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I learned an important life lesson during my first year in grad school, working on my Ph.D. in Molecular and Cellular Biology.

The rule for 1st year students in my major professor’s lab was simple, and we hated it.

Here was the first part of the rule: you could not start an experiment until you had designed it, understood how it would test your hypothesis, and what you would conclude from different possible outcomes.  In most cases you had to think about the follow-up experiments that would be required.
It was actually the second part we hated most.

Once you had an experiment designed and written out, you put in your drawer, pulled out a blank sheet of paper, and had to design a completely different way to test the same hypothesis.  You weren’t allowed to try the first design until you had a 2nd workable experimental design.

Sometimes the second design came easily, and was obviously better. 

Sometimes I struggled to come up with anything at all, or could only think up a truly bad design.

You had to talk through your designs with our major prof before you could start actual bench work.  His feedback and commentary were some of the best learning experiences I had in the whole program.  “Think!” he would say.  “I am training you to think like a scientist!”

I encourage you to consider this in your own project work.  Come up with a design, an approach, a response.  Think of a completely different alternative.  The discipline pays off because you’ll often find a better approach.

There’s a horrible disease that saps the strength of leaders and managers.  It goes by the acronym ‘SSDT.’
  
How many times have you heard someone in your organization say, “Someone should do that”?  How often do you say it yourself?  All too often the response is… nothing happens.  You can hear crickets chirping, and the whisper of soft backpedaling out of responsibility.  Safest bet: change the subject, or reach into your bag of blameshifting tricks and say, “Not my job!”
 
Someone should do that.  SSDT.  It can sap the life out of you.
 
How should you, a responsible manager and sharp leader, handle these situations?  What do you think when you realize there is an opportunity to do something?  How do you respond when that someone might be you? 
 
Agree and deflect
Say “not my job”
Agree and accept responsibility
Speak clearly about commitment
 
 
Blameshifting is not professional.  It doesn’t move a project forward, build up a team, or add to your credibility.
 
Stop it.
 
Take responsibility. Take ownership.  Even if some task or project is not expressly yours, if you’re involved, you’re in it – and take responsibility and ownership appropriately for being part of the process or system.
 
Here’s my question: Outside of avoiding some immediate pain (but not really), does blameshifting make anything better?

The loneliness of leadership is oft-described; few people speak wisely about the loneliness in every individual.  This is critical for leaders to understand.

The people you encounter are desperately lonely, at least in certain seasons of their life.  Henry David Thoreau touched on this in his classic book, “Walden”:

The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation. From the desperate city you go into the desperate country, and have to console yourself with the bravery of minks and muskrats. A stereotyped but unconscious despair is concealed even under what are called the games and amusements of mankind. There is no play in them, for this comes after work. But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things.

The human condition is a constant struggle in this dimension:

We long for intimacy, and are terrified of it.

We crave connection, and fear being exposed.

We want to be known, and our default is to hide.

We are expert mask-builders and mask-wearers.

There is no formula for dealing with lonely people.  Efforts to “fix” them will fail.  My counsel:

1.       Recognize in your own assessment that loneliness has some effects on a person’s performance over time.  It will be difficult to quantify, but it is non-zero.

2.       Use this recognition to help you work with people with appropriate toughness (“This needs to get done with this standard of quality”) and tenderness (“I understand today is the anniversary of your dad’s passing”).

3.       Don’t expect a highly charged, energized, engaged work team to be a substitute for all an individual’s needs for connection.

There is a relationship between enthusiasm & optimism, and energy that fuels productivity. 

We also need rest and recovery.  Especially leaders.  Fight against the feelings of guilt over taking breaks and getting appropriate rest.

I find it intriguing that most but not all our units of time in the western world are derived from astronomy:

A year Earth orbits the sun
A month Moon orbits the Earth
A day Earth rotates 1 time on its axis
Hours and seconds Convenient time intervals of a day

What’s missing?  A week.  There is no astronomical basis for a week.  In the Judeo-Christian heritage we have a week from biblical revelation: “Six days you shall labor and on the seventh day you shall rest.”  This is a command from God. As a student of the Bible I can tell you of a consistent pattern: We are commanded to do the things we do not naturally do, but are good for us. 

Rest. Recover.  This is not leadership laziness.

The typical chess club invests a lot of time encouraging players to study openings and memorize opening sequences.  In 5th grade I was handed a 12 page list of openings to memorize.
 
The curious thing is that multiple chess grandmasters have shared that they spent very little time on openings, and instead focused on practicing the end-game.   Josh Waitzkin describes this in his book, “The Art of Learning.”  Josh and his mentor Bruce Pandolfini drilled every end-game scenario. It’s critical to know how you want the game to end, and steer your opponent in that direction.  (Fun fact about Waitzkin: The first master he ever defeated was Edward Frumkin, in a game featuring a remarkable sacrifice of Waitzkin’s queen and rook in exchange for a checkmate six moves later. Waitzkin was only ten years old at the time.)

The problem with studying openings at the expense of endings is that you get fixated on fast results but miss the overall game objectives.  You reward speed and conformity rather than concentration and bravery.  The reality is that new chess players get some early wins, but once they get to middle and advanced levels they can no longer win.  They’ve optimized the wrong part of the real game. The best players evolved way beyond a focus on openings.

