resume parsing technology worth using. The screening call must occur by telephone to know with any degree of certainty if a candidate is a potential match to a role. The screening could occur in person, but it has been my experience this screening step best occurs by telephone conversation. Meaningful applicant screening cannot occur until after the screening call when a qualified subject matter expert can speak with the candidate and find out how much truth resides in their application package.

FAIRNESS

The need to be fair to applicants is found in the linear connection of worldview, ethics, morality, and virtue by those who desire to also be treated fairly. Most developed nations have many laws governing the fair treatment of job applicants to protect against employment discrimination. The United States Wages and the Fair Labor Standards Act, and the Prohibited Employment Policies and Practices help make many things quite clear to employers. Their Conducting and Documenting Interviews guidelines seem reasonable enough to me.

Now, all of these laws, requirements, and guidelines can be averted with ease. Person A has a job to fill. Person B applies for the job to work for Person A. Person A tells Person C to read through the many social networking options available to accomplish research on Person B. Person C then tells Person A verbally what they found out about Person B.

This plan has been around for millenniums. It provides plausible deniability to Person A that they have not violated an employment discrimination law. This plan also introduces the possibility of improper research occurring along with the possibility of incorrect interpretation of either the proper or improper research. It also furthers the possibility Person B did not maintain the necessary confidentiality of Person A. The hassles here are not worth the risks. I do not endorse this plan. My linear connection of worldview, ethics, morality, and virtue would not consider this plan, but the plan is possible for anyone to perform.

THIRD-PARTY TESTING

The Myers–Briggs Type Indicator and the Strong Interest Inventory are workable options to help meet your needs to understand the personality held by each candidate. The ProfileXT assessment includes an assessment of candidate’s cognitive ability. A suitable personality assessment helps to understand a candidate, but personality testing alone is insufficient to understand the potential match between each role you need to be filled and each candidate’s ability to fill each role. This testing could be used in combination with other applicant evaluation methods. I am leery of using a third-party test alone to evaluate anyone or anything. I hold this concern because there are still too many gaps in the picture to get to the truth of an applicant’s ability to join my organization and do the work I need to be accomplished.

I look at the pile of job applications and wonder if it is possible to find a candidate suitable to meet my needs. I get tired from reading the applications. I get overwhelmed by the work I need to be accomplished by my people getting further behind. Sound familiar? I experienced this pain for years. I finally said enough to this way of working and decided to gain the help of someone who is qualified to meet my needs by paying them to fill a short-term role in my organization.

Multiple job applicants.

COUNSELED RESULTS INTERPRETATION

A podiatrist is someone who I do not need all of the time in my life. However, should I need work performed on my foot, then I want to talk to someone who knows how to help solve my foot problem. I also want someone qualified to work on my foot. Do you remember our discussion about heavy equipment operation? The same principles from that discussion hold true to your need for help to find suitable applicants to consider.

A qualified counselor can help you find your preferred destination.

RECOMMENDATIONS

I am not a fan of shills. They wreak of impropriety. What I am a fan of is an endorsement based on credible research. Share on X

I do not see a straight line to finding a suitable applicant for any role in today’s world. There are too many changes occurring in global commerce, social, and political landscapes to plan for an organization to have any worker remain their entire work career with any organization. I cannot afford to endorse any candidate for a role unless I have credible research supporting my endorsement.

I do see the need for strategic foresight. I am both a scholar and practitioner of strategic foresight. Anyone can do some meaningful form of strategic foresight. Just ask a single mother who raised her kids to graduate from school, stay off alcohol and drugs, and stay out of jail. She is living proof strategic foresight can exist at all levels of society.

I do see the need for succession planning. I am both a scholar and practitioner of succession planning. Ask anyone who lived through the changes that occurred during 2020 to tell you their version of succession planning. This planning has a lot to do with contingency planning. Sometimes these planning efforts also benefit from the help of strategic foresight, should strategic foresight be accomplished before it was needed.

What you are trying to avoid is more problems coming to you. You cannot escape the truth your linear connection of worldview, ethics, morality, and virtue combination must have a suitable overlap with the linear connection of worldview, ethics, morality, and virtue combination held by everyone you bring into your organization. Furthermore, that overlap must also be suitable for those in your organization now to have the inclusion effect occur productively across the linear connection of worldview, ethics, morality, and virtue found in your organization’s culture. Remember, your organization includes any matrix-supplied folks involved in doing work with your people, your customers, your strategic partners, and your supply chain network.

What you are hoping for is the reality of truth helping you both find and select a suitable job applicant for each role you need to be filled in your organization. You are hoping one candidate will stand out among the rest, or at least find you have no appropriate candidates. Light helps with eliminating darkness, yes?

My recommendation to help you find some qualified candidates from the job applicants you have now is to evaluate their personality and worldview. This consideration will help to diversify your organization by walking out the linear connection of worldview, ethics, morality, and virtue held by everyone involved in working with each role you need to be filled by your selected job applicant. You are going to face their personality and worldview eventually. It is best to understand both of them during the assessment process.

You do not need a counselor to help you interpret the skills held by an applicant. The skills form a clear set of credentials. If applicant skills are not clear, then they are not qualified to become a candidate.

A match by personality to a role is realized by also matching skills and worldview. An espoused worldview is the most straightforward means I have found to understand more about a person. Their personality and skills may help me understand their worldview, but it is not a guarantee. Personality may be situational. Worldview is often continual. Skills are often temporal.

I urge keeping the screening call bound to a list of predefined questions prepared by you. This approach will help assure the person conducting the screening call does not attempt to interject an interview approach you do not approve of.  It will also help assure all applicants are evaluated fairly.

