By Larry Ackerman on December 11th, 2011
The allure of wealth is intoxicating. The possibility of having as much money as you need to do what you want, when you want is a potent aphrodisiac. When I talk about a “rich life,” however, that’s not what I’m talking about. At least, not exclusively. But you already knew that, because you are, or aspire to be, a conscious leader.
So far in this blog series, we’ve looked at the first 7 attributes of personal identity strength and how they influence conscious leadership – autonomy, differentiation, change, stewardship, potential, alignment and brand. This post addresses the eighth and final attribute, sustainability – a leader’s ability to shape an organization that not only positively affects others today, but that lays the groundwork for shaping a legacy that survives his or her tenure – in short, your ability make a difference that endures.
So, who’s the lucky soul who exemplifies a “rich” life? For me, one of the characteristics of all conscious leaders is their ability to teach, not just tell. Call it leader-as-coach. With that thought in mind, my candidate is Sharon Daniels, CEO of AchieveGlobal, the worldwide training concern. I ran across Sharon in a New York Times column recently that featured her life and how she’d achieved (!) her current position. (A Passion for Coaching: http://nyti.ms/uwmysK) What moved me to make her the poster child for this posting were two things: first, how, along with her CEO responsibilities, she volunteers in crisis counseling and pregnancy counseling and, second, how she has applied her coaching and mentoring talents to raising her family (with apparently positive outcomes). Certainly, Sharon Daniels is making money, but she’s also making a difference in many significant ways.
What are the measures of a rich life? Based on Sharon’s story, they certainly include income. But they also include recognition, a powerful sense of accomplishment, self-esteem, even love. Not a bad ROI; Return On Identity, that is!
How do you create such a life? You surrender to the pull of your identity. I’m not referring to giving up; I’m talking about taking hold; taking hold of the most powerful force you have as a human being, the part of you that fuels your capacity to make important things happen. As a leader, surrendering to the pull of your identity is what it takes to do right by yourself and, in turn, by others.
Conscious leadership is a way of life, not just a way of management. It calls for courage, for humility, for vision, for vulnerability. It calls for humanness. In that spirit, the 8 building blocks of identity strength that we’ve surveyed over the past several months offer a useful framework for becoming a conscious leader.
Larry Ackerman
President & Founder of The Identity Circle
Speaker • Author
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By Larry Ackerman on November 13th, 2011
(Our guest blogger is Larry Ackerman, President & Founder of The Identity Circle, a consulting & coaching firm based in Westport, CT. He is the author of 2 ground-breaking books on identity including Identity Is Destiny: Leadership and the Roots of Value Creation & The Identity Code:The 8 Essential Questions for Finding Your Purpose and Place in the World.)
As a leader, what do you stand for? Maximizing profit? Driving productivity? Minimizing costs? When people look at you, what do they see? A powerful, go get’em executive? A thoughtful visionary? A game changer? What’s your message? Not the one you necessarily state; but rather, the one you embody, the one you live.
In our discussion so far about how a strong personal identity drives conscious leadership, we’ve looked at the first 6 attributes of identity strength – autonomy, differentiation, change, stewardship, potential and alignment. This post addresses the seventh of eight identity strength attributes, brand– the promise you make as a leader that shapes your relationships with all others.
The word “brand” is bandied about extensively these days in relation to individuals as well as companies and products. Developing and communicating your ‘personal brand’ is an increasingly common practice for people who want to stand out from the crowd. For those aspiring to be – and be seen as – conscious leaders, clarifying your personal brand is a pressing need.
Let’s be clear here. I’m not talking about sharpening your “look,” or polishing your image, or any other superficial interpretation of brand. I’m talking about expressing your authentic self in ways that reflect your distinctive, value-creating capacities – that reflect what you stand for.
My choice for this posting’s example of a conscious leader with a powerful personal brand is Steve Jobs. That wasn’t hard. Nor is it due to his recent and most unfortunate death. Jobs-as-poster-child-for-personal-brand does raise some interesting issues around the notion of “conscious.” Among the many recent articles about Jobs, one in The Wall Street Journal caught my attention – The Amazing Steve Jobs Story (http://on.wsj.com/p9uPJR), as it was Illuminating and personal.
