No News Is Bad News

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NO NEWS IS BAD NEWS

In Silence, People Tend To Think The Worst

In Management And Leadership, Frequent Communication Is Essential

From An Article In The TAKING COMMAND! Blog By Douglas E. Castle

During prolonged periods of silence, people are left to wonder; that wondering leads to visualization of negative possibilities and potentials (generally speaking, and in accord with the basic insecurities of Human Beings). The longer and more absolute the silence, the more these negative thoughts tend to propagate. 

If you are a leader, manager or commander and you are silent, any one or several of the following assumptions will likely be made regarding your lack of communication – ironically, your lack of communication speaks volumes:

~ You are overwhelmed by your workload, and you are not competent to handle the enormous responsibilities of leadership;

~ You are either ignoring your responsibilities and/or are searching for another role to play in another organization;

~ You have received devastatingly negative news that you are afraid to confront or announce;

~ You are disappointed in the work being performed by your subordinates, and you are either too disgusted with them to communicate with them or you are passively/aggressively punishing those guilty parties by depriving them of your attention;

~ You have lost your impetus and momentum as a driver, and are not accomplishing anything – therefore, you've nothing about which to converse.

Any of the above suppositions, all of which are common in cases of a lack of top-down communication, are bad for your personal brand, effectiveness, and relationship with your troops (or employees). You will be rendered less of a standard-bearer and more of a bag of ballast – and those who report to you will think 1) that the ship may be sinking on your watch, or 2) that they are failing you significantly enough to be rendered unworthy of your attention.

Communication, powerful and frequent, is one of the hallmarks of a truly good leader.

Those whom you are charged with the responsibility of leading must know your status as well as their own in order for the enterprise not to fall prey to the ever-disabling rumor mill. 

Good leadership requires good communication skills as well as charisma and all of the other personality and management-style attributes we've discussed so many times before on the Taking Command Blog.

If you need a quick reminder (in the style of the late lawyer Johnny Cochran), “If you don't converse, things will get worse.” 

Whether the news is good or bad – don't ever let your troops, employees or teammates think that you are an introvert or an escapist. Introverted personalities may make for fine actuaries, but they make for poor leaders.

Douglas E. Castle

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TAKING COMMAND! ACHIEVING YOUR OBJECTIVES.

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The Discipline Of Strategic Listening

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I read a wonderful, brief article in the Harvard Business Review which focused on speaking strategically -- essentially, using your voice only when it is to your advantage.

The insights are superb, but one of the points that needs to be brought to the fore is the Discipline Of Strategic Listening.

There are times during your social and business exchanges when it is of great strategic significance to make a concerted effort to let another person speak uninterrupted, while you listen [being truly alert, focused and 'present'] and learn valuable information.

The ancillary strategic benefit is that you've given the other person a chance to feel the ego security of being respected and heard, while you've simultaneously had time to re-program or re-fine your speaking tactics by incorporating some of what you've heard.

Bottom line:

You learn while you listen, so you can use what you've learned to refine and improve your persuasive speaking skills.

I'll stop talking now and present this wonderful article to you:

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How to Speak More Strategically

Posted: 2012-05-31 19:56:53 UTC

It had been three weeks since my throat started to feel sore, and it wasn't getting better. The pain was most acute when I spoke. So I decided to spend a few days speaking as little as possible. Every time I had the urge to say something, I paused for a moment to question whether it was worth irritating my throat.

This made me acutely aware of when and how I use my voice. Which led me to a surprising discovery: I spend considerable energy working against my own best interests. And if my experience listening to others is any indication, so do you.
In my observations, we speak for three main reasons:

1. To help ourselves
2. To help others
3. To connect with each other

That's not surprising. All three of those objectives are legitimate and worthwhile.
What is surprising though is how frequently we fool ourselves into thinking we're achieving those objectives when, in reality, we're thwarting them. The more I listened, the more I noticed how we undermine our own interests.

Frequently, I had the urge to gossip about someone else. I realized that I did this to help myself (I will feel better if I think I'm better than that person) and to connect with the other gossipers. But clearly that would distance me from the people about whom I was gossiping. In fact, it would probably even distance me from my fellow gossipers too; who could trust someone who talked behind other people's back? My attempt to strengthen relationships was, instead, hurting them.

