Quick Hits

How did you transition from being an individual contributor to being a leader?

When an organization sees what have been able to do as an individual contributor, they might decide to move you up into a leadership role.

 

That can be exciting but it can also come with great challenges — you’re now faced with a completely different perspective, from the day-to-day details of an individual contributor to the bird’s eye view of leadership.

 

You find yourself managing people who used to be your co-workers. You have to guide a team rather than just do your day-to-day work.

 

Does one set of skills translate into another? Does a great individual contributor necessarily make a good leader? And how can an individual contributor prepare themselves for leadership?

 

My guests on this edition of Quick Hits have all experienced great success as both individual contributors and leaders. It was my pleasure to get to pick their brains.

 

Jim Tam, the principal client director for Korn Ferry’s digital group, said that “You don’t have to have the title to be a leader…It comes naturally to some people and some people need to go to class and coaching and read tons of books in order to be a leader.”

 

Stewart Wiggins, fractional COO at Induna Advisors, offered advice on the best action a leader can take in the first days of their new role: “Don’t say or do anything for 60 days. Just observe. It’s okay to be a leader and watch. It’s okay to be a leader and ask questions.”

 

Gary Fredericks, CEO of On Point Partners, built on that advice: “It’s not that you don’t do anything. It’s that you don’t make any changes or decisions until you’ve had a chance to hear what everybody working there has to say.”

 

I hope this conversation will be helpful to those of you just starting out as leaders.

 

Do you have a question about transitioning to being a leader or a suggestion about how you did it? I’d love to hear about it in the comments.

 

Connect with the panelists:
Jim Tam: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jimtam/

Stewart Wiggins: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stewart-wiggins/

Gary Fredericks: https://www.linkedin.com/in/garyfredericks/

Dr Robyn Odegaard: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robynodegaard/

 

Want a summary of the Quick Hits I post every week, plus the links to the LinkedIn pages of each of the panelist to show up in your in-box every week? Just let me know where to send it: https://drrobynodegaard.com/quick-hits-notifications/

 

#QuickHits are designed to exercise your brain by letting you listen in on an unscripted conversation to get other people's thoughts on pertinent subjects. If you would like to join a conversation or have a topic you would like to hear discussed, please message me. https://www.DrRobynOdegaard.com

 

#Leadership #Experience #promotion

Is a performance improvement plan (PIP) beneficial to the employee or is it just to create documentation to fire someone?

This might be the most honest and yet heart wrenching conversations I’ve done.

 

A couple of weeks ago Stewart Wiggins and I were talking about PIPs and I shared that I have only ever seen three outcomes from someone being put on a PIP:

 

• They quit
• The manager forgets to document the process and the PIP expires
• They get fired

 

Stewart agreed and said that he has worked for companies that purposefully create performance improvement plans that were SO impossible that there was no way the person could succeed.

 

That conversation led to this one.

 

Ed Samuel has 30 years of experience spanning the corporate world and now working as a career coach at Sam Nova.

 

Pascal Derrien has had big corporate jobs and now is the CEO of Migraine Ireland.

 

Along with Stewart who has many years of corporate experience, I knew this panel would have some great insight into the benefits and risks of being put on a performance improvement plan.

 

In the last 90 seconds of our conversation, I asked for their advice – “If I’m put on a PIP should I try to get better at my current job or start looking for something else?”

 

All three said start looking. Ed added a word of warning that many companies in the US don’t even have to give you the 90-day PIP process. They can fire you because there is often wording on the offer letter that says they can let you go for any (or no) reason.

 

After listening to the experience and opinions on this Quick Hits – do you think PIPs are actually meant to help improve performance?

 

Connect with the panelists:
Stewart Wiggins: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stewart-wiggins/
Pascal Derrien: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pascalderrien/

Ed Samuel: https://www.linkedin.com/in/edsamuel/

Dr Robyn Odegaard: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robynodegaard/

 

Want a summary of the Quick Hits I post every week, plus the links to the LinkedIn pages of each of the panelist to show up in your in-box every week? Just let me know where to send it: https://drrobynodegaard.com/quick-hits-notifications/

 

#QuickHits are designed to exercise your brain by letting you listen in on an unscripted conversation to get other people's thoughts on pertinent subjects. If you would like to join a conversation or have a topic you would like to hear discussed, please message me. https://www.DrRobynOdegaard.com

 

#PIP #PerformanceImprovementPlan #yourefired

Is guilt about disappointing myself or disappointing someone else?