Jobs, reportedly, was not a nice guy. He was tough and impatient. Sometimes, nasty. Which raises an intriguing question: Do leaders have to be nice to be and be seen as conscious? It seems that the essence of conscious leadership is to be a force for good in the world as well as a force for profit. Steve Jobs brought about so much “good,” (as well as profit) it’s hard to fathom. He led a bloodless, happiness-fueled social revolution that continues to this day.
So, what then is (not just was) Jobs’ personal brand? What remains his promise, his message? From where I sit, it comes down to this: Liberation. Jobs promised us liberation… from the seeming bounds of physical space (think stacks of CDs), from the costs and complexities of entertainment and communication, from, well, the very limitations of what we mere mortals believed was even possible. What does Steve Jobs stand for? Liberation; he was/is a liberator at his core.
How do you establish a powerful leadership brand? You declare yourself on the strength of your gift. That’s what Jobs did, even if he wasn’t aware of it (though, I bet he was.) Jobs’ “gift” was all about liberation and it’s been in place since he founded Apple in 1976. The gift I refer to is of course your identity – that unique combination of characteristics that reveals the contribution you’re capable of making to your organization – and the world. Crack the code on your identity and your personal leadership brand comes clear.
In my next posting, we’ll look at the eighth, and final, identity strength building block, sustainability, and what it takes to create a leadership legacy that’s as meaningful as your current performance.
Larry Ackerman
President & Founder of The Identity Circle
Speaker • Author
Follow me @lackerman
Join the conversation
By Larry Ackerman on November 13th, 2011
(Our guest blogger is Larry Ackerman, President & Founder of The Identity Circle, a consulting & coaching firm based in Westport, CT. He is the author of 2 ground-breaking books on identity including Identity Is Destiny: Leadership and the Roots of Value Creation & The Identity Code:The 8 Essential Questions for Finding Your Purpose and Place in the World.)
Congratulations! You’re now the CEO! Or, maybe the new division head, or marketing, or HR VP. Welcome to the world of yes ma’am, or yes sir!
One of the classic challenges executives face – especially newly-minted execs – is how to know who’s telling you what they really think, and who’s telling you what they think you want to hear. In other words, who can you trust? In a world founded on relationships, sorting this deck is a priority for leaders.
But when it comes to conscious leadership, maybe who you can trust is only part of the challenge; the other part, even more important maybe, is who can trust you? In this day and age of fragile employment, getting workers to follow you sounds easy – follow or get fired – but it isn’t, not if you want them to invest themselves wholeheartedly in their work.
In this blog series so far, we’ve talked about how a strong personal identity contributes to conscious leadership. We’ve looked at the first 5 attributes of identity strength – autonomy, differentiation, change, stewardship, and potential. This post addresses the sixth of eight identity strength attributes, alignment – the quality, depth and resultant power of the connections you make with others.
Frankly, I found it hard to find a suitable poster child for this topic, since trust is such a personal experience and stories about this vital trait – especially as it connects with conscious leadership – aren’t that plentiful today. In my search, I wound up reaching back in time and found someone who created an extraordinary relationship with his organization that fueled his success and reputation. That person is Robert Haas, former Chairman and CEO of Levi Strauss. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Haas)
As a leader, Haas began a great experiment in corporate governance by expanding on the ethical traditions of the company began by his grandfather, Walter Haas. During his tenure, Bob Haas tried to create a corporate culture in which tens of thousands of employees around the world were treated fairly and well. If not the perfect businessman, Haas’ policies and management style brought him into firm alignment with his people, earning their trust in ways that drove value creation for decades. (http://articles.sfgate.com/2005-07-24/business/17380632_1_levi-strauss-foundation-robert-haas-harry-bernard). In short, Robert Haas was a conscious leader before conscious leadership became fashionable.
The way to determine who you can trust is by taking stock of who matters and why. For executives, this means creating an inner identity circle composed of no more than a handful of people who genuinely want to contribute to the conscious qualities you have to bring to organizational life. For rank-and-file employees, it means determining just how committed you are to them as human beings, not just as hands and heads. Can we trust you? is a pressing question for everyone. As the leader, it’s up to you to make the first move.
In my next posting, we’ll look at the seventh building block of identity strength, your brand, and how to build one so it reflects the best of you as a conscious leader.
