Several of our clients have what we call an "objective culture" -  meaning the leader creates a culture that focuses primarily on the goals the business must achieve.  This is not a negative thing.  However, when a leader creates this type of culture, he or she must remember to provide some room for the subjective - to hear from the people who are supporting the organization in achieving its goals.  Most often, this means providing some time to hear what the staff has to say about doing the work.  It can also mean providing some informal time for staff to get to know their leader - time to make authentic connections.

Matt Rowan of the Health Industry Distributors Association is working with groupforward to build his Executive Team's leadership skills and strengthen their group dynamics.  After some transitions and hard work at that level, Matt and his leadership team undertook a very creative retreat to bring the subjective to light.

Matt and the HIDA Executive Team designed a day that allowed the entire staff to talk about the culture at HIDA and what issues were important to them.  To make the day manageable, Matt and the Executive Team met with the director level staff first to start the conversation about leadership.  This initial step allowed the Executive Team and the Directors to find out if they were on the same page and to solidify their leadership approach when they convened all the staff together.

As part of the retreat design, each Executive Team member facilitated parts of the discussion when all the staff gathered together.  As a result, the staff had a chance to talk with the various Executive Team members about the culture at HIDA and to identify some issues that would make the culture even stronger.  That was the hard work of the day.

To make sure that the staff had time to just kick back and get to know each other on an informal basis, they also went bowling and then had dinner.  It made for a long day (and was totally in keeping with HIDA's objective culture of getting the job done), but the informal feedback has been very positive.  More connections were made between all levels of employees. It turns out, too, that watching each other bowl was as informative as any conversation when it came to how people approach work!

What did Matt do that was so important?  He took the first step.  He was able to put the issue of dealing with the subjective issues about HIDA's culture into an objective format (problem-solution format) and then it made sense and he could see what needed to happen.  As another client once said, "If I can make this organization development stuff make objective sense, then I can deal with the stress of taking it on."

Good job, Matt!

So, what's the first step you need to take?

• Talk to Matt Rowan about his retreat!
• Talk to groupforward about where to start.

In Leadership Presence, Halpern and Lubar define leadership presence as "the ability to connect authentically with the thoughts and feelings of others, in order to motivate and inspire them toward a desired outcome."  Susan M. Heathfield, writing for the online resource About: Human Resources, reminds us that an inspirational leader creates a work environment in which people feel important and appreciated.

Lisa Miller, of Human Genome Sciences, Inc. worked with groupforward as she fine-tuned her leadership presence.  As she honed her skills, Lisa came up with a great design for a team development session.

Prior to the session, Lisa sat down and thought about each of her direct reports and what quality stood out the most about each person.  She went online and found posters that illustrated each of the qualities.  For example, if someone was known for being tenacious, she found a poster that had that word and an illustration of that quality.

In the session, Lisa hung the posters around the room and had her direct reports read the posters and see who they thought each poster represented.  For some, it was obvious who was represented. For others, it was not so obvious.

Either way, the group had a tremendous amount of fun. Because the session started off with humor, each person was able to more easily own their own qualities.  Lisa was then able to move into a discussion of how each quality supported the team's work or, in the case of overuse, detracted from the team's work.  From the feedback Lisa received after the session, it was one of the best sessions in which the team had ever participated.  In fact, the exercise was so well regarded that her staff took the posters back to their offices and hung them up!

So, what did Lisa do that was so important?  She indicated, through the use of the posters, that she "saw" or noticed each person.  She also saw a positive quality about each of them that was of value to the team and she highlighted that to the team.  It is critical for leaders to communicate that they are aware of their team members and acknowledge them.  Lisa took a novel approach to make an authentic connection with each of her direct reports and to let them know they were important.

Bravo Lisa!

What steps do you need to take?

• Talk to Lisa and learn more details about her session!
• Consult with groupforward to find out what it takes to hone your leadership presence.