If I were you, then I would select someone who can prove to me they can help me accomplish the candidate assessments and interpret the results of each assessment by their provable work history along with the education and certifications they hold. I would check their references. I would ask for examples of their already accomplished relevant work. I would also take their assessment of the first person they assess and run it by some other qualified professionals. I know the second person will want to do their own assessment, but it is worth an objective review by an objective person. If the second person refuses to interpret the first person’s work results, then I would not ask for any further help from the second person. I know my family doctor and podiatrist share their research and findings. So, other qualified professionals can do the same sharing of materials they are qualified to interpret.

I recommend you take time this week and consider how you desire to gain a deeper understanding of the personality and worldview of each applicant you are considering for each role you need to fill. The best means I have found to understand a person’s worldview is to ask them the following question: what is your worldview? I also recommend you select some third-party personality testing sources to use with your applicant after they pass their first interview with their potential boss.

So, I ask you: where do you want to go? I hope your answer is to develop the plans necessary to accomplish the strategy you know you need to achieve to arrive at your desired destination. If this is the case, then let’s get to work. If not, then I wish you the best of everything.

I hope we will see each other here next week. Email me if you need to talk before then.

COMMENTARY CATALOG

http://www.shdawson.com/commentary/

Dr. Stephen H. Dawson, DSL

Executive Strategy Consultant

Stephen H Dawson, DSL

Stephen Dawson is an executive consultant of technology and business strategy, serving significant international organizations by providing leadership consulting, strategic planning, and executive communications. He has more than thirty years of service and consulting experience in delivering successful international business development and program management outcomes in the US and SE Asia. His weekly column, “Where Do You Want To Go?,” appears on Thursdays.

Dr. Dawson has served in the technology, banking, and hospitality industries. He is a noted strategic planning visionary. His pursuit of music has been matched with his efforts to lead by service to followers. He holds the clear understanding a leader without followers is a person taking a long walk alone.

Stephen has lived his life in the eastern United States, visiting most of the United States and several countries. He is a graduate of the Regent University School of Business & Leadership. Contact him at service@shdawson.com.

Thank you for visiting our Blog!

Jim Weber – Managing Partner,  ITB Partners

Jim Weber – Managing Partner, ITB Partners

I hope you enjoyed our point of view and would like to receive regular posts directly to your email inbox.  Toward this end, put your contact information on my mailing list.

Your feedback helps me continue to publish articles that you want to read.  Your input is very important to me so; please leave a comment.

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The Stuff

“We cannot become what we need to be by remaining what we are.” Max De Pree

Stephen H Dawson, DSL

There is only one person who matters when defining what must be done in any situation. That person is our self. The reality of our impact both now and tomorrow is the challenge of living what we believe by doing what we believe. This impact is the linear connection of worldview, ethics, morality, and virtue.

We are working to resolve your delay in accomplishing your strategic planning work by swapping out some folks in your organization. You have decided to become what you need to be by not remaining what you are now. You are completing your materials summary, your Love Action Items list, and scheduling the first meeting with your boss based on the plan we covered recently. Today, let’s cover what I, in both a dignified and proper manner, call…the stuff. The stuff is the linear combination of worldview, ethics, morality, and virtue. Think of them as indispensable blocks to build your life, your organization, your society, your country, and our world.

I held off discussing the stuff with you earlier, as I did not want to overwhelm you with too much to process at one time. You are growing as a healthy leader by going through the process we are working out together. We are not late discussing the stuff, as you are now working on completing your materials summary and your Love Action Items list. Now is the time to discuss the stuff, to help round out your writing and prepare it for your first stop: your boss reviewing your written forthcoming leadership plan.

I will not bore you with the background of the Greek philosophers who became famous from their perspectives on worldview, ethics, morality, and virtue. They did not invent the terms, they do not own the terms, but they did much to help people understand the terms. I appreciate their help in my learning these terms. Yet, we do not answer to them. We answer to reasoning that can withstand scrutiny.

Here is how I see the stuff: No one cares about what I care about in life unless they are willing to pay me for what I care about in life. Their payment to me can come through countless options. I urge you to adopt a similar perspective. I will now teach you all there is to learn about the stuff in less than five minutes, holding our shared understanding that it takes a lifetime for everyone to do the stuff to prove to our self’s we know our stuff.

WORLDVIEW

What a person believes. It is a singular term. It is the list of items a person believes. The listed items do not need to be defined clearly to the person believing them. There is no mandate to one’s self to prove what that person does by self-debate. Worldview defines the subset of truth to the person but does not define truth entirely. Share on XOne does only need to believe something for it to be a part of their worldview. Worldview is nothing more than what a person believes.

Worldview is what we believe.

ETHICS

What a person does. It is a plural term. It is the list of items a person does. The listed items do need to be defined clearly to the person doing them. Each ethic is performed both consciously and purposely. There is a mandate to one’s self to prove what that person does by self-debate. Ethics are nothing more than what a person does.

Ethics are what we do.

MORALS

What a person must do based only on their worldview. Morality defines right and good. It is a plural term. It is the list of items a person must do as the subset of what they could do to fulfill their worldview. The listed items do need to be defined clearly to the person doing them. Each moral is performed both consciously and purposely. There is a mandate to one’s self to prove what that person does by self-debate. Morals are nothing more than what a person believes they must do.

Morals are what we believe we should do.