Guilt is often felt when we don’t live up to a standard of some kind. But I wondered if it was an internal standard or if it was an external one placed upon us by others.

 

I have noticed that I feel A LOT less guilt than I used to and I don’t let people send me on guilt trips.

 

I was fortunate to have a global perspective on this conversation. Ursula Manvatkar is in the United Arab Emeritus. Atif Agha grew up in Pakistan and has been in the US for 25 years. While Lisa McDonald and I were born and live in the US.

 

It was an interesting discussion looking at the guilt of doing something wrong versus the guilt of not meeting an expectation.

 

We touched on the idea that those expectations can be cultural, family or self-imposed.

 

There is also an aspect of confidence. The more confident someone is in who they are and the decisions they make the harder it is for someone else to make them feel guilty.

 

What do you think? Is guilt about an expectation you have of yourself or something someone else has for you that you have failed to meet?

 

Connect with the panelists:
Atif Agha: https://www.linkedin.com/in/atifagha/

Ursula Manvatkar DipM MCIM: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ursula-manvatkar-dipm-mcim-chartered-marketer-39065910/ 

Lisa McDonald: https://www.linkedin.com/in/fearlesslisam/

Dr Robyn Odegaard: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robynodegaard/

 

Want a summary of the Quick Hits I post every week, plus the links to the LinkedIn pages of each of the panelist to show up in your in-box every week? Just let me know where to send it: https://drrobynodegaard.com/quick-hits-notifications/

 

#QuickHits are designed to exercise your brain by letting you listen in on an unscripted conversation to get other people's thoughts on pertinent subjects. If you would like to join a conversation or have a topic you would like to hear discussed, please message me. https://www.DrRobynOdegaard.com

 

#guilt #guilty #manipulation

What is the difference between being kind, compassionate and coddling someone?

 

Kindness might not look the same for everybody, but we can always control our internal intention. We can do our best to listen and take others’ needs into consideration.

 

Some acts might have the appearance of kindness but are in fact disguised condescension or harm. That’s coddling. As author Seema Desai put it on this edition of Quick Hits, there’s a difference between saying “You look like you’re having a hard time. Would it be helpful if I x, y, z? Versus, ‘I see you don’t have that done. So I’m just going to go ahead and do it for you because you’re probably too busy to do it anyway.’”

 

When we’re kind to someone, we take their perspective into consideration. If they want us to back off, the kind thing is to back off. We coddle them when we act on their behalf just because we don’t see them as capable of acting on their own. Coddling is never kind.

 

Better Conversations founder Simon Coles added that coddling “is a fairly one-way relationship. Whereas you can be kind and compassionate to somebody and they can be kind and compassionate back to you tomorrow.”

 

My third guest, communications consultant Philip Tate, summed it up clearly: “Kindness is a two-way street.”

 

I am grateful to the kindness that these three great minds showed in sharing their insight with me and I hope it’s helpful to you as well.

 

What do you think? Does kindness ever bleed into coddling someone?

 

Connect with the panelists:
Philip Tate: https://www.linkedin.com/in/philiptateaprfellowprsa/

Seema Desi: https://www.linkedin.com/in/seema-desai-dds/

Simon Coles: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sjcoles/

Dr Robyn Odegaard: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robynodegaard/

 

Want a summary of the Quick Hits I post every week, plus the links to the LinkedIn pages of each of the panelist to show up in your in-box every week? Just let me know where to send it: https://drrobynodegaard.com/quick-hits-notifications/

 

#QuickHits are designed to exercise your brain by letting you listen in on an unscripted conversation to get other people's thoughts on pertinent subjects. If you would like to join a conversation or have a topic you would like to hear discussed, please message me. https://www.DrRobynOdegaard.com

 

#Kindness #Coddling #Compassion

How do you know if you’re being manipulated?

