Three People Every Leader Needs

I I recently went by a dog park and watched people with their dogs.  As I watched them working and playing with their pets it struck me that people interacted with their dogs in at least three different ways.

There were the cheerleaders who just encouraged their dogs with praise and positivity.  There were the critics who scolded their dogs for misbehaving at the park.  Finally there was the “coach” who used a combination of praise, instruction, and believing the best about their dog no matter what they did.

I hope you have at least one of each of them: a cheerleader, a critic, and a coach in your life.  We all have hidden potential and each of these people can help you uncover yours.

My wife is my cheerleader (at least most of the time) I hop in the car after speaking and ask her, “How did it go?” 

“I thought it was spot on.  I really liked it.” Or “You were great today,” is often the response I get.  We all need that cheerleader to keep our bucket full, so we don’t feel completely empty inside and just want to throw in the towel on work or life.  We all need at least one cheerleader in our lives, and you probably wish you had a few more. They give us the confidence to keep on keeping on and trying new things, expanding your skills, and taking risks.

On the other hand, there doesn’t seem to be a shortage of critics in your life if you are a leader of anything.  “Ron, you need to quit dropping your voice at the end of your sentences I can’t hear your point half the time.”  “Boy, you really made a bad decision there didn’t you.”  “I guess your just one of those people who never seem to learn.”  You get the idea.  If you’re like me my critics never seem to have learned the sandwich principle either (sandwich your criticism between two positive statements).

Critics make us uncomfortable but as someone once told me, “When you feel uncomfortable, get ready, because you just might learn something.”  Our personality is what comes out on a typical day and our personalities can certainly limit our growth, but our character is how you show up on a hard day.  Critics tend to reveal our character and that’s a good thing.  Getting comfortable with discomfort is a great way to tap into your hidden potential.  I have a strength program I use that keeps adding weight to my workouts increasing my discomfort until I fail.  It then lowers the weight slowly increasing it again until I am successful at the weight I failed at.  The discomfort of added weight is essential to growing stronger physically and something similar can happen if we handle our “emotional discomfort” in a healthy way.

That takes us to coaches and coaching.  Coaches see potential in us that we might not recognize in ourselves.  A coach sees our hidden potential and can help us unlock it and guide us to continued improvement by closing the gap between where we are and where/who we want to be.  They help us see the things (like limiting beliefs) that are holding us back and seeing possibilities where we see dead ends.

So, for example, what if you could turn your critics into coaches?  Try asking, “What could I do better next time?”  See if it starts to turn that critic into an advocate.  Maybe it works, maybe it doesn’t but just changing the script was an exercise in character development.

I have been blessed to have some great coaches over the years and they inspired me to become a trained coach myself.  When looking for a coach the tendency is to ask an “expert” to help you but sometimes experts are so talented that they don’t know how they do what they do (think great athletes who make horrible coaches).  They can do things intuitively on autopilot but often can’t explain the process they used to do what they did.  Typically, you are better off with someone just a step or two ahead of you (preferably someone trained as a coach) who can help you move forward from your current position because they know exactly what steps are needed to move you forward.

One last piece of coaching advice for you: instead of asking for feedback from the people around you ask for advice.  Research shows that advice is often more productive because it is forward-looking and constructive (not about what you did wrong but what you could do in the future).  Advice tells us what we can change and not just what we messed up.  Advice tends to give us specific, actionable, concrete tips for improvement.

On the other hand, when we ask for feedback, we tend to get either cheerleaders or critics.  Both have a role to play.  The cheerleader speaks to our best self and the critic to our worst self.  Finding the balance between the two is often a difficult task so look at the coaches to help you find balance and the next step to unlocking your greatest potential.

Questions for Reflection:

1. How comfortable are you with discomfort?  What about your organization or team?  How can you as an individual or team learn to move toward discomfort rather than away from it?
2. Have you ever experienced moments when your personality got in the way of who you want to be or what you want to do?  What did you do to overcome it?
3. Do you typically ask for advice or feedback?  Do you struggle more with cheerleaders or critics?
4. Who do you know in your life who is a position to help you close the gap between who/where you are now and who/where you want to be?