VIRTUES

The items at the top of a person’s morality list. It is a plural term. It is the list of items a person must do as the prioritized subset of what they could do to fulfill their worldview. The listed items do need to be defined clearly to the person doing them. Each virtue is performed both consciously and purposely. There is a mandate to one’s self to prove what that person does by self-debate. Virtues are nothing more than what a person believes they must do before doing anything else.

No alt text provided for this image

Congratulations. You just mastered understanding the terms worldview, ethic, morality, and virtue. I hold the worldview more folks in this world should master what you just learned.

Please understand it is not my intent to trivialize these terms. It is my intent to keep them from causing you harm. You have been doing the stuff since the moment you took your first breath. You will continue to do the stuff until the moment you take your last breath. It is best, as with all doing, one knows what they are doing after a suitable period of learning occurs. We talked about this consideration when I asked if you wanted me to use heavy equipment before I learned how to operate the heavy equipment.

A common phrase in social and political circles today is moral responsibility. I struggle to find a meaningful definition of this phrase as a term, so I do not identify this phrase as a term. A moral can only be held between two people when they perform similar ethics based on their similar worldviews. What the verbal assailant is doing with this phrase is attacking your virtues, not your morality. It is a form of intellectual cowardice, as they refuse to learn the terminology they use in their statements.

I encourage you to remember the linear relationship between worldview, ethics, morality, and virtue the next time someone tries to push you around with their demand that you supply them your morality as they see fit. Think back to our discussion on power when you hear them place such a demand on you.

CONCLUSION

I know we covered some heavy topics this week. Fear not, for indisputable facts help strengthen your leadership ability. Take the stuff for what it is: your stuff. Remember, there is only one person who matters when defining what must be done in any situation. That person is our self.

I encourage you to spend time this week completing your materials summary, your Love Action Items list and schedule the first meeting with your boss based on the plan we covered recently. Also, consider how your followers speak and act in light of what you have now learned about the stuff. Finally, consider how much of an overlap there is between each follower’s worldview and your worldview by considering what they do…their ethics. We will look at their morality and their virtues during future discussions.

So, I ask you: where do you want to go? I hope your answer is to develop the plans necessary to accomplish the strategy you know you need to achieve to arrive at your desired destination. If this is the case, then let’s get to work. If not, then I wish you the best of everything.

I hope we will see each other here next week. Email me if you need to talk before then.

COMMENTARY CATALOG

http://www.shdawson.com/commentary/

Dr. Stephen H. Dawson, DSL

Executive Strategy Consultant

Stephen Dawson is an executive consultant of technology and business strategy, serving significant international organizations by providing leadership consulting, strategic planning, and executive communications. He has more than thirty years of service and consulting experience in delivering successful international business development and program management outcomes in the US and SE Asia. His weekly column, “Where Do You Want To Go?,” appears on Thursdays.

Dr. Dawson has served in the technology, banking, and hospitality industries. He is a noted strategic planning visionary. His pursuit of music has been matched with his efforts to lead by service to followers. He holds the clear understanding a leader without followers is a person taking a long walk alone.

Stephen has lived his life in the eastern United States, visiting most of the United States and several countries. He is a graduate of the Regent University School of Business & Leadership. Contact him at service@shdawson.com.

Thank you for visiting our Blog!

Jim Weber – Managing Partner,  ITB Partners

Jim Weber – Managing Partner, ITB Partners

I hope you enjoyed our point of view and would like to receive regular posts directly to your email inbox.  Toward this end, put your contact information on my mailing list.

Your feedback helps me continue to publish articles that you want to read.  Your input is very important to me so; please leave a comment.

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Light

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that.” Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., PhD

Stephen H Dawson, DSL

Standing in the spotlight can be a scary experience. The focus is on the person or persons in the spotlight, while many others view using some form of judgment. Many people in the world today are prepared to attack anyone in any spotlight. It is becoming more and more popular to be nameless and faceless while seeking fame. This combination results from group thinking, not individual thinking, leading to group identity serving as individual identity. This combination is not only silly, but it is also impossible.

Leadership is achieved by people who lead. Group leadership is a flawed concept resulting in a toxic leadership style. It is flawed because the leader-follower relationship involves specific people following a specific person serving as their leader. Team leadership is a viable means to build an organization, either small or large. The definition of team leadership is not the same as the definition of group leadership. Furthermore, both the team and group leadership constructs eradicate the power of signing paychecks. The power is lost because people work for a mysterious team or group definition, not a boss in whatever form a boss exists in the organization structure even though wages are paid every pay cycle. Neither the team nor the group leadership condition forms the employer-employee relationship. Leadership is only successful when a productive leader-follower relationship is present.

We have been working on resolving the impediments suffering the accomplishment of your strategic planning. We concluded you have a people problem, not a worker skills or workspace problem. We have covered many topics preparing for the action item necessary to resolve your most significant impediment: your need to get different people assigned to the work. We talked about the definitions of love. We considered a concept for how to harness the energy supplied to you by love so you can combine the topics we have discussed to help you form a plan to evaluate the candidates you have as you consider offering them a role in your organization where they will help complete your strategic planning work. We acted last week to capture your action items for how you will deliver love to your followers in a table called the Love Action Items list. Today, we will review your work from last week and further prepare it to be understood by those who will report to you in the operation of your organization’s future structure.

YOUR BOSS

Your Love Action Items list requires the support of your boss to be enacted successfully. You require their support and approval for the following reasons. First, you report to them. They must know what you are doing to run your organization. Second, if you hold a similar worldview as the rest of the world that values reason, then you would do well to honor your boss by coming to them for their input, support, and approval of your efforts to run your organization. Third, their role can help provide you access to more resources to develop further your Love Action Items list than the resources you had access to when you built the list you hold in your hand now. Finally, they may shut down your entire effort to run your organization by way of your Love Action Items list.