In the conversation I had with this group and posted yesterday, we defined manipulation as “harmful influence,” of a particularly sinister kind, because we don’t always know when it’s being done to us.

 

We decided we needed another ten minutes to discuss ways that we can become aware of being manipulated.

 

When I look back, I can point to “gentle suggestions” that individually weren’t a big deal, but when strung together they were subtle coercion, intended to control or change me.

 

Having lived through a relationship with a narcissist, I am now very sensitive to manipulation and am quick to set boundaries or walk away.

 

After our last conversation, I knew this group would be a great place to me to ask how other people recognize when they are being manipulated and what they do about it.

 

Many thanks to my three guests for their thoughtfulness and for being so generous with their insight: Stewart Wiggins, fractional COO at Induna Advisors; Tim Hawkes, the managing director of Unlimited Potential; and Dr. Hannah Hartwell, an expert in learning and development.

 

How about you? How do you notice when you’re being manipulated and what do you do about it?

 

Connect with the panelists:
Tim Hawkes: https://www.linkedin.com/in/timhawkes/

Stewart Wiggins: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stewart-wiggins/

Dr Hannah Hartwell: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hannahrhartwell/

Dr Robyn Odegaard: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robynodegaard/

 

Want a summary of the Quick Hits I post every week, plus the links to the LinkedIn pages of each of the panelist to show up in your in-box every week? Just let me know where to send it: https://drrobynodegaard.com/quick-hits-notifications/

 

#QuickHits are designed to exercise your brain by letting you listen in on an unscripted conversation to get other people's thoughts on pertinent subjects. If you would like to join a conversation or have a topic you would like to hear discussed, please message me. https://www.DrRobynOdegaard.com

 

#Manipulation #coercion #boundaries

What is manipulation?

I looked up “manipulation” on dictionary.com and it said, ‘the act of manipulating someone’ — Clearly their grade school teacher didn’t tell them you can’t use the word to define itself.

 

You might be accused of being manipulative when in fact you're only maintaining boundaries and arguing for your position.

 

To help find a definition, I turned to my insightful and intellectually generous guests on this edition of Quick Hits.

 

Learning and Development Executive Dr. Hannah Hartwell defined manipulation as “harmful influence. You’re leveraging the mental and emotional sides of somebody else to get what you want.”

 

Stewart Wiggins, a fractional COO at Induna Advisers, noted that manipulation “can be used as a positive if you project it as a positive. I’ve been in leadership roles before where people indirectly reported to me. I had to lead those people through influence. We all had to accomplish the same goal, but because they didn’t report directly to me, I had to influence them to achieve that goal.”

 

Tim Hawkes, Managing Director of Unlimited Potential, warned that the danger of manipulation is that you can never be sure when it’s happening to you. “If you get mugged in the street, your first thought isn’t, ‘Oh I’ve been mugged.’ Your first thought is, ‘I feel terrible. What am I going to do?’ Then you come away half an hour later and somebody might say, ‘Man, you’ve been mugged.’ And you’ll know that’s what happened. I think it’s the same for manipulation.”

 

How would you define manipulation? Maybe more importantly, how do you know if you are manipulating someone or if they are manipulating you? (that Quick Hits will be posted tomorrow)

 

Connect with the panelists:
Tim Hawkes: https://www.linkedin.com/in/timhawkes/

Stewart Wiggins: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stewart-wiggins/

Dr Hannah Hartwell: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hannahrhartwell/

Dr Robyn Odegaard: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robynodegaard/

 

Want a summary of the Quick Hits I post every week, plus the links to the LinkedIn pages of each of the panelist to show up in your in-box every week? Just let me know where to send it: https://drrobynodegaard.com/quick-hits-notifications/

 

#QuickHits are designed to exercise your brain by letting you listen in on an unscripted conversation to get other people's thoughts on pertinent subjects. If you would like to join a conversation or have a topic you would like to hear discussed, please message me. https://www.DrRobynOdegaard.com

 

#Manipulation #Influence #Negotiation

What do you do if you are in a poorly facilitated meeting?

