admin

“A ritual is a sequence of activities involving gestures, words, actions, or objects, performed according to a set sequence. Rituals may be prescribed by the traditions of a community, including a religious community. Rituals are characterized, but not defined, by formalism, traditionalism, invariance, rule-governance, sacral symbolism, and performance.” (from Wikipedia)

One of the characteristics of high-performing individuals and teams are specific rituals they create to “attach” meaning and psychological preparation to functional tasks. 

A police officer friend tells me that every morning he puts on his uniform is a ritual to get his head into the right place to be effective.  He buttons his shirt from bottom to top because it helps him stand tall.  He gives his badge and name plate a quick polish to remind him what he stands for.  He carefully checks the snap on his pistol holster to reinforce the requirement to keep lethal force under control. 

Moms develop morning routines for young children to help them get everything organized and launch into the day.  Teachers greet students at the beginning of class and send them out with a repeated phrase.  Soldiers go through their checklists before battle, and a comm check becomes an opportunity to affirm “we’re together in this.”  Many businesses have rituals associated with starting or ending a meeting, when a new person onboards, and when the company hits a big objective.

Many families have rituals for birthdays and special events.  I know of families which only eat certain foods on holidays, or always go out together to see a movie on January 1^st. I grew up in a family that had red plates for the birthday person to use at meals.  My wife designated “backwards” meals on birthdays – we started with dessert first.  My dad used to tell me “Be a Brooke” – meaning uphold the family honor of hard work and truthfulness – when he dropped me off at events, and when he sent me off to college. 

Rituals can also guard against our worst tendencies.  I knew a coworker who identified a telephone pole about midway from his home to the office.  When he headed home from the office, he mentally took all the work stuff in his head and stowed it in an imaginary bag hung on that telephone pole.  He picked up the contents again as he drove to the office.  This helped him be truly present at home with his family.

Rituals are more than habits and traditions.  They have psychological power to help us perform our best. 

Give some thought to what rituals you can create for yourself and your team.  Creating new rituals sets you apart as a leader.

You and I (and everyone we know) are more likely to make poor decisions when we’re financially stressed.  We’re more susceptible to temptations and ethical compromises.  Financial stress is a significant distraction from doing your best work.  It’s a kind of bondage.  A friend says “Heroin addicts and people with steady paychecks have things in common.”  I’ve known people who were compelled to stay in toxic work situations because they absolutely needed the next paycheck.  I’ve seen a friend need to declare bankruptcy when he was laid off and couldn’t get another job for 8 months. 

I’m all in on being responsible and caring for your family, even if you have to suffer somewhat.  I’m challenging bondage because of avoidable financial straits. 

I wasted money when I was younger.  I chased the expectations of a particular lifestyle as my income grew.  I didn’t make any huge mistakes, but wise up before I did! 

My specific advice, especially now that we’re living in a period of high inflation:

• Build and maintain an emergency fund of 6 months living costs.  You’ll be well-prepared for a layoff.  You’ll be able to walk away from a toxic job.  You won’t panic when the car needs repairs or the appliance dies or when insurance won’t cover all the roof damage from the storm.

• Save money early for retirement, college funds, and life goals – let compounding interest be your friend.  $50/month in your twenties can be more powerful than $500/month in your late forties.

• Get everything you can from company benefits – especially 401K match, insurance options, scholarships, and EAP help. 

• Get life insurance.  I was twice astounded to learn of widows with children being left with little but debts because their husbands didn’t arrange for life insurance.  Term coverage is available and cheap.  Whole life coverage could be a good part of your overall financial plan. 

• Don’t run up credit card debt on little stuff.  Debt is a useful tool in the right hands, for the right reasons. 

• The most likely debt crises will be from car and house obligations.  Live below your means.  Don’t compare yourself to others.  Yeah, the other guy has a gorgeous new car and brags about pricey vacations, but you can sleep better.