Larry Ackerman
President & Founder of The Identity Circle
Speaker • Author
Follow me @lackerman
Join the conversation
By Larry Ackerman on July 13th, 2011
(Our guest blogger is Larry Ackerman, President & Founder of The Identity Circle, a consulting & coaching firm based in Westport, CT. He is the author of 2 ground-breaking books on identity including Identity Is Destiny: Leadership and the Roots of Value Creation & The Identity Code:The 8 Essential Questions for Finding Your Purpose and Place in the World.)
Be all you can be! The sky’s the limit! Reach for the stars! From the time we’re kids, we’re deluged with messages about our “unbounded” potential. Anything’s possible, we’re taught. It’s a message we often carry with us into our careers &, unwittingly, right into the executive suite. As seductive as that message is, it’s wrong; ironically, it does a disservice to the notion of potential.
In our discussion so far about how a strong personal identity drives conscious leadership, we’ve looked at the first four attributes of identity – autonomy, differentiation, change & stewardship. This post addresses the fifth of eight attributes of identity strength, potential – knowing what yours is &, as important, what it isn’t.
True mark of the conscious leader
Everything has its limits; even we do, despite the hype we grow up with. In this case, our “potential” is limited, or more precisely, shaped by who we are, by our innate capacities & natural passions. That’s not bad news; that’s good, even reassuring, news. Put another way, you can’t be anything you may want to be in life, but you have more potential than you may know. This is truly a mark of the conscious leader: Knowing how you create distinctive value in the world &, at the same time, what your limitations are.
A recent cover article in Business Week features a story about Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook’s Chief Operating Officer. From what I read, Ms. Sandberg sounds like someone who’s in touch with her innate potential. She doesn’t seem to be pressing to be CEO. She gets wide credit for being as interested in the people side of leadership as Mark Zuckerberg clearly isn’t. And her network reaches well outside of Facebook, ranging from building a professional women’s circle in Silicon Valley, to meeting with Cambodian human trafficking activist Somaly Mam.
Is she social? Clearly. Is she networking? No doubt. Yet, as the number two executive at Facebook, Sheryl Sandberg is – amusingly – more than the COO of the world’s preeminent social networking company. Her actions, her choices, seem highly conscious, like those of a leader who knows what’s in her wheelhouse & what’s not.
Way to answer “What is my gift?”
Understanding your leadership potential through the lens of your identity calls for answering a key question: What is my gift? The way you answer this question is by following the signs of joy. That may sound like over-the-top soft advice for business execs responsible for leading their organizations to new heights of growth, productivity & profit. But it’s not. Sheryl Sandberg’s sense of joy in how she is organizing her life is almost palpable. Maybe, she’s onto something.
Reward of embracing your gift
If you fashion your leadership style around what you’re naturally good at, at what gives you joy in your work as a leader, your gift – & the potential it implies – will be clear to everyone around you. What will this get you? Nothing less than a legion of people who want to follow you; who want, in short, to take your lead.
Next Up
We’ll look at the sixth building block of identity strength – Alignment, & how to find it with the right people, for the right reasons.
By Suzy Spivey on April 30th, 2011
(Our guest blogger is Suzy Spivey, Dream & Life Purpose Coach, who shines the light of possibility for individuals & organizations to find their purpose, clarify their dreams & make them happen!)
Rating: 5 STAR
 
As a Dream & Purpose Coach, Mark Albion had me at hello as he defined the central theme of True to Yourself on page one—“to reach your dreams, you must help other people reach their dreams.” Talk about preaching to the choir! But could this idea seriously be used as a grounding philosophy from which to build a successful business? In this concise playbook, you’ll find out how leaders of values-based businesses have done it, how you’ll reap the benefits of their years of experience, & learn from their mistakes & successes.
“Walk toward the talk” gems
Culling the threads from interviews with 75 members of the Social Venture Network (SVN), Mark has woven a rich tapestry of hope for values based business leaders, replete with strategies, excerpts, mistakes, myths/truths, & action exercises. Much of the advice & learning gems in True to Yourself are not new concepts. In fact, many of the strategies have been with us for millennia, covered in the Bible, & expounded on by the likes of Aristotle, Plato, & Shakespeare, to name a few. Former U.S. Secretary of Education, William Bennett, pulled together a nice collection of such works to teach children morals & virtues in The Book of Virtues.