I also had the urge to share information when I thought it would be helpful to someone. That's a productive reason to speak. But several times I had the urge to say something simply to show that I knew the answer. Or to get attention. Or to increase my power in the group. It became clear to me that my urge to speak in those moments came from my desire to feel special. I wanted people to like me and to think highly of me. But who likes the guy trying to show off?

Sometimes I wanted to help myself by getting the answer to a question, or making sure I was counted in a decision. That's useful. But other times, I just wanted to make sure my voice was heard over the din of the other voices. I caught myself wanting to speak over someone in a meeting. Or arguing a point to get others to agree with me so I'd feel more confident in my own opinion (which I'm hearing a lot this political season). Is that really helping someone else?

In fact, I was amazed at how often I wanted to speak simply to assure myself that I was here. I had a role. I was noticed.

As I sat silently, trying to preserve my voice, I had the opportunity to notice how and when other people spoke as well. And I noticed all the same tendencies.

If I were to reduce our counter-productive speaking to a single motivation, it would be this: We often speak to make ourselves feel better in the short-term.

But life and relationships are long-term. And when we gossip, raise our voices, speak behind other people's backs, offer unsolicited opinions, or make jokes at other people's expense we're isolating ourselves over time.

There was some good news in my experience of talking less: I listened more. And listening, it turned out, was a much more productive way to achieve my speaking objectives than speaking.

When I listened, I helped myself, helped others and built relationships at least as effectively as I did speaking and with much less collateral damage.

I'm obviously not suggesting we stop speaking; we can't achieve our three objectives unless we do. We need ask for things. We need to share information. And there are a number of ways — like offering compliments and rephrasing what we're hearing — we can build relationships through speech.

I am, however, suggesting that we think ahead — long term — when we're about to say something in the moment. And that, before speaking, we ask ourselves one simple question: Is what I'm about to say going to detract from one of the three reasons I speak? If the answer is yes, consider saving your voice.

My throat is better now and I can speak as much as I want. Which left me feeling a little nervous; now that I know how easy it is to be self-defeating, will I keep myself on the productive side of the speaking equation?

Thankfully, the sore throat left me with a gift: the memory of a sore throat.

These past few days, when I get the urge to talk, I find myself doing a little calculation in my head: If I only have so much speaking I can do in a day, is this thing I'm about to say a worthwhile use of my voice?

What's amazing is that most of the time I immediately know.
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Friends, Colleagues, Readers and Fellow Commanders -- There is not a single one of us who didn't see some aspect of himself or herself in the HBR article inserted above. And if we are adaptively intelligent, we can use the wonderful observations of the author to our strategic advantage.

This is indeed actionable material.

Douglas E. Castle for The Taking Command Blog and The Sending Signals Blog

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The 2 Most Undesirable Traits In A Leader

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People have different views about what qualities make an individual a true and worthwhile leader -- the type of individual whom people will follow into battle (either legislatively or literally). An individual who is truly a commander has followers who feel safer and strengthened by his or her words and actions.

That having been said (one of my favorite phrases), the two elements which will undermine any aspiring or existing leader's credibility and influence status are common to all followers, although they don't often admit it:

1) Indecisiveness. Being too slow to make decisions, or being too obsessed with "buy-in" and "compromise" means that you are uncertain of either your position on an issue, or of your personal power. Both are unforgivable.

2) Weakness. If you are afraid to do battle with the opposition, even if you feel that either appeasement or collaboration are better alternatives (appeasement is never forgivable, and if you want to collaborate, be certain to assertively and ceremoniously establish the 'ground rules' as the consortium's de facto control person) makes you appear to be a coward, or somehow compromised.

Even some of your own most vociferous constituents, employees, followers or troops will be hesitant (usually for fear of reprisals) to point out moments when you've either tripped or are about to trip on one of these landmines. But with each incident of exhibiting indecisiveness or weakness, the probability of your maintaining an effective and efficient command will wane.

Presentation is sometimes every bit as important as substance in your role as a guiding light. Do not ever forget this.

Douglas E. Castle

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The Three Key Command Skills.