It is probable your boss will ask how each HOW item matches the organization’s objectives to accomplish the organization’s goals in pursuit of its mission statement. Have a direct match connecting each HOW item to your organization’s objectives presentable in a flow diagram. The diagram can be as simple as boxes with connecting lines and arrowheads showing flow directions. A picture states a thousand words, so use your flow diagrams to your benefit.

It is doubtful your boss will be willing to step through the detail of the materials we have covered up to this point. You will need to summarize in writing the materials we have covered for them to understand better what you are bringing to them. They will most likely need to take some time to step through your materials summary and your Love Action Items list. The best-case scenario is they meet with you a few times to cover your materials summary and your Love Action Items list.

Talking with your boss

TEST IT OUT

Take your Love Action Items list and run it by some people who are not in your organization. Take it to people who will not share the Love Action Items list with anyone in your organization at this point. This anonymity empowers both you and them to be as transparent as possible in your discussions with them. I am not saying they must agree 100% with everything you have contained in your Love Action Items list. I am saying listen to their reasoning and modify your Love Action Items list by further development as appropriate.

If your Love Action Items list does not contain wording sufficient to satisfy all cognitive levels present in your organization, then you must wordsmith your Love Action Items list to the point all members of your organization can understand clearly the message of each HOW item, understand how each HOW item matches a specific love definition, and why they will benefit by doing the items on your Love Action Items list. The items are your words stating your leadership plan. This Love Action Items list is work you must accomplish without outside writing assistance. It is understood you will use outside editorial assistance to refine your Love Action Items list after you have written it as a draft.

Talking with your friends

You testing your Love Action Items list also involves discussing your list with your organization’s general counsel and then with your organization’s human resources after you complete discussions with your general counsel. This strategy assurances all codified requirements match the construct of your Love Action Items list by those who are qualified to make this interpretation. Then, your time with human resources assures their support both to you and to any follower of your leadership who feels they are not being treated fairly by the HOW items in your Love Action Items list.

My strategic partner David Daniels shared with me his input on dealing with the people problems at this point in the process. “Every organization has an IN group and an OUT group. NO company avoids this dynamic. Diverse input, can be sidetracked by those that are perceived to be in control. Share on XOften, when this attitude prevails, many employees feel isolated and not included. The result: you get the prevailing wisdom from those who already maintain the dominant position in your organization. This critical part in the strategic process gets derailed and the CEO loses the ability to surface great ideas that could move the company forward.” David went on to say, “Engaging the GC & HR lead is important, but they may be part of the IN group and will resist giving up their power and influence. The CEO needs an extremely competent Chief Diversity Officer who reports directly to the CEO. This person can identify the IN group to guide them to a much better place demonstrating how to include all relevant voices. Please remember, Diversity is far more than race, gender, sexual preference, etc.”

David and I agree on the central point of your role in your organization. You run your organization. You are seeking the input of the general counsel and human resources. You, after gaining their input, then must make the decision to run your organization.

LIGHT IT UP

You are now ready to take your Love Action Items list and write the job announcements for each role replacement you need to be filled to help accomplish your strategic planning work. Your efforts to this point will connect all of the materials we have covered with the focus of using love to energize the light to shine on these job announcements. Plan to post the job announcements in as many ways possible that are suitable for your organization’s privacy requirements.

Announcing your job openings

It is then time to accomplish communications with your organization’s members of the changes you have decided to make. The communications must include you teaching your people the four definitions of love. It is best you do not accomplish these communications before posting the job announcements. You are the leader of the organization. You are acting appropriately to resolve some people problems in your organization that impair the accomplishment of your organization’s strategic planning. There is nothing about your people replacement decision needing the approval of your followers at this point.

The best-case scenario is anyone who does not want to follow your leadership by way of your Love Action Items list will complain about you as a person, not your leadership. This complaint is a misdirection effort to hide the fact they do not want to act in accordance with the items you have listed in your Love Action Items list. The good news here is you are now able to see clearly who no longer wants to follow your leadership, you see perhaps a bit more of why your strategic planning work is not progressing as you prefer, and you have the opportunity to discuss with the complainers why your Love Action Items list is written as it is for you to lead your organization.

If this discussion, not discussions, is not successful for the complainer to understand fully the future of the organization you lead, then the complaining follower will need to leave your organization. Your single discussion, combined with the well-written contents of your Love Action Items list and associated communication materials, serves as more than enough for any adult worker to understand how your organization will now operate. The time you spent with your boss, your general counsel, and human resources sharing the material we have covered and your work to develop your Love Action Items list will pay off for you immensely. You may be a bit rattled by either the person or persons who complain, but there is no place for either you or them to stand on the same ground anymore. You made the decision for how you both need and want to run your organization. It is now time for you to fulfill your leadership decision.

This review effort may take some time to accomplish. Do not be discouraged at the time and effort necessary to accomplish the review effort. We have other actions we need to accomplish before you start interviewing applicants, so we will be working in parallel with your review effort to achieve these actions as you wait for your reviewers to step through your materials summary, your Love Action Items list, and meet with you.

So, I ask you: where do you want to go? I hope your answer is to develop the plans necessary to accomplish the strategy you know you need to achieve to arrive at your desired destination. If this is the case, then let’s get to work. If not, then I wish you the best of everything.

I hope we will see each other here next week. Email me if you need to talk before then.

COMMENTARY CATALOG

http://www.shdawson.com/commentary/

Dr. Stephen H. Dawson, DSL

Executive Strategy Consultant

Dr. Stephen H Dawson

Stephen Dawson is an executive consultant of technology and business strategy, serving significant international organizations by providing leadership consulting, strategic planning, and executive communications. He has more than thirty years of service and consulting experience in delivering successful international business development and program management outcomes in the US and SE Asia. His weekly column, “Where Do You Want To Go?,” appears on Thursdays.

Dr. Dawson has served in the technology, banking, and hospitality industries. He is a noted strategic planning visionary. His pursuit of music has been matched with his efforts to lead by service to followers. He holds the clear understanding a leader without followers is a person taking a long walk alone.

Stephen has lived his life in the eastern United States, visiting most of the United States and several countries. He is a graduate of the Regent University School of Business & Leadership. Contact him at service@shdawson.com.

Thank you for visiting our blog.

 

Jim Weber, Managing Partner – ITB Partners

Jim Weber – Managing Partner,  ITB Partners

I hope you enjoyed our point of view and would like to receive regular posts directly to your email inbox.  Toward this end, put your contact information on my mailing list.

Your feedback helps me continue to publish articles that you want to read.  Your input is very important to me so; please leave a comment.

 

 

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Servitude

“Only a life lived in the service to others is worth living.” Albert Einstein

Stephen Dawson, DSL

I met Melissa in the summer of 1983 at a teenager retreat. We spent a lot of time together with the other teenagers and alone with each other during the retreat. We became quite fond of one another. We lived several hundred miles from one another. We ended our time together, wanting more of a relationship. Melissa wrote me a letter a month later she had decided there is no future for our relationship. She planned to spend some of her college years in both the United States and France. She did not see a way we could grow our relationship with distance.

I cried for an hour after I read the letter. I knew she was 100% correct. She had much more intelligence than me, much more class than me, and her family was much more wealthy than mine. There were no viable means to grow our relationship. I ran into her several months later, unexpectedly. Our conversation was awkward. We wanted to continue our relationship, but the spark was gone. I have not talked with her or seen her since that day.

Melissa served both me and us with her leadership demonstrated in her letter. She considered the facts, made a choice, and communicated herself well. Her efforts form the basis for a successful leadership strategy.

Consider the attributes of this story. Then, consider how your people, the followers of your leadership, are wondering how to grow a relationship with you. Who makes the first move? Who makes the next move? How will these moves be made? Oh, and there is accomplishing the work they are being paid to do.

I shared in-depth recently about love. I also shared leading by serving is a formal leadership style. I shared over the past several weeks how leaders I identified have demonstrated love to their followers, along with those outside of their organization. If things went well for you this past week, then you are wondering now how to deliver love to your followers. If things did not go well for you last week, then you are wondering now if loving your followers is worth the hassle. Let’s talk about the second item first, and then we will cover the first item.

HASSLE AVOIDANCE OPTIONS

I see there are three options when it comes to relating to people. The first option is to love them. The second option is to hate them. The final option is to care less about them. This final option may be considered to be a form of hate, but I identify it as a form of ambivalence. It is not a form of apathy.

If I know my leader hates me, then there is no point in my trying to follow them. I may be forced to follow them, but I will not perform at my best potential to deliver my work. It seems to me this combination is an inescapable attribute of humanity.

If I know my leader is unsure of either their love or hatred for me, then I am thinking the day will come when they chose to either love or hate me. I will wonder which option they will choose with more and more thought devoted to this wondering until the day comes when they make their choice. I will not focus entirely on my work, as I will have part of my attention direct elsewhere. It seems to me this combination is an inescapable attribute of humanity.

If I know neither hatred nor ambivalence empowers my followers to work fully to accomplish their work, then it makes sense to be the only viable option is to love them. I know of no credible evidence where I should conserve love. Conserve, in the form of holding back at some point. I may be too tired to give love, but this condition is a call to rest instead of a call not to give love. If I want the best return for my investment of time, money, and perhaps even a bit of social status, then it makes sense to me to maximize my investment of love into my followers so they will have the best potential to deliver to me the work I ask them, and perhaps am even paying them, to accomplish.

LOVE DELIVERY OPTIONS

A relationship involves two or more people. If I have thousands of people in my organization, then it is impossible to spend individual time with each other. I must work with my direct reports to accomplish loving all followers of my leadership. I must instruct, model, and require my direct reports to love their direct reports, all the way to the lowest level of the organization. This step is what I call a mandate.

Next, I must know my direct reports are doing what I mandate of them. I must go to those at different levels in my organization and ask them individually to tell me their understanding of the mandate to understand what I required in my mandate is being accomplished. Talking in person is better. Talking by video is better than only audio. However, audio talking is better than not talking. It is more effective to go to the middle of the organization first, then the bottom when having these talks. This approach gives me accurate first-hand findings quite quickly. This step is what I call a measurement.

Talking together

Next, I take any corrective action necessary to match what I mandated with what I measured to eliminate any variance. This action occurs speedily over a day or so. This step is what I call a demand.

If any of my direct reports disagree with my leadership, then it is best either I change my leadership, or they cease reporting to me. I am willing to discuss how I accomplish my work. I am not willing to discuss what I mandate. A mandate is derived by what I know must happen to preserve the organization, to grow it, and perhaps even turn it over to another leader at some future date. I know a mandate by the intersection of my worldview, my ethics, and my morals.

So, how about the followers? There must be enough of an intersection between leader and follower in their worldview, ethics, and morality for them to be able to accomplish the work in their hand. The best practices of both diversity and inclusion tell me I have a better chance of success with as much input as I can receive. Yes, there is a condition known as analysis paralysis. This condition is when a person cannot act on their work because they are taking in too many considerations. We covered this condition when we discussed being scared. The inputs never stop. So, it is best to have as diverse a follower set as I can have in my organization to ensure I have the most inputs possible. Furthermore, I had better love each of them if I expect each of them to be included in my organization by their choosing to do the work I have put into their hand.

Talking again with someone

BONDSERVANT

It is my considered position my loving anyone is a choice I must make daily. I must choose to make myself indebted to love. I do not force anyone to love me. It is impossible to achieve this action, so there is no reason to try and do it.

The idea here is to have a continuous conversation that matters. Matters, in the form of contributing productively to the desired outcome. It is spending the time talking about what organization members are supposed to be talking about: their work. Then, the purposeful conversations occur at all levels of the organization.

A continuous conversation

CAPTURING

Now, it is time to write out your action plan to know with certainty how you are going to lead your followers by means of love. Review the material we covered in our discussion on the topic of love. Then, write out a table with the following structure:

Column One, HOW. Write a sentence of how you will deliver love to your followers.

Column Two, STORGE. This column is populated with entries of YES or NO based on HOW you deliver love.

Column Three, PHILIA. This column is populated with entries of YES or NO based on HOW you deliver love.

Column Four, EROS. This column is populated with entries of YES or NO based on HOW you deliver love.

Column Five, AGAPE. This column is populated with entries of YES or NO based on HOW you deliver love.

Love Action Items List

This table now contains your Love Action Items list.

You should be able to write out twenty sentences of HOW you will deliver love without expending much effort. I encourage you to keep each sentence as short as possible while maintaining your clarity. Write out the HOW entries first, then come back and identify which love definition each HOW item matches. The result is each row in your table telling a specific action, matched with one or more specific love definitions, for anyone impacted by your leadership to understand your leadership style better. If you need some help with the HOW part, then read some of the work accomplished by Gary Chapman. Chapman realized there are five common love communication mechanisms.

My strategic partner David Daniels shared with me his thoughts on forming the Love Action Items list. “I have always welcomed different points of view, as long as they came from a positioning of the organization’s values and mission. However, once a decision was made, I fully expected my team to embrace and support the direction. I have watched so many situations where leadership gave the appearance of support to the leader and then went out and trashed the direction or lent unenthusiastic support of it.” I agree with David’s viewpoint. It is best to write your Love Action Items list from the position your people changes may involve changing some of your people who report to you directly, whether or not they serve as leaders.

Your analysis of your table containing your Love Action Items list will help you plan to deliver love to your followers. The best news is your followers will know how you are planning to act, know instantly how your actions match your plan and are empowered to contribute to your table by adding rows as you approve. The key here is your HOW items need to be received by your followers, and your followers HOW items need to be received by you.

Now, some good news. The four types of love expressed through five different options work out to be 465 different combination options. Clearly, there is no shortage of options available to anyone desiring to love anyone. Do some reading on permutations and combinatorics to learn more about combinations. Remember, the leader-follower relationship must work in harmony and not be forced to be effective. We will discuss the work you accomplished with your Love Action Items list next week.

So, I ask you: where do you want to go? I hope your answer is to develop the plans necessary to accomplish the strategy you know you need to achieve to arrive at your desired destination. If this is the case, then let’s get to work. If not, then I wish you the best of everything.

I hope we will see each other here next week. Email me if you need to talk before then.

Dr. Stephen H. Dawson, DSL

Executive Strategy Consultant

Dr. Stephen H Dawson

Stephen Dawson is an executive consultant of technology and business strategy, serving significant international organizations by providing leadership consulting, strategic planning, and executive communications. He has more than thirty years of service and consulting experience in delivering successful international business development and program management outcomes in the US and SE Asia. His weekly column, “Where Do You Want To Go?,” appears on Thursdays.

Dr. Dawson has served in the technology, banking, and hospitality industries. He is a noted strategic planning visionary. His pursuit of music has been matched with his efforts to lead by service to followers. He holds the clear understanding a leader without followers is a person taking a long walk alone.

Stephen has lived his life in the eastern United States, visiting most of the United States and several countries. He is a graduate of the Regent University School of Business & Leadership.

Contact Stephen Dawson at service@shdawson.com.

Thank you for visiting our Blog!

Jim Weber, Managing Partner – ITB Partners

Jim Weber – Managing Partner,  ITB Partners

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Energy

I want you to want me.” Cheap Trick

I was 16 years old, living in Knoxville, TN, when the 1982 Worlds Fair occurred. The theme of the fair was energy. Energy, in all senses of the term. Thermodynamics was only a part of the fair’s concept. The idea was to gather as many nations as possible to demonstrate their concepts of how they plan to use all types of energy in the future. The fair was a success by almost all measurements. The fair showed me several options for how I could become more than who I was at the time. It helped to transform me to become a better person.

Knoxville committed to host the fair based on the agreement to develop Knoxville to host guest headcounts greater than anything Knoxville had ever experienced. All city infrastructure had to be upgraded, the roadways had to be redesigned and upgraded, the fair site established, and all other associated planning accomplished and executed in less than a decade. The milestone transformed the city and surrounding area from rural to metropolitan. The people of the region changed mindsets from local to global. There were not enough restaurants or hotels available during the fair to serve the millions of attendees.

A centerpiece of the fair was to be a tower called the Sunsphere. The initial concept for the tower was for it to be taller than the Eiffel Tower. The initial planning revealed there was neither enough time nor money to accomplish the tower at such a height. The ultimate outcome also required lowering the tower height during construction due to cumulative fair site work delays.