Food for leadership thought: Project openings are important but perhaps we spend too much time studying those rather than project endings.

Have you ever eaten roadkill?  I did a few times growing up in West Virginia.  Some of it’s fine – chunks of rabbit or squirrel, or groundhog in a stew.  Opossum, however – truly nasty stuff.  Gack, I can still remember trying to vomit so the taste in my mouth would be obliterated with stuff previously in my stomach. Not being a foodie and nervous about trying new foods, I’ve pulled up that memory when I’ve traveled internationally and am staring at a plate of something unsavory looking that my host recommends.  “Hey,” I think, “it can’t be worse than possum.”   And I eat it. 

One time in Boy Scouts I was “recruited” to help clean out a pit toilet that the new EPA decided was now too close to the river.  Being small and easily intimidated, I was the kid lowered into the pit with a shovel and bucket.  The only thing that kept me from passing out from the smell and texture was the fear that I’d faint and drown in this crap (literally).  Afterwards I used a whole bottle of Head & Shoulders to get the smell out of my hair, and burned my clothes as a hopeless cause.  I pull up that memory when I’m faced with an unpleasant job or task.  “Hey,” I think, “it can’t be worse than cleaning out the pit toilet.” 

Ever had a horrible boss?  It’s useful to say, “Hey, it can’t be worse than _______ was, and I survived that and even learned a few things.”  If a person can’t be anything else he or she can at least be a bad example. 

How could you profitably use your worst experiences and memories as ways to help you move forward? 

Professionals do not assume other people understand the value they bring; they articulate it.  

For example, professionals often serve as linchpins in key conversations, broker alliances of shared values, and work out problems in advance of critical meetings.  It’s a mistake to say, “I coordinated that.”  Instead, describe the result of your coordination effort.  Supporting logistics is honorable and necessary, but you’re executing more than what an entry level admin assistant can do, right?

This might be something like:

• Eliminated all but 2 possibilities for a decision-making meeting to keep them focused on selecting the best outcome
• Tailored the agenda and provided written updates in advance so the quarterly review required 1 hour instead of 3 hours
• Secured verbal commitment for a new contract by introducing 2 people to our VP of Sales
• Suggested a contributor help draft a white paper about a step-change improvement to our manufacturing process
• Provided concise statement of the problem and obtained stakeholder’s approval in advance

Don’t assume people, especially your busy boss, automatically grasps the significance of what you delivered. 

(I served under a VP for several years who forbade anyone from using the word “coordinate” in a goal or a job description.  At first I found this quite irritating, but I did profit from the push for clearer thinking about the value delivered.)

Common tactics of bullies:

• Making false accusations and spreading rumors
• Non-verbal intimidation
• Making fun of a person’s feelings or behaviors
• Holding people to different standards
• Creating a scapegoat; nothing is ever their fault
• Singling out a target with a crowd at their back
• Name-calling and labeling
• Encouraging a person to quit
• Destroying property, or sabotaging work
• Skilled at playing the victim when cornered

Behaviors which encourage bullies:

• Being passive and compliant
• Adopting their image of you
• Leaders letting known bullying go unchallenged, unchecked

Standing against bullies:

• Don’t allow their words and deeds to become your self-image
• Remember their three most common drivers:  They see you as a threat.  They hate themselves. They secretly want to be you.
• Stand firm on rights and principles
• Act fearlessly.  Cowards may bluff but will retreat in the face of courage.
• Don’t return evil for evil

Wait a sec… did you think I was talking about children? 

The cynical leader says, “If there is doubt, if there is uncertainty, or when I need a distraction – reorganize!” 

There are many reasonable ways to design an organization’s reporting structure and operating model.  All organizations must adapt to changing environments and objectives. 

The key parallel questions:

                What problem are we trying to solve?

                What problems do we prefer to have?

A foundational question (the answer is rarely obvious): What business are we in?

I observe these common pivot points where designs flex over time:

• Centralized Decisions and Skills vs. De-centralized Decisions and Skills

• Global vs. Regional vs. Local standards and processes

• Rely on the unique strength mix of an individual in a role vs. a Structured Team or Program

(Can you think of others?)

I call these pivot points because we tend to swing the pendulum from one side to the other.  Each point along the spectrum has its problems, therefore there will always be someone who recommends a reorganization or redesign in order to solve a present problem.  

How many times in history have we seen examples where crisis situations evolved rapidly and leaders were stuck without good options?  Everything escalates rapidly.  They recognized problems too late.  There is no one available who can step in to fix things.

How many times has that happened to you? 

Perhaps the best people and project managers, and the best political, military, and organizational leaders are largely unknown.  They planned well and systematically generated options so that major crises didn’t happen. 

Reviewing crisis events pushes us to ask and answer this question: “What could have been done differently to prevent this from happening?”  There are sometimes mechanical and process factors.  There are almost always missed opportunities to have built relationships.  Weak relationships will lose to stronger relationships when the crisis comes. 

The optionality that leaders need often comes down to “Who can help here?”  Pre-existing relationships have platinum value.  Your web of relationships represents options you have to prevent bad outcomes, or begin to address them quickly before they become a crisis. 

Create time every month to diversify and deepen your personal network.