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The businesses of commerce, conquest and of life require three key command skills. Without all three of these complementary component abilities, problems will generally not be solved, and objectives will not be achieved. The ultimate test of any leader, manager, entrepreneur is the ability to establish an objective (usually born of a vision and fueled by a driving passion), and to ultimately reach it through a process of problem-solving and decision making utilizing all assets and intelligence at his or her disposal.

Regrettably, it is incredibly rare that these three skills co-exist in significant levels in any one individual; it is quite rare that any two of these three qualities have been cultivated in any single person; and it is increasingly difficult to find a "C -Suite" or Executive Officer caliber person who can even claim a mastery of even one.

Here they are: 

1) The knowledge of what needs to be done;

2) The knowledge of how to actually do what needs to be done, subject to budgetary and temporal constraints, as well as other pressuring parameters or limiting conditions;

3) The knowledge of how to implement, to put into coordinated, cooperative action, what must be done given the resources available and the limitations imposed.

While some very brilliant and highly successful individuals are not experts in all three categories, most of these people have a viable, fluid working knowledge of all three of these skill set requirements, and know how to enlist or recruit the assistance in partnership or collaboration of their most needed counterparts. A strong leader knows his or her areas of weakness, and either strengthens them, or engages the services of another who comes pre-qualified.

Go ahead. Take Command. Assess yourself honestly, take an inventory of your strengths and weaknesses in accord with the simple list above, and work to exercise the weak 'management muscles' while recruiting talent to complement your strengths and to cover for your deficiencies.

As a personal note based upon my own failures in many project and program efforts through a long career, don't let pride ever get in the way of your assembling a team with all of the vital areas addressed.

Douglas E Castle [http://aboutDouglasCastle.blogspot.com]

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Managing Relationships - Walking On Eggshells

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Relationships require management and maintenance. Without these psychological nutrients, death ensues, and a bridge is either burned or washed out.  Open, honest and occasionally rapid-fire (back-and-forth) communications are required to gauge the nature of the relationship as the participants each independently evolve, and as the relationship, of necessity, changes its structure in order to accommodate the changing requirements, expectations and circumstances of both members.

If you cannot maintain an open and unfettered two-way channel of honest communications in a relationship, it will never be suitable for a partnership or a joint effort. These relationships are inherently limited in terms of utility. They are generally not worth a significant investment of your time -- with the occasional exception of a very private, or guarded person who only becomes voluntarily communicative when he or she feels safe and unthreatened, and has the comfort of familiarity.

And in a relatively new relationship (or even an established one which is 'up for review') where you feel as if you are walking on eggshells because of either a) the other person's volatile, or hair-trigger personality, b) your reasonable fear that if you say the 'wrong thing' that person will no longer be receptive to your advances or initiatives, you must acknowledge the fact that your relationship, and its entire basis, may either be entirely one-sided or completely fictional -- in even terming it a relationship, you may be making an unrealistic assessment.

If you feel the tension of constantly walking a tightrope in your interaction with another person, trust your commander's instincts...something exists between you and the other participant which is not quite right. And it is better to do a flamenco dance on those eggs as early on in the game as possible (and perhaps make a Spanish omelet), than to continue to invest time in cultivating that which has no true potential.

The question:  Isn't it better to find out earlier if you are wasting your time, rather than to invest emotionally, financially and otherwise in a meaningless, one-sided campaign? It is far better to know precisely where you stand in a relationship as soon as possible, than to continue to water a dead tree, or indulge in a fantasy which is keeping you from addressing reality. Why invest resources into or develop dependencies upon things that are so tenuous and tentative.

When you feel as if you must walk on eggshells in order to sustain a relationship, there might not even be a relationship there. It is best to put on your motorcycle boots and speak front-and-center, and toe-to-toe [I normally avoid cliches like the plague] to the other person. Honesty and confrontation can often prove to be a leader's greatest weapons in the arsenal of tools to save precious time. Why tiptoe around a sleeping lion?

Importantly, when you save your precious time, you are doing the other person a favor as well, albeit not quite as obvious.

Life is an experiment and the world is your laboratory. Get out and start scrambling some eggs. Now.

Douglas E. Castle

http://aboutDouglasCastle.blogspot.com

http://Links4LifeAlerts.com

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http://InfoSphereBusinessAlerts.blogspot.com  

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Public Speaking: Your Command Opportunity.

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You are judged firstly by your general appearance; secondly, by the way in which you carry yourself (superb posture, purposeful stride, slight swagger), and thirdly, by the way in which you speak. If you are to lead, you must refine your public and private speaking to perfection. Words are tools, weapons, conveyances and a means of initiating action. Superb communications skills are crucial in your advancement toward your greatest successes in every aspect of your career.

I've spoken about this before in my SENDING SIGNALS! Blog [http://SendingSignals.blogspot.com], and in my personal blog at http://aboutDouglasCastle.blogspot.com.

Incidentally, while it is an enormous asset to have a broad vocabulary and a tremendous command of your language, these things are not quite as important as the way in which you deliver your message. Every speech is an opportunity to gain territory and influence.

Public Speaking Can Either Be Terrifying, Or The Ultimate Power Trip.

It's actually all up to you.

Photo Embed From: Images By Douglas Castle (blog)

Most individuals tend to be desperately afraid of speaking before audiences -- and by the term "audiences," I mean any assembly of persons from a conference room with twelve people seated at a long rectangular mahogany table, or an auditorium or corporate conference center speaking room, with a crowd of 400 people who are either falling asleep in their seats (the standard lecture hall configuration), or perhaps a grand dining hall where people are busily eating and drinking (food and drink were their principal reasons for coming) and carrying on multiple conversations which converge upon you in a deafening roar of indistinct, unintelligible noise. Welcome...

Actionable Skill: Business Leaders, Executives, Entrepreneurs: Power Up Your Public Speaking!

Return On Investment (ROI): Your ability to comfortably command and control an audience is one of the key skills which will propel you to a position of dominance and authority within your company, profession or industry. Stating the obvious (which is part of inimitable style), all of this domination and authority leads to an increase in your income and wealth.

The Tactics And Strategy To Get You There:

You have to make a choice.

You must either master your audience, as a puppeteer plays his puppets, or you can be frightened, stammering and sweating -- and lose their respect as well as their attention. The way you internally address the situation (the "context" as either Gladwell or Milgram would call the environment, as you perceive it, or as your obnoxious subconscious mind, with its nagging, self-limiting, self-conscious, self-doubting whisperings would have you perceive it), will determine whether you will either have a wonderful experience of exhilaration and victory, or a disabling one that will land you on the therapist's couch before, probably wearing Depends Adult Diapers and crying your mental health investment away.

Before you even begin to speak, you must bear several important factors in mind; it even helps to recite them to yourself repeatedly -- as a pre-speech "mantra." They are basic truths about the group (whatever group) you are about to address. You need to know these factors, and believe absolutely in their truth if you truly wish to take command of the speaking platform and have what will turn out to be an exhilarating experience. The author (Douglas E. Castle, Chairman of TNNWC Group, LLC) is not being sarcastic...an empowering, transformative experience.*

*NOTE: If you are a follower of Braintenance (for cognitive enhancement, increasing intelligence, exercising your mind's "muscle" mass, improving your thinking skills, life extension, unleashing creativity, powering up memory and recall, and, generally speaking, 'training and maintaining your brain,' you will find some excellent fodder for your mental mill in studying the content which follows.

The Truth (The Factors) About Your Audience:

1)  They are all fearful of public speaking themselves. They are, in fact, empathetically frightened for you. They are picturing themselves in your role - and they are actually feeling a bit frightened;

2)  They are likely bored, and would like to be somehow brought out of their boredom. If you stood up on the stage on one leg playing "The Star-Spangled Banner" on the kazoo, they would be far happier than just continuing with their attempts at staying awake, making smalltalk, or feeling out of place. In fact, if you could stand on one leg, play the kazoo, and juggle three avocados...well...that would be fabulous.

3) They are, at least initially after the first "hush", at your command, and are actually more susceptible to your ideas when you are at the podium; they perceive you in an elevated status -- professional and authoritative. Know this, be aware of it, and use it to your decided advantage. You are in charge.

Douglas E Castle

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