• Teach your children about good financial practices. 

You’ll be a better leader and person if you’re financially free.   

An acquaintance who had read my book “Bold and Gentle” inquired how I had decided on the biggest challenges my kids would face in the next 50 years. “How do you anticipate the future when there are so many uncertainties about so many factors?” he asked.

Apart from revelation given to us, you can’t predict the future, but you can anticipate it and prepare for possibilities. 

There are a few principles:

Studying historical patterns helps us anticipate the future because people are still people. Individuals and mobs have only so many motivations, therefore behaviors will repeat. There will always be malevolent individuals with a will to amoral power. There will always be some sheeple. Individuals can be unpredictable over short time periods, but large groups of people are quite predictable over longer time periods.

You can count on hard trends. A hard trend is something which will generally be true over time. We can reasonably expect that compute power increases while the costs decrease. We can reasonably expect that medical advances will reduce deaths from heart disease, cancer, and neurological decay. We can reasonably expect that people will prefer faster service at a lower cost. We can reasonably predict that any new technology has rabid early adopters, consensus adopters, and stubborn laggards. You can’t always guess the precise timing implications of a hard trend, but it still has predictive power.

You can expect that a few key decisions and singular events will have disproportionate effect. This is the “sandpile instability” reality. Grains of sand accumulate in a pile and fingers of instability develop. One of those fingers will collapse at an unpredictable time – affecting the larger pile. (This is described well in Mark Buchanan’s book “Ubiquity: Why Catastrophes Happen.”) One assassination triggers WW1 because fingers of instability had developed over decades. Multiple recessions have occurred after economic bubbles grew unstable and popped. Sand piles cannot grow forever without shifting to release unsustainable tensions.

…

It’s instructive to evaluate God’s rules for the nation of Israel as taking the tension out of instabilities before they became disastrous.

For example, God forbid Israel from entering alliances with other nations. This kept them from being drawn into wars that were not their direct concern. This insulated them from interconnected political instability.

They were to give the land a Sabbath rest every seven years. This minimized the problems of chronic soil depletion.

All debts were to be forgiven every seven years. This prevented massive debt buildup and avoided the inevitable problems of economic collapse. Forgiving debts took economic tension out of the system.

Indentured servants had to be freed after seven years. This mercy minimized the likelihood of creating a permanent underclass of citizens. Certain social tensions and resentments would not accumulate.

I’m not advocating we adopt these laws today. There is no indication in the New Testament that these specific laws would carry over to the Christian church, and indeed, the NT fosters even higher principles. I’m simply pointing out the “self-repair” wisdom embedded in the laws for an agrarian society surrounded by violent nations.

…

Anticipating the future is a responsibility. We can forecast different scenarios and consider how we could respond – and be less surprised as events unfold. We can also forecast possible future states to decide which actions and what systems will be most effective and helpful for more people over longer times.

“The mind is strong against things it has prepared for.” (Seneca) Cultivate your imagination to anticipate the future.

The common view is that we’re terribly divided as a people. This is not unique in history. The path towards unity and amity requires more dialogue that explores tough topics. We’ve mastered babbling and talking past one another and raised non-purposeful conversation to an art form in social media. We need genuine dialogue.

Observation: We simultaneously crave dialogue and are fearful of where it takes us. The popularity of long-form podcast interviews and panel discussions is not a surprise. We get to hear it from a safe distance. At least we’re passively learning what meaningful conversation sound like.

In-person conversations are both desirable and riskier. Many (not all) of us can do small talk well enough, on safe subjects. Dialogue to explore deeper subjects? We grimace at the thought, even if a part of our heart longs for it.

I’m not talking about the uber-confident “I know the right answer” folks who are eager to vomit up their talking points. I mean genuinely open and curious conversation where there is no pre-determined end point. Education (from the Greek educare, meaning ‘to draw out’), not two people each trying to indoctrinate the other.