To see these intrinsic ideas—of compassion, commitment, honesty/transparency — emerge as keys to success in business from real-life situations played out by real-life business leaders is priceless. And to see ideas like “walk your talk” tweaked to a more realistic “walk toward the talk” is invaluable.
“How-to” direct from the source
As a business leader, when did you last reflect on this question “How will you make the mission & values (of your business) come alive for each employee every day?” and do you know the answer? We’re all starved for trustworthy guidance & many “how-to” business books fall short of actually sharing the “how-to” of it all. True to Yourself delivers the “how-to” direct from the source.
It’s not easy doing right by the world & other people while making money. But it’s possible. And as we’ve witnessed many profit-first businesses crash & burn during the Great Recession — taking millions of others down with them —aren’t we being shown that it’s time for a new paradigm? As Judy Wicks, Founder & CEO of Philadelphia’s White Dog Café, said in the book, “constant growth for increased profits is destroying life. We need to build an economy based on compassion for all of life.” This is a practice & approach whose time has come.
If values are important to you, & you dream of making a difference in the world as a small business leader while fulfilling your life’s purpose, True to Yourself is not only a must read, but an essential workbook to help you define your values & ingrain them into how you develop & lead your values-based business.
Are you a values-based business? What is one advice you would give to inspire leaders to “walk toward the talk?”
By Larry Ackerman on April 27th, 2011
(Our guest blogger is Larry Ackerman, President & Founder of The Identity Circle, a consulting & coaching firm based in Westport, CT. He is the author of 2 ground-breaking books on identity including Identity Is Destiny: Leadership and the Roots of Value Creation & The Identity Code:The 8 Essential Questions for Finding Your Purpose and Place in the World.)
If you have to ask yourself the question “Where am I going?”, the answer is usually clear: You don’t have a clue. This posting on the power of personal identity to help make you a more conscious leader will – I hope – make you more comfortable with the uncertainty that is part & parcel to leading oneself as well as others. To provide context for this discussion, here’s a quick reminder of where we are in this series. So far, we’ve looked at the first 3 attributes of identity – autonomy, differentiation, & change. This post addresses the fourth attribute of personal identity strength – stewardship
Not just for executives
Normally, stewardship is an idea we link to executives responsible for shaping the future of their organizations – making choices that are in the best long-term interests of the enterprise, not just near-term interests. Why isn’t stewardship an attribute we consciously apply to ourselves as well? After all, we have futures & the quality of those futures depends heavily on the decisions we make today.
One of the secrets of stewardship is that it requires being comfortable with the unknown. No one has a crystal ball; not the best executive, not me, not you. Which means you need to get on good terms with uncertainty – & be able to make choices in its midst.
Qualities of a conscious steward
One of the more memorable “stewards” I’ve read about recently was Julius Nyerere, the first president of Tanzania, whose leadership is legend, & who tied his own future with that of his formative nation. One of the ideas Nyerere used to steward the population was people-centered leadership. He invited Tanzanians to tell him where they wanted to go as a nation. What was possible? How might they achieve their dreams?
At the center of Nyerere’s success as a leader – indeed, a conscious leader – were two qualities: faith & fortitude. After all of his studying of the economic, social & political climate of the day, after all the ‘data were in,’ Nyerere had faith in the future of this nascent nation. Moreover, he had the fortitude to stay the course, no matter how daunting the challenges would be (& were).
The way you answer the question “Where am I going?”
It is by committing to the path revealed in what you’ve learned so far. That is because, sometimes, the only answer to this thorny question is, I don’t know. To admit you don’t know takes courage. But it also takes something more: a deep-seated belief in yourself that things will work out, that you’re on the right path, even if you can’t see exactly where it’s leading.
In short, stewardship is a by-product of having a strong personal identity – a vital asset that gives you the “muscle” you need to go toe-to-toe with uncertainty & come out whole.
Next Up
We’ll look at the fifth building block of identity strength – Potential. How clarifying that potential in yourself is like reaching the summit of a great mountain after an arduous climb. What happens once you’ve reached the peak? Well, we’ll deal with that later.
By Lisa Hamaker on March 16th, 2011
(Our guest blogger is Lisa Hamaker, Principal of Kaliday Marketing, helping companies define & achieve excellence.)
