As someone who has led full-service communications and marketing organization charged with protecting and elevating the reputation of an organization for nearly two decades, I’ve learned that the focus of much of that work is, by necessity, external in nature.
Media relations. Crisis communication. Advertising and branding. Executive communication. Stakeholder-specific communication. Social media management. The list is long and the demands on the team from external audiences and stakeholders can be daunting.
We all fall victim to the tyranny of the urgent, often at the expense of the important. The result can be a Sisyphus-like pursuit of self-imposed deadlines and self-manufactured mini-crises that serves more to exhaust than it does to engage or enlighten.
The tug between the urgent and the important only becomes more pronounced as we tether ourselves closer to one another via technology. It’s simply too easy to spend the day responding to texts, e-mails, social media posts and the like, beating smoldering campfires to death while the forest is ablaze in the distance.
Maybe it’s a modicum of wisdom that comes with age. Or maybe it’s that after 30+ years of being on some sort of daily deadline for something, I find myself wanting to spend more time and energy helping bring long-term structural improvements to the organization I serve.
Whatever the case, I find myself giving more thought than ever these days to the importance of creating and sustaining a high-performing, mission-driven team.
And the more I think about it, the more I am convinced that the path to great organizational performance starts at home — our work home.
Healthy team dynamics feed better organizational results. Or put another way, less drama means more time and energy to focus on the important things — delivering results for your organization.
Beyond that, life’s simply too short — and too challenging under the best of circumstances — to make dealing with chronic work dysfunction worth the trouble in the long run.
The concepts are compellingly simple; the execution much more challenging. Too often, leaders add to the problem by not tending to their staff gardens until the weeds have threatened to choke off the harvest. Senior leaders who are charged with being big-picture “strategic” thinkers many times see “staff management” as a tedious necessity.
I like to think of myself as a strategic leader, but the best game plan is for nothing if the players don’t execute.
It’s my job to coach my team — and that means taking an interest in them as professionals AND humans. It also means leading by example, much more than by fiat. I can’t ask them to respect one another and our mission if I don’t model the behavior I want to see by living our values every day.
Everything speaks.
Your words and the way you say them. How you handle success — and setbacks. The joy you bring to the job — and the days when you’re having no fun at all.
Your staff notices. All of it. And they feed off the vibe you radiate.
Is it fair? Maybe not all of the time, but it comes with the job and the paycheck, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
My greatest value to the organization lies in my ability to hire talented people, get them to buy into a shared vision of success and clear the road for them. The day that my staff only responds to me because of my title is the day I have lost them — and the right to lead them.