Dialogue comes to English from dia (two, or mutual) and logos (word, meaning). Dialogue is a two-way exchange of meaning.

There are learnable skills to make sustained dialogue valuable. Asking questions. Listening with an ear to understand. Summarizing points back to your conversation partner to test understanding. Use of humor and exaggeration to get through rough spots. Patience to be still and let silence be. Sensing when to pivot to a different topic. Pacing. Willingness to push through uncomfortable, resisting all temptations to “win the moment.” Sharing facts gently as a means of support, not weapons to club someone into submission.

Real dialogue with people who don’t share your echo chamber perspectives is difficult, and worth the work.

I’ve mentioned Perry Marshall’s principles of demilitarized conversation zones before:

1. Put down your weapons

2. No anonymity (no hiding behind screen names)

3. Assume other people have reasons for believing what they believe

4. Agree to get to the truth, not the sale…or “the win”

…

Climate change is an area where I’m loaded-for-bear with facts.  I’ve been good at ‘winning’ arguments but less good at dialogue-working-toward-solutions.  Some readers and colleagues take me to task because they perceive that I’m not all in on the existential threat of global climate change. 

I should begin my dialogues with points of agreement, rather than documenting errors in the way climate data has been collected, analyzed, and presented.  Or stating that “climate change” is an untestable hypothesis because no matter how it changes (or how quickly) you’re right. Or wilting fantasies with cold facts about energy and agricultural economics. Plus a few other ways I’ve irritated sincere believers. So here goes:

Climate is changing.  Atmospheric CO2 levels are increasing; this increases the acidity of water.  Human beings are healthier with clean air, clean water, and abundant food. Human beings have polluted the planet, and we generate considerable waste.  Fossil fuel-based energy is dirty at multiple steps in the process; by contrast, electrical energy is cleaner at the point of use.  The natural forces that drove ancient cycles of glaciation, sea level rises and falls, and tectonic plate movements are still at work.  Our sun goes through an 11-year cycle of solar minimum and maximum.  Environmental and biological systems are resilient right up to breaking points. We poorly understand complex systems and rarely identify tipping points before they happen. All predictive models will be wrong, and some are still useful.  We have a shared responsibility to care for the planet for the current and future generations.

Yes?  With me?  Good.

So now let’s discuss what should be done, where, and when.  Let’s explore possible solution spaces, cognizant that long-term climate shifts are more complex than human activity-driven CO2 release. (CO2 levels rose and fell dramatically prior to the Industrial Revolution.) Let’s remember that cause and effect are rarely close in time and space.  Let’s agree that there is no “right” CO2 level or temperature, so we need to be careful about setting targets.  Let’s be mindful that not every soul has the same choices as those of us living in affluence. Let’s be candid about economic tradeoffs and the price we’re willing to pay. 

Most of all, let’s be driven not by fear but by the opportunity for every person to live in a world of energy and food abundance, with minimal air and water pollution.  Human beings are the most adaptable multicellular species on the planet, going places even roaches, nematodes, and funguses can’t go. 

This last point is an example of a helpful strategy in dialogue: Point to the desirable future and pull people along with you.

…

It’s popular to identify hypocrisy, bash them over the head with it, and then walk away with a triumphant smile.  You tread to the edge of personal attack without getting sued. YouTube is replete with “gotcha” and “So-and-so destroys…” videos. 

This is popular because it’s easy, preferable to violence, and plays well to your preferred echo chamber.  We’re all hypocrites, we’ve all made statements in the past that were foolish, or we’ve changed our mind. 

The real opportunity is to gently (strength-under-control) point out inconsistencies and hypocrisy as a starting point for seeking truth and solutions.  No personal attacks.  No use of a hypocritical statement as a weapon.  Open acknowledgement that complex issues are messy and it’s possible for two things to be true at the same time.  Ready acceptance that individuals will prefer different problems associated with a type of solution.