Rating: 5 STAR
“Pink has a knack of teaching in such an entertaining way
that you’ll forget you are learning.”
- Forbes Magazine
  So true! Daniel Pink’s books are enlightening compendiums for those of us who want to understand ourselves & our interactions with others at a deeper level, want proof & information, but are not interested in the detailed psychological investigation behind it. His latest New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post & Publishers Weekly bestselling book DRiVE: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us took me on a fascinating journey where I dropped many of my beliefs about motivation. It showed me that for most workers & students today, intrinsic motivation is much more powerful than extrinsic motivation. I have been aware of the idea from management practice that money is not a motivator. I was incorporating that into my work, but Pink’s book took my ideas & practices to a new level.
Stages of Motivation
The book quickly, yet convincingly, outlines the transition of human nature from our earliest days (think Lucy) to today’s ultra-fast paced & quickly changing information age, & walks us through the stages of motivation:
- Through Motivation 2.0: Seek reward, avoid punishment
- Past Motivation 2.1: Incorporating our higher drives as outlined by Maslow
- To Motivation 3.0 characterized by the letters “I” for intrinsic & “X” for extrinsic.
The core of Motivation 3.0 says that for most action, we humans are driven by the 3 basic elements: autonomy, mastery & purpose.
One of my most important take-always was how intrinsic motivation can be usurped by rewards – not only undermining progress, but also reversing it.
Why you want to be more “heuristic”
In the first chapter, Pink discusses “algorithmic” & “heuristic” activities. “An algorithmic task is one in which you follow a set of established instructions down a single pathway to one conclusion. A heuristic task is the opposite. Precisely because no algorithm exists for it, you have to experiment with possibilities & devise a novel solution. Working as a grocery checkout clerk is mostly algorithmic. You do pretty much the same thing over & over in a certain way. Creating an ad campaign is mostly heuristic. You have to come up with something new.”
This helped me to really understand an insightful moment I had in Nordstrom a couple of decades ago. An elderly couple was sitting wearily on a couch, obviously worn down by holiday shopping. A young sales person was offering them a couple of large shopping bags to help them organize their purchases for easier transport. The couple was quite grateful, I suspected as much for the pleasant, human gesture as for the bags themselves. Then I noticed that the sales person was as happy as the couple, & realized that she received great pleasure in being of service. More important, the sales person had the autonomy to provide this service at her choosing & under her control. Another store I had just come from did not provide that autonomy to their employees. I had to travel up two floors to customer service for an additional shopping bag. Nordstrom had taken an algorithmic activity (handing out bags) to a heuristic one (creating relationship & customer loyalty). Two shopping bags created a tremendous amount of good will & employee motivation. Priceless!
For my personal experience with the rewards of intrinsic motivation, please see my blog post on “Deer and DRiVE”.
Know more, accomplish more…. everyday with less stress
Whether you are a business leader, parent, business participant, or just want to improve how you relate to, & work with others, “DRiVE” is a fun, engaging & useful journey to knowing & accomplishing more with less stress. Most important, the result is stronger, more fruitful relationships.
As mentioned above, one of the things I like about Dan Pink’s writing is that he makes knowledge easy to obtain. But what is more important is putting that knowledge to use in my daily life. DRiVE does that with engaging ideas & examples. In addition, it includes a Toolkit with dozens of ideas & projects for understanding our own motivations & ways to make them more “I” directed & help those around us do so as well. One more thing that impressed me about Dan Pink & “DRiVE” is the Discussion Guide at the end. Even without discussing the book with others, I deepened my learning with the questions. Then I responded to Dan’s request to submit my own question & received an answer from the author himself. Very cool!
I now realize that for many people (even most of us), learning is intrinsic, especially after we graduate from formal schooling. To me, intrinsic supersedes entertaining. Looking back to the opening for this post, the quote from Forbes that I obtained from the book jacket, the statement seems incongruent to me. When Forbes talks about “teaching in an entertaining way,” they are continuing to shadow learning with a negative connotation—is that intentional? Or is equating learning with drudgery such common practice that it REALLY underscores the need for Dan’s book in the first place?
Let us know what you think.
By Stuart G Danforth on March 2nd, 2011
(Our guest blogger is Stuart G. Danforth, Director of Positive Leadership Dynamics, Solution Focused Leadership Advisor from MA.)