We talked about the topic of love last week. If love has any assurance to it, then it is people want to be loved. I remember during the summer of 1982 how much I wanted to be loved, as a part of transiting from boy to man. I wanted to be a meaningful part of the world, to help the world be a better place for everyone. You have heard from me you need to love your followers to succeed in any leadership role. I affirm this statement to you now. You will not, repeat…will not…succeed in your strategic planning efforts without the energy supplied by love.

We are going to cover now a concept for how you would do well to use energy to address the people problems you have with your strategic planning work not being accomplished as you prefer. We will leverage past discussions, learn more about the 1982 fair I attended, and combine things where you can form a plan to evaluate the candidates you have as you consider offering them a role in your organization where they will help complete your strategic planning work.

FOCUSED ENERGY

You have a tangible goal: derive a well-planned strategy. Knoxville had a tangible goal: be ready to go on May 1, 1982. I had a tangible goal: have a fantastic time as a teenager in 1982 while learning how I can be a part of the world that has come to my front door. Fear of failure is often a great motivator for change. We talked about fear during our past discussions. You, Knoxville, and I (the three of us) experienced time running out of our schedules to accomplish our respective goals. It became clear to me in 1981 that I needed help understanding the largeness of what I would experience at the fair. I purchased an unlimited access pass to the fair, and I attended the fair many times. Thankfully, there was a map available to help my young mind navigate the complex fair landscape. I was able to calm my excitement and be more effective during my visits to the pavilions, demonstration events, concerts, and other fair site activities. The key here for the three of us is the need to leverage the energy supplied by those trying to deliver love to us without us becoming overwhelmed in the size of the experience, the wonderfulness of the love, or immersing in a piece of the picture that will slow our forward progress.

1982 Worlds Fair Park Map

ENOUGH MONEY

You have a budget to accomplish your strategic planning work. You are spending too much on your work because you are not getting the results you either need or want to accomplish the scope of your work. Knoxville had money and workers to develop the city and the fair site, but the complexity of the work often caused the planning of work packages to be less than optimal, pushing expenditures higher than budgeted. No worker can work effectively without specific tasking from specific planning. I was running out of time as a kid for free housing and food. I needed to find a means to get more work graduating high school in 1984 than my existing part-time job at a fast-food restaurant. I wanted to spend much more time at the fair than I had available to me, as I needed to work at my job. The key here for the three of us is having enough money goes with having a clear plan in hand. They both help contribute to having enough time to do what we need to do, to get where we need to go.

EFFECTIVE PLACEMENT

You need to place some new faces in some of the roles in your organization to help complete your strategic planning work. OK, maybe it is only one face, but I think it is more than a single face. Either changing roles for existing organization members or removing them from your organization is a huge impact for work that is behind schedule and over budget, as blame often flows easily during work delays. You are, effectively, going into organization design mode with the people changes you must accomplish.

Knoxville had to take their city that was not designed well by layout and derive a new roadway system, upgrade all utilities significantly, and help the lodging and hospitality industries be ready to serve what turned out to be millions of guests. This effort involved reworking the intersection of Interstates 75 and 40, which met in downtown Knoxville. The prior interchange was a horrible roadway design that would never function effectively with the addition of millions expected to attend the fair.

I was becoming more upset the more I attended the fair. I was humbled by the wonderful pavilion hostesses. They were lovely, professional, and quite intelligent. They each were between 24 to 28 years old, each selected by their countries after a rigorous selection progress established by each country. They melted my teenage heart. I was sad that they would leave and I would not see them again. I realized it was best I ask them as many questions as I could to understand not only their concepts of how they plan to use energy in the future are structured, but also about their country’s culture. Yes, to answer the question in your mind, I asked a few of them out on a date. They all turned me down. I trust it was due only to the age difference.

David Daniels shared with me his view on inclusion during the team selection step. “The concept of inclusion works best when you have identified your biases and understand how they might manifest themselves with your decisions as a leader. Your diverse team needs to be comprised of employees who share your values and buy into the mission of your organization. Your leaders need to ensure that every employee understands where they and their department fit into the big picture. Then, and only then, will you achieve the levels of engagement by the team that, in turn, optimizes this critical resource set who is unleashed to exceed expectations.” Effective team formation is not a bolt-on action. It is an inner-mixing action fed to a combustion chamber of the work the team is to accomplish. The day may come when battery-powered airplanes and cargo ships cross oceans. Until then, it is the combustion engine that moves both people and merchandise between continents. We must deliver our output each day, for yesterday is gone, and tomorrow is where we deliver our work outcomes. The concept of the combustion engine is relevant to the workplace of both today and the foreseeable future.

The key here for the three of us is knowing where we fit into the big picture. We each have a scope, a budget, and a schedule. We are each time-bound to accomplish our work. We cannot spend decades doing work that does not require decades. Now, don’t get me wrong. I agree time must be spent as appropriate. It is the appropriateness part that each leader must consider. I remember Dr. Beverly Crusher helped me learn this lesson. She helped me learn to measure with caution each time I must make this appropriateness decision. See if her worlds help you understand the appropriate aspect of how we spend our efforts.

WIDESPREAD COMMUNICATION

Your investors have charged you with the responsibility to accomplished the planning of the strategy they require you to achieve. Knoxville made a deal by their free choice with the Bureau International des Expositions to host the fair. I had life calling me to grow into adulthood, along with food and housing running out in a few years. The messages were each well-formed and delivered with clarity. Now, it is time for you to take the energy of those circumstances calling you and use it to your benefit.

