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HOW TO DEAL WITH A TOXIC BOSS

Mon, 29 Jan 2024 19:12:55 GMT

Stay Calm and Professional : When in a situation with a toxic boss, your response to their behaviours that threaten your wellbeing is likely to be one of the long determined human responses to exposure to danger, which is, the fight, flight, freeze response or the fourth response which has recently been identified and that is to *Feign. To feign means to hide from the threat. This is a situation where you are not fighting your toxic boss, you are not running away from the situation and you are not frozen by its impact on you but you are simply hiding from it or ignoring it and hoping that it will go away by itself. The fact is, it is not going to go away. If anything, the situation could worsen. You have to do something about it. To begin this process of dealing with a toxic boss, your first response should be to maintain your composure and professionalism when you observe the signs, I discussed in my earlier post. Avoid reacting emotionally or engaging in confrontations that may escalate the situation.

Document Everything : Then keep a detailed record of your interactions with the toxic boss and this includes emails, meetings, and any specific instances of maltreatment. This documentation can be valuable if you need to escalate the issue later.

Seek Support : Speak to trusted colleagues or friends about your experiences. They may offer valuable insights, advice, or emotional support to help you cope. They may also be invaluable witnesses to collaborate your narrative if you decide to escalate the matter later.

Establish Boundaries : Set clear boundaries with your toxic boss. Politely assert your need for personal space and autonomy while expressing your willingness to collaborate and communicate constructively.

Confront the Issue : If you feel comfortable and safe doing so, consider discussing your concerns with your toxic boss, using the “I" statements to express how their behaviour affects you and propose potential solutions. The use of “you” statements may come across to your boss as accusative and may likely put your boss on a defensive position. Where this approach does not yield the desired outcome for you, then you may wish to escