Expectations

Okay, let’s go! Over the past two weeks, our visionary faux CEO Misty Waterspring has unveiled two deceptively simple yet profoundly impactful expectations for her leadership team, 1) be a good listener, and 2) always cause people to care more, not less. Too obvious to warrant mention?

Think about your organization. Are there any leaders who would be more effective if they had better listening skills and greater self-awareness? Of course.

Most people in leadership roles are good people who care and want to do well. But they’ve been given this leadership role, probably in the context of a reward, and told simply that the job is to oversee and manage. Not much discussion of the attributes that make a leader effective, or any expectation that they cultivate those attributes - it's an unforced error. A leadership short-circuit.

Trajectories steepen as leadership qualities improves. That’s 100% true for an individual career and for entire organizations. Better leadership benefits everyone, from student interns to stockholders. Everyone. There’s no downside to adding more inspiration to the world or for helping others achieve their fullest potential.

So where does an organization with established ‘leaders’ even begin?

By far, the biggest bang for your leadership buck is; 1) define leadership, 2) set some minimum expectations, and 3) align incentives.

And perfection here, is definitely the enemy of good enough. The imperative is just to define a minimum, i.e., listen to people and don't make them hate us! You can further evolve expectations from there.

There’s nothing provocative about this. Every position in your organization has minimum expectations of competence. Why not leadership expectations for leaders? Leadership here, is properly defined as one's personal influence, as opposed to a manager who only wields the uninspiring authority of the title.

Here are the immediate benefits of setting minimum expectations:

1. Doing so compels leaders to pay attention to honing their leadership skills.

2. It reduces the number and severity of leadership-driven self-inflicted wounds to the organization.

3. It provides a basis for identifying and addressing poor leadership.

4. It improves people’s trust, loyalty, and commitment to the organization, improving overall quality and employee engagement, reducing risk and voluntary turnover, and improving its reputation and trajectory.

Mastering the art of leading people (yeah, that’s the gig) demands vigilance and sweat equity. An organization without leadership expectations effectively declares, “Leadership? Not our forte.”

No expectations, no incentives, no motivation, no improvement. People change behaviors in response to tangible consequences, good and bad. Expectations and incentives provide the required motivation to become the best leader one can.

Faux CEO Misty Waterspring will add a couple more basic expectations for her organization’s leaders in the weeks ahead. It'll be interesting to see what she adds. A pathway to a competitive advantage is emerging ahead...

Have a great weekend!

Dave

Thoughts, feedback or blowback, hit dave@goodnewsfriday.com

Review past topics (good stuff) @ goodnewsfriday.com

Written by me, not ChatGPT, with speed assist and blunder avoidance by Grammarly. Kinda getting hooked on Grammarly's extra set of eyes tbh...

Misty Waterspring is the made-up CEO of a large water organization (naturally). I asked ChatGPT for a list of fun names and there she was. :)