You must form a message to an intended audience stating you have a work opportunity you want to be filled with a new face from a person either inside or outside of your organization for each role you need to be filled. This action is not merely a job posting from the personnel department, hoping a suitable candidate is supplied to you. The role opportunity is to accomplish specific work in an environment operated by…love. It will operate by love because you are leading the organization. You are convinced you must demonstrate love to your followers, you must serve them through this yet-to-be-defined leadership style called servant leadership, and you are certain the planning of your organization’s strategy must be accomplished with excellence. This combination is what Knoxville did, it is what I do now, and what I know you must do to realize success as a leader trying to accomplish your organization’s strategic planning. Perhaps you can reassign all of your people assigned to the work to new roles in the work. I doubt this option will work, but it is possible.

Knoxville took on more than they could accomplish with the 1982 fair. They needed help many times from many external organizations to both plan and do the preparation work. It was not clear things would be ready for opening day. I remember the Sunsphere was not finished until two days before opening day. Your strategic planning work not being accomplished as you prefer means you are about to be in the same mess as Knoxville was in the late 1970s. I remember the leaders of Knoxville becoming quite humble to ask for the help they needed. You may need to be more humble than you are now to identify those who you need to be a part of your organization to complete your strategic planning work. I see gaining more humility as a good thing. It is a good aspect of love, as love shares the loving experience and does not dominate those they love.

OUTCOMES

The Sunsphere still stands today. It is a good memory for those who were in Knoxville before the fair and afterward to see what happened, recall how it happened, and know things changed for the better.

I grew up, though having to walk many bumpy roads to get there. I see my summer of 1982 as a valuable contributor to not perishing along the way to get to our conversation now. I have thought of that summer often over the years.

You are looking to grow as a leader by gaining more effectiveness in your organization by adding some new folks to help with some of your organization’s work. I encourage you to take note of the experiences Knoxville and I went through. Finding the people you are hoping will join your organization needs not only help from those outside of your organization, but you also need healthy joy to get them to join your organization. It is not a matter of joining to do the work of an already accomplished plan. It is the condition where an organization cannot work because they do not have a plan that candidates must consider. Who wants to join an organization that has no work plan? Today, people revel in fame from things like social networking, politics, and many communal forms. A dysfunctional organization does not have fame, but perhaps they have shame. Use the energy of positive change potential you have in your hand now to your benefit. It will take more humility on your part to get the energy focused, placed, and communicated.

Now is not the time to assign blame for how things became as they are for your people. Now is the time for taking inventory of where you stand, counting the costs to get to where you want to go, and deciding if you want to pay the price to get there. If so, then it is now time to talk with those you consider offering to join your organization. Talk to them, but do not offer them a position. You are researching as of this point. If you are not ready to take the step to go and speak with those candidates, then we need to come up with another plan for you.

Sunsphere

Remember, strategic planning work is perpetual. It never ends. The tangible of a plan to accomplish a strategy is not a piece of paper generated by executive leadership at an annual meeting. It is the collection of plans from the entire organization unified into a single plan. Concisely, one cannot lead if one cannot plan strategy. Execution of a strategy is much easier than deriving a strategy. Ease, in the form of knowing the right things to do. We talked about right and evil during past discussions. I know we need to talk about these terms more than what we have so far. Today, understand that healthy love, love supplied to people that helps builds them to become more humble, helps lead us to what is right, and helps keep us away from evil. I keep coming back to this thing called humble for a reason. It is because pride is a horrible means to lead anyone to do anything. Being proud is not a form of pride, but we can cover these terms another day. If I need to define the term humble, then please tell me.

Summarizing, you want people to be a part of your organization. Those people must want to be a part of your organization. You want them to want you. They want you to want to give them a job. This combination is more than a catchy lyric in a successful rock tune. It is a viable means to find the people you need to help you with your strategic planning work. Yes, I just said want must intersect with need in your staffing choices. You will find this collective wanting is what you need because you are convinced you must demonstrate love to your followers, you must serve them through this yet-to-be-defined leadership style called servant leadership, and you are certain the planning of your organization’s strategy must be accomplished with excellence.

So, I ask you: where do you want to go? I hope your answer is to develop the plans necessary to accomplish the strategy you know you need to achieve to arrive at your desired destination. If this is the case, then let’s get to work. If not, then I wish you the best of everything.

I hope we will see each other here next week. Email me if you need to talk before then.

Dr. Stephen H. Dawson, DSL

Executive Strategy Consultant

Dr. Stephen H Dawson

Stephen Dawson is an executive consultant of technology and business strategy, serving significant international organizations by providing leadership consulting, strategic planning, and executive communications. He has more than thirty years of service and consulting experience in delivering successful international business development and program management outcomes in the US and SE Asia. His weekly column, “Where Do You Want To Go?,” appears on Thursdays.

Dr. Dawson has served in the technology, banking, and hospitality industries. He is a noted strategic planning visionary. His pursuit of music has been matched with his efforts to lead by service to followers. He holds the clear understanding a leader without followers is a person taking a long walk alone.

Stephen has lived his life in the eastern United States, visiting most of the United States and several countries. He is a graduate of the Regent University School of Business & Leadership. Contact him at service@shdawson.com.

Thank you for visiting our Blog!

Jim Weber, Managing Partner – ITB Partners

Jim Weber – Managing Partner,  ITB Partners

I hope you enjoyed our point of view and would like to receive regular posts directly to your email inbox.  Toward this end, put your contact information on my mailing list.

Your feedback helps me continue to publish articles that you want to read.  Your input is very important to me so; please leave a comment.