  One recent, frigid, January afternoon I caught up with Les McKeown to talk about Predictable Success: Getting Your Organization On the Growth Track–and Keeping It There, a Wall St Journal & USA Today Bestseller. The round-faced, silver-haired McKeown comes right to the point when he speaks; it makes you sense that you need to have your brain turned on immediately when launching a conversation. Then he catches you out with his dry, Irish humor & you relax. I found myself chuckling along with him as he spoke about his predictable success framework, & his myriad experiences working with organizations intent on success.
McKeown’s framework highlights the organizational life-cycle from early stage struggles all the way through to a company’s death rattle. For our talk, I asked him to focus on one of the stages of this framework, what McKeown terms “whitewater”. Whitewater is the third phase of this framework, & it is the first significant struggle an organization will encounter after it has had some marketplace success.
Early whitewater indicators
I asked McKeown to lay out some early whitewater indicators. He cites an increase in mistakes made… “over scheduling, missing important appointments, wrong orders, products delivered to wrong addresses & the like…” as a common signs. “Usually it takes managers a couple of months to recognize the pattern,” McKeown says, adding, “at first, these seem to be small issues.”
Fall-out of playing “flock-ball”
McKeown chuckles as he relates that a typical early strategy in dealing with mounting errors is to play “flock-ball” – picture what happens at a kindergarten soccer game – where everyone rushes to create solutions at once, but inevitably the errors remain throughout the disorganized response. Soon, there is often a drop in morale that develops. The fun dissipates; growth starts feeling less easy.
So, if selling has been the dominant activity, what happens to the sales effort when whitewater occurs? Often, a company will see their sales as a strength & just try to sell their way out of the current pain. “This just makes the problem worse.” he says, “What it really needs is better systems & processes to handle the growing complexity. Picture trying to fix a leaky fire-hose by increasing the amount of water running through it.”
Do you have “founder’s dilemma?”
McKeown notes that at this time, the company’s sales effort likely needs to slow, so that the operations supporting the company can be aligned properly. This activity is fraught with tension & leads to what he calls the “founder’s dilemma.”
A founder, especially a visionary leader, is also likely to be someone who can’t be bothered with the details of operations. So, the organization is faced with an uncomfortable situation: the answer to struggles in the past has always been to sell more, & the driving ethos of the culture is unlikely to be focused on operational details. If the company continues down this path, things will get worse, not better.
How to get out of your dilemma
“It is clear what needs to happen at this point,” McKeown says. “The management team needs to unhook from the sales function. The service & operations piece of the business needs to become stronger.”
It is not any easy time for any organization. Often times, McKeown says, up to a third of the sales force may opt to leave the company at this time, while the non-sales functions of the company need to staff-up.
This is a scary prospect. The sales pipeline might dramatically reduce as the business has to slow down to handle the transition. McKeown says the company needs to move from a mindset of “big is better, to better is big.”
The whitewater phase also requires owners & managers to clarify professional positions & responsibilities – a formalization process that leads to clearer expectations & responsibilities, which are directly linked to the company’s strategy. It’s where the first meaningful organizational chart is likely to emerge.
Once the appropriate roles are defined, each team or functional area needs to develop the ability to efficiently work with teams from other functional areas. It is no longer OK to just know one’s own responsibilities; each team must understand how their work relates to other functions, & begin to work in a more integrated manner.
Next up
Change in any organization is unsettling. In my next post, I will ask McKeown about how to deal with resistance to change, & what success in this endeavor looks like.
Your help
Right now, I would like your feedback: Does this “whitewater” process seem familiar? Have you had a “sales stall” that was more about supportive systems & processes than sales effectiveness? What about resistance to organizational change? Any good suggestions for dealing with resistance, before we get McKeown’s advice? Please comment & start a discussion!
 Stuart G. Danforth
Director of Positive Leadership Dynamics
Solution Focused Leadership Advisor
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By Larry Ackerman on March 1st, 2011
(Our guest blogger is Larry Ackerman, President & Founder of The Identity Circle, a consulting & coaching firm based in Westport, CT. He is the author of 2 ground-breaking books on identity including Identity Is Destiny: Leadership and the Roots of Value Creation & The Identity Code:The 8 Essential Questions for Finding Your Purpose and Place in the World.)
If you’ve been following this series, you know that we’re now getting deeper into exploring how a strong personal identity fuels conscious leadership. So far, we’ve looked at the first two attributes of identity – autonomy & differentiation. Two down, six to go.
Change…make it meaningful
This post addresses the third attribute of personal identity strength – change, or more precisely, you’re ability to evolve while retaining a clear sense of who you are. If that sounds like a paradox, it is. How can I become something different, more, better, while remaining who I am? Not only can you, but if you want to change in meaningful ways, then you must.
The more painful the better
Since personal change doesn’t get the publicity corporate change gets, it was challenging finding an example to offer, but I did. I was rifling through some old files & came across a quote I’d tucked away a few years ago because it was, frankly, so unexpected. It’s from the New York Times, in the summer of 2004, & reflects the relationship between Jack Welch & then J.P. Morgan CEO, William Harrison. Here it is: “In addition to holding their strategic discussions, Mr. (Jack) Welch & Mr. (William) Harrison spent significant time together honing the executive training program at J.P. Morgan. Mr. Welch was particularly impressed with Mr. Harrison’s use of a group exercise in which senior J.P. Morgan executives, including Mr. Harrison, wrote on a board the personal & professional experiences – the more painful the better – that helped them evolve as people. ‘Bill was very good at it,’ Mr. Welch said. ‘It makes you become simpatico with the guy.”
Talk about personal change. Here we see hard-charging executives getting below the surface of business to deal with their own humanity in order to become better leaders. What does it take to have the courage to change in this way? It takes a strong sense of identity – the knowledge, whether conscious or not, that no matter what change calls for, you won’t lose touch with who you are at your core. If you want to get a feel for the man, check out this past interview with William Harrison by Charlie Rose that highlighted Harrison’s view about his life in the wake of the merger with Chase.
A key question to ask yourself
Building one’s capacity for change calls for answering a key question: Is there a pattern to my life? Most people believe there is no particular pattern; that life is comprised of many disparate events. They’re wrong. There is a pattern to our lives – revealed in our personal achievements – that says much about who we are &, once discerned, provides a powerful lens for dealing with change. The way you answer this vital question is by making the connections that explain past events & foreshadow your future.
How you express who you are matters
Back to the paradox I mentioned earlier. How does having a strong personal identity help you become a more conscious leader? It allows you to change from a changeless foundation. At the end of the day, who you are doesn’t change, but how you express who you are can &, often, must. Embracing this fact won’t just enable you to be a more effective leader; it will encourage others to do the same – to everyone’s benefit.
Next up
We’ll look at the fourth building block of identity strength – Stewardship…how to deal with the uncertainty that is always part of the stewardship challenge.
By Lisa Hamaker on February 22nd, 2011
(Our guest blogger is Lisa Hamaker, Principal of Kaliday Marketing. Lisa provides her insights from participating in the Conscious Capitalism Institute (CCI) virtual MasterClass with Chip Conley, Founder & Executive Chairman of Joie de Vivre Hospitality, on February 18, 2011. The topic was based on Chip’s book, PEAK: How Great Companies Get Their Mojo from Maslow. Dr. Shubhro Sen, Co-Founder & Executive Director of CCI was the host & moderator. )
I did it differently today, & it felt good. Usually when I attend something, even online, I have to prepare in advance. If an author is speaking & I have not read the book, I at least do a little research about the author, book, or both.
A couple of days ago, I decided to break from my usual routine & just attend; have few expectations & less information. As with past MasterClasses from AuthorsGlobe, today was insightful, meaningful, useful & a few more “ful”s. Chip Conley is a consummate conscious entrepreneur—he was acting consciously before he recognized it extrinsically, & before society put a name to it. During his presentation, I kept thinking about how wonderful it must be to work or be ensconced as a guest at a Joie de Vivre boutique hotel. More important, Chip’s concepts are well organized & so meaningful that even without my prep work, I had a number of ah-ha moments. Similar to my past blog on a MasterClass on Conscious Transformation in Business, I will share my key insights & learnings.