I encourage you to keep going past “you’re a hypocrite” and “this is a horrible problem getting worse – lions and tigers and bears, oh my!”  We need solutions.  We need one another to discover truth and find solutions.

I respect a friend who strongly advocates for higher government payments to single parents.  She knows that in some cases this creates unhealthy dependency.  She acknowledges that it likely increases state debt.  “I know a few of these moms.  They’re hurting. They’re scared. They need help.”  At the same time, she’s furious about high taxes that make it harder to pay for her food and rent.  She’s been burned by lazy bums failing to show up for interviews because all they needed to do to collect unemployment was schedule an interview. We’ve had good conversations about alternative ways to help, such as neighbors and churches, and the role of personal responsibility. 

My conversations with her have reinforced the value of another dialogue tactic:  Say thank you.  “Thank you for that perspective.”  “Thanks for sharing that information.”  Saying thank you lays individual bricks in a bridge that can carry more weight in the future.

I wrote this advice on how to be a more effective reader and writer, and these same practices help you become a more effective leader:

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

People have asked how I can be such a prolific writer and reader.  The simplest answer is “It’s a choice followed by corresponding action.”  The truth is that I have multiple writing projects sitting partially done, and struggle constantly to finish and publish my writing.

Here are things which help me:

• Deadlines and commitments.  I have committed to this newsletter weekly, three LeaderLearning messages weekly, two blog posts weekly, and at least 3 posts on LinkedIn daily.  I’ve forced myself to create deadlines for publishing some of the Anger and 300 years book content via email on a schedule.
• Assume that everything you encounter is fuel for pondering, cross-connecting, prayerful meditation, topics to write about and teach about.   Capture thoughts and inspiration as quickly as possible because they have the same vapor pressure as gasoline on a sidewalk in July sun.  There may be “nothing new under the sun,” but there are things which are new for you and the people in your sphere of influence!
• Put myself in good company of smart and savvy observers and story-sharers – in person, via books, podcasts, films, etc.  This is food and fuel for your creative process. Invest your limited time and attention where it will yield higher returns.
• Always have a book handy.  You’ve probably noticed how many people, given a few spare seconds, whip out their smartphone.  Do that with books instead.
• Extract quality from quantity.  Don’t expect brilliance in a first draft of a sentence or book.  As best you can, squelch the self-editor which wants to work as you write – then unleash the editor’s power in the next stage.  No gem emerged from the ground cut and polished.  As I write this sentence, I have a “for newsletter content” document which is 121 pages long and hopefully no one will ever see 3/4ths of it!
• Walk!  It’s amazing how much clarity and coalescing happens in your mind when you walk.  Charles Dickens, incredibly prolific, walked the streets of London 2-4 hours daily.

The primary reason current leaders should be coaching and mentoring other is to elevate their team’s performance and build the resiliency that comes with a leadership pipeline.

The primary benefit for leaders to do this work is that it’s the best way for them to develop their skills and perspectives.  Teachers learn more than their students because the process of teaching requires a person to absorb, understand, and articulate.  New insights come this way.

I frequently talk with seasoned leaders who are in a “plateau” stretch of work – they have created some level of mastery, work is getting done, problems still take enormous energy, but they’re not growing.  My two questions for them are:

• “Do you need to consider moving into another role or area of responsibility?”
• “Can you do more coaching and mentoring?”

Those are the two routes for moving from a plateau to a growth curve.

I should trademark “Babbling Brooke”™ because I routinely say too much about too many topics.  

A key attribute of effective leadership is communication clarity. Howard Hendricks would tell his seminary students “A mist in the pulpit creates a fog in the pew.”

One of my mentors recommended condensing my verbosity to 3 statements I could fit on a 3×5 notecard.  Why? Few people can remember more than 3 key ideas from a presentation.  He said something like “If you want to impress them with your intelligence, talk and talk and talk.  If you want to move them to act differently, say no more than 3 things, explained well, and leave them wanting more.” He cited the example of the orator Edward Everett speaking for 2 hours before Abraham Lincoln delivered his 272-word speech at Gettysburg.