There are many ways a meeting can go wrong if they aren’t well guided — they can veer off topic, they can go in circles, they can repeat points that have already been addressed and resolved.

 

Sometimes they need a firm hand that says, “This discussion is over, we are moving on in the agenda.”

 

But that can be tricky. You have to be firm, but diplomatic, so that you avoid creating resentments. It gets even trickier on Zoom, where you don’t have the same kind of body language an in-person meeting affords. 

 

On this edition of Quick Hits, I discussed this topic with three great minds who have a lot of experience running meetings:

 

Business consultant Chuck Groot shared that “One thing I’ve done in the past is just interject a little question here or there just to spark it. Not overtly take over the meeting, but help the person out.”

 

Transformation Expert Sara Oblak Speicher recalled meeting “that would be scheduled five minutes before 5 o’clock. And by the time it was over, I was like ‘This was an email. Not a meeting.’”

 

And entrepreneur Dr. Mohan Ananda advised to “at the end of the meeting, always ask, what are the real action items out of this meeting? So that we have certain things to follow up.”

 

How do you handle a poorly facilitated meeting? (Other than muting or leaving it)

 

Connect with the panelists:
Sara Oblak Speicher, MBA: https://www.linkedin.com/in/saraospeicher/ 
Chuck Groot: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chuck-groot-b5763b25/

Dr. Mohan Ananda: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mohanananda/

Dr Robyn Odegaard: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robynodegaard/

 

Want a summary of the Quick Hits I post every week, plus the links to the LinkedIn pages of each of the panelist to show up in your in-box every week? Just let me know where to send it: https://drrobynodegaard.com/quick-hits-notifications/

 

#QuickHits are designed to exercise your brain by letting you listen in on an unscripted conversation to get other people's thoughts on pertinent subjects. If you would like to join a conversation or have a topic you would like to hear discussed, please message me. https://www.DrRobynOdegaard.com

 

#Meetings #Leadership #facilitation

How useful is daylight savings time?

This has been an ongoing debate for the more than hundred years since daylight savings time was first introduced. It seems that most people agree with me and would just like to stick to one. But which one?

 

The American Association of Sleep Medicine argues that standard time creates better conditions for a healthy lifestyle. Other studies show some correlation between daylight savings time and lower crime rates.

 

This was a fun and abstract conversation about changing the clocks and the concept of time itself.

 

Scientist and entrepreneur Mohan Ananda says that “For especially young people, there is a psychological impact right after the change because it becomes dark earlier in the evening. Once they pick one, whether standard time or daylight-saving time, then everybody will get used to it and things will be okay.”

 

Transformational expert Sara Oblak Speicher noted that “the more freedom that I create in business for myself and in schedule, the more I’m able to be in my natural rhythm. And I notice how miserable I get for a couple of weeks in fall when I wake up still in the darkness.”

 

Business consultant Chuck Groot told us about the “great debate” in his home of British Columbia. “There’s been a big push because people don’t like those changes. They link having something solid and just go with the flow. We all have a basic circadian rhythm in us which is based on thousands of years of genetics.”

 

What do you think? Is there still a reason for dealing with the stress on our bodies to change the clocks twice a year?

 

Connect with the panelists:
Sara Oblak Speicher, MBA: https://www.linkedin.com/in/saraospeicher/ 
Chuck Groot: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chuck-groot-b5763b25/

Dr. Mohan Ananda: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mohanananda/

Dr Robyn Odegaard: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robynodegaard/

 

Want a summary of the Quick Hits I post every week, plus the links to the LinkedIn pages of each of the panelist to show up in your in-box every week? Just let me know where to send it: https://drrobynodegaard.com/quick-hits-notifications/

 

#QuickHits are designed to exercise your brain by letting you listen in on an unscripted conversation to get other people's thoughts on pertinent subjects. If you would like to join a conversation or have a topic you would like to hear discussed, please message me. https://www.DrRobynOdegaard.com

 

#DaylightSavingsTime #TimeIsAConcept

Is competition good or bad within a team?

A healthy sense of competition can be beneficial, essential even, on an individual level. It allows individuals to strive to be the best they can possibly be. But when a team has to work together, does that sense of competition benefit the group or cause it to splinter?

 

I heard strong cases for both sides of the argument from my guests on this edition of Quick Hits. They all have extensive experience working with teams in their respective fields and were generous with their accumulated wisdom.

 

Mentor and sales consultant Kevin Wash said that competition is “essential. It takes a team from being ordinary to extraordinary. Within a team there are individuals, but every person in the team should be challenged to move from being okay to being the best they can be. And competition is what does that.”

 

PR consultant Rick Alcantara asked a key question. “If your tendency as a business leader is to continuously reward the high achievers, if you’re cutting them breaks and giving them all the special benefits, do those things serve as a disincentive to other folks?”

 

Financial futurist Jim Lee also argued that, “If you are competing, you’re trying to do more of what you have been doing and you’re less likely to experiment, take risks and exercise creativity.”

 

Competition within a team has risks and rewards, and in order for it to benefit the organization, it has to be careful managed.

 

You can likely tell from the conversation where I stand on the subject. What do you think? Is competition good or bad within a team?

 

Connect with the panelists:

Rick Alcantara: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rickalcantara/  

James Lee: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jleeadvisor/

Kevin Wash: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevin-wash-23b90915/

Dr Robyn Odegaard: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robynodegaard/

 

Want a summary of the Quick Hits I post every week, plus the links to the LinkedIn pages of each of the panelist to show up in your in-box every week? Just let me know where to send it: https://drrobynodegaard.com/quick-hits-notifications/

 

#QuickHits are designed to exercise your brain by letting you listen in on an unscripted conversation to get other people's thoughts on pertinent subjects. If you would like to join a conversation or have a topic you would like to hear discussed, please message me. https://www.DrRobynOdegaard.com

 

#QuickHits #Competition #TeamWork

How many times do you allow someone to reschedule a meeting before you stop blocking out time in your calendar for them?

Having people cancel, reschedule or completely no-show for a meeting can be frustrating. Of course, life happens and sometimes we have to be accepting. We can never what is going on in someone’s life. But if it continues to happen, that may be a sign that this person isn’t worth holding onto as a friend, client or colleague.

 

On this edition of Quick Hits, I asked my three wise and experienced guests about how they handle rescheduling and no-shows.

 

Brandon Mahoney, co-founder of Launch Point Labs, said that it depends on “the way they communicate that they’re not going to be available. I’ve had individuals let me know, ‘Hey, this Thursday is actually not a good time for me. Can we move it?’ And if you’re giving me that advance notice, that’s fantastic.”

 

Ed Samuel, career coach at SamNova, shared with us his process. “I give them ten minutes. Once it hits 12, 13 minutes, I will go into the calendar system and say, ‘The meeting’s canceled. You are a no show. I hope everything’s okay. Feel free to re-book.’ I don’t want to be nasty and I don’t want to not respond. But I also want to send a message. ‘You’re a no-show.’ No show is not good.”

 

Diane Helbig, founder of Helbig Enterprises, advised us to “give people a little bit of grace because life has gotten so nutty.” But we also have to set boundaries for certain situations. “With my podcast, if people are no shows and I don’t hear from them, I don’t even reach out.”

 

When all is said and done, time is precious. I appreciate you offering some of yours to listen to this conversation and I’d love to hear how you handle people who don’t show up to scheduled meetings.

 

Connect with the panelists:
Brandon Mahoney: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brandoncmahoney/

Ed Samuel: https://www.linkedin.com/in/edsamuel/

Diane Helbig: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dhelbig/

Dr Robyn Odegaard: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robynodegaard/

 

Want a summary of the Quick Hits I post every week, plus the links to the LinkedIn pages of each of the panelist to show up in your in-box every week? Just let me know where to send it: https://drrobynodegaard.com/quick-hits-notifications/

 

#QuickHits are designed to exercise your brain by letting you listen in on an unscripted conversation to get other people's thoughts on pertinent subjects. If you would like to join a conversation or have a topic you would like to hear discussed, please message me. https://www.DrRobynOdegaard.com

 

#meetings #TimeIsPrecious #NoShow #Scheduling