- Respect & Integrity: To open his teaching, Chip stated, “Life & business is all about where you pay your attention, & most businesses neglect the fact that we are all humans.” The minute we neglect to show deep human respect to each & every person who crosses our path, we loose a little of ourselves. His words also helped me realize what I do not like about the term “work/life balance.” It’s a rare person who completely leaves their personal situation behind when they are at work & visa versa. What if we just have the goal of living life to the fullest in each moment & don’t worry about balance? Chip addressed this topic again at the end when answering a question. He discussed the root of word integrity—to be integrated, to bring together all our identities, to be holistic, whole. Is he an artist or entrepreneur? Both!
- Power of Diversity: Chip became an outstanding leader by pulling a model into his business that was outside his major area of study & experience. He brought Maslow’s hierarchy of needs into the business world; making theoretical psychology practical & uplifting for thousands of people. His ideas & successes have encouraged me to continue on my journey of following my passion rather than my past schooling.
 
- Maslow’s Hierarchy as Mojo Motivator: The core “mojo” model of the PEAK principles & practices starts with the employee pyramid which relates Maslow’s hierarchy to the elevating movement of an employee as they transition from job-to-career-to-calling (green pyramid below). The gold pyramid below shows that as human beings make that transition, our expectation for reward from our work transitions from money-to-recognition-to-meaning; this creates motivational levels that move from base-to-loyalty-to-inspiration.
 
Chip also shared similar pyramids for shareholders & customers, & in a powerful, insightful synergy… pulled the pyramids together with a heart, which beautifully demonstrates the core values & raison d’être for the Joie de Vivre hotels & PEAK organizations. It was wonderful to see such a powerful model, that can drive the success of even the largest organization, be based on the simple tenet that no matter the task, people are intrinsically motivated by the higher purpose of “running their hotel,” not just performing menial tasks like making beds & cleaning bathrooms. This deeper purpose means that the employees in turn create a joyful experience & happiness for all the stakeholders.
- A Wonderful Coincidence: A couple of decades ago, one of my first Zen lessons was that it was important to excel at cleaning the toilet before I could excel at “bigger things”, & that cleaning the toilet with purpose is a beautiful foundation for bigger things. Today, I not only re-learned that lesson, but also understood that cleaning a toilet is a “bigger thing.”
- Magazines & Successful Hotels: I love that Chip long ago knew that great marketing is about telling a story that people want to be a part of, rather than trying to tell us to be a part of the story of the product— for example, some marketing says that I should want to be like the beautiful woman in the cosmetic ad. In the Joie de Vivre model, I feel truly respected & appreciated for who I am, & therefore more easily engaged. Chip achieved this by modeling each boutique after a defining magazine, then choosing 5 words that identified the core values of that magazine & the feelings they wanted to inspire for their guests.
 They did come to the hotels because the guests identified with the core values & achieved “identity refreshment.” The 5 words directed every decision made about the hotel & guest experience, providing vision & guidance for all employees, business partners, & stakeholders.
- Life Guidance from an Unusual Source: Interesting that the two major “life guidance insights” that Chip shared with us both happened in a bookstore, a place of quiet & reflection for most people. He is obviously a person who enjoys being with other people & gains from lively interactions, but these insights came from personal moments. It underscored the need for quiet time in our lives no matter how extroverted we are.
- Challenge of Being Open: I think that one of the best ways that business leaders can inspire others is to be open about their trials. Chip answered a question about sharing the Joie de Vivre culture with new hires with the following response: “One challenge about making the business model public is that it sets up high expectations for employees & other stakeholders. I get calls & emails telling me about how situations are not living up to the ideals set forth in the book. It means we have to constantly work to stay in touch with employees & others.”
In choosing the name Joie de Vivre for his business, Chip certainly captured passion for doing big things with joy & zeal, & his passion for sharing with those around him to help them be the best version of themselves.
Thank you, Chip for a wonderful learning experience & for creating a conscious company. Thank you, AuthorsGlobe for Educating, Empowering, & Connecting!
What are you doing that brings joie de vivre into your business…your life? Have you read PEAK? What are your key learnings? Do you agree with Zappos who gives the book to every employee & guests?
Utilizing her 25 years as a business professional, her broad industry background, & her experience as a coach in Solution Selling™ workshops, Lisa is able to connect with clients & colleagues on an intellectual & emotional level that’s not often manifest by other consultants. This makes her highly effective in helping people to support & execute dramatic change. She has a passion for doing what best meets the needs of her clients & their stakeholders including customers, employees, partners & investors.
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