Don’t be fooled by apparent simplicity: Achieving clarity is hard work that requires the best of you. Marcus Tullius Cicero once wrote “If I had more time, I would have written a shorter letter.”  Mark Twain wrote “If you want me to give you a two-hour presentation, I am ready today.  If you want only a five-minute speech, it will take me two weeks to prepare.”

Worth it. I like the phrase, “Everyone communicates, few connect.”

Shallow connection comes from the safe and common “blah blah blah” and buzzspeak of organizations today.

Deeper connection comes from sharing the truth without shading, respecting the intelligence and experience of people with skin in the game.

A mistake I see leaders in challenging times make is to favor what people want to hear over what they need to hear.  Warm fuzzies in difficult situations dissipate quickly in the chill of reality.  The formula needs to be “Facts of our situation / Here’s the plan of action / This is our confidence.”  Don’t sugarcoat difficulties as if that makes them better. It’s helpful to reframe challenges into opportunities, but don’t diminish the challenge or speak as if it’s not real. People won’t always like what they need to hear. In the long run they’ll respect you more.

Most leaders, when challenged to rank order the skill or contribution level of the people in their team, tend to think about aggregate capabilities.  “Sue is better than Michael, and Michael is more experienced than Jill.”   If you ask them to quantify how much is better, you’ll usually hear “Sue is 10-15% better than Michael.  Jill is 10% better than Michael at writing code, but Michael more than makes up for that with his years of experience.”   

That’s understandable and useful for aggregate capabilities and potential.  Each of us are a gumbo of skills and experiences.  

I encourage you to sharpen your thinking about quantifying specific skill areas in your team members, or in candidates for open positions.  The distribution of individual skill/experience is likely to follow a power law.  The best software developer using .net in agile environments is probably 10x better than the average developer, who is likely to be 10x better than the worst.  Not 10% better or worse, but 10X.  Often was makes someone 10x better is a prior set of practical experiences. Those same individuals might be flipped order if you’re talking about using python as an individual contributor in a bioinformatics team.  Context matters!  

100x differences between best and worst are common, and occasionally you will find 10,000x differences.  (There are a million software developers who are infinitely better than I at writing .net code!) 

Thinking in terms of power laws for specific skills helps you articulate a better rationale for selecting one person over another for an assignment, role, or position.   

Setting the destination is crucial, and then you must determine the path.  Let me share a personal story to illustrate one of the big dangers.

I really wanted my Orienteering merit badge when I was a Boy Scout.  Orienteering is using a map and compass to navigate from point to point over unfamiliar terrain.   

I failed on my first attempt, didn’t qualify for the badge.  I read everything and practiced with my compass.  I passed the written test, but failed the two practical tests in the woods.  In both tests I set out first (alphabetical order).  I took my bearing to the target on the map, then held to a straight line through thicket, bramble, and muck.  I thought I heard the other boys a few times but stuck to my bearing.  I emerged at the destination scratched up and a muddy mess to discover I was dead last.  Both times, dead last.  I was so late on the second test that Mr. Jones was about to send out a search party for me. 

Mr. Jones – who we all admired and were a little scared of, because he had been in the Army Ranger battalion – said “You failed, Brooke.”   I was crushed and humiliated.  I was already an Eagle Scout and had passed every other test for merit badges before.  

I worked up my courage to ask Mr. Jones what I’d done wrong, because I wanted to get that Orienteering badge.  

“You failed because the purpose of orienteering is to get to the destination with the least time and effort, using the map and compass to guide you.  The other boys read the map better, picked up the trail a hundred yards into the woods, curled around the swamp and had less of a climb, and got there with dry feet way ahead of you.” 

This was like a 2×4 to the forehead.  The next summer camp, my next opportunity, I qualified for the merit badge. 

Years later I read what Abraham Lincoln said to a critic:  “A compass will point you to true north, but it’s got no advice about the swamps and deserts and chasms that you’ll encounter along the way. If in pursuit of your destination you plunge ahead, heedless of obstacles, and achieve nothing more than to sink in a swamp, what’s the use of knowing true north?” 

Lesson learned:  Be firm in your destination, but flexible in your approach.   

Now there is a counterpoint situation, and it was one Mr. Jones would have known well.   In wartime, especially in guerilla and unconventional warfare, attack where the enemy least expects you.  Stealth requires staying off the trail and avoid the easy way.  T.H. Lawrence captured the port city of Aqaba, attacking after crossing 600 miles of desert, something considered impossible.  Special forces tactics are often based on surprise attacks from unlikely vectors.  In business terms, sometimes the winning approach is to consciously embrace the difficult path for a high ROI. 

Ingratitude and selfishness seem rampant in many organizations – an issue of entitlement.  One of the ways I recognize I’m getting older is that I notice myself and others complaining and whining more.  I suspect I’m not complaining more but noticing it more than I used to years ago.   

The US Army Ranger School is one of the toughest leadership training programs anywhere.  It’s physically and mentally challenging – 3 major phases over 62 days, teaching small infantry unit tactics and leadership under austere conditions to simulate combat.  There’s minimal food and sleep, constant movement, and frequent go/no-go tests of strength and decision-making.  You must be fit and skilled to earn a slot at Ranger School, and fewer than half will graduate with the coveted Ranger tab.   

At the end of each phase every participant must rank order the performance others in his unit, from top to bottom.  This peer review reflects the importance of earning the respect of others.  The men and women who score low are “peered out,” and can either recycle that phase or quit.  Some soldiers ace every physical test but are peered out because they were a poor team member.    

I interviewed a retired Army Ranger and asked how peer judgments were made.  He told me that soldiers score low in peer reviews because they’re the lowest performers in the physical trials, are the first to complain and last to take on extra work, criticize their peers, fall asleep too many times on guard duty, and grumblers.  “You can avoid a low peer rating by volunteering to carry the heavy claymores and machine gun, encouraging your squad to keep going, never leave your Ranger buddy to fail alone, and zip your lip instead of complaining.”  

Where would you rank in peer reviews if they were held quarterly and annually?  Few organizations do anything like this, or take them this seriously, but your performance is being measured, especially when conditions are difficult.  Pre-decide how you’ll behave and the choices you’ll make under pressure.   

• Take on a heavy load to help a peer. 
• Cheer your peers onward and upward. 
• Don’t let your peers down. 
• Be constructive; no complaining. 

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- 

Does your organization have high expectations to create a high-performing culture?  Consider The Ranger’s Creed: 

Recognizing that I volunteered as a Ranger, fully knowing the hazards of my chosen profession, I will always endeavor to uphold the prestige, honor, and high esprit de corps of the Rangers. 

Acknowledging the fact that a Ranger is a more elite soldier who arrives at the cutting edge of battle by land, sea, or air, I accept the fact that as a ranger my country expects me to move further, faster, and fight harder than any other soldier. 

Never shall I fail my comrades I will always keep myself mentally alert, physically strong, and morally straight and I will shoulder more than my share of the task whatever it may be, one hundred percent and then some. 

Gallantly will I show the world that I am a specially selected and well trained soldier. My courtesy to superior officers, neatness of dress, and care of equipment shall set the example for others to follow. 

Energetically will I meet the enemies of my country. I shall defeat them on the field of battle for I am better trained and will fight with all my might. Surrender is not a Ranger word. I will never leave a fallen comrade to fall into the hands of the enemy and under no circumstances will I ever embarrass my country. 

Readily will I display the intestinal fortitude required to fight on to the Ranger objective and complete the mission, though I be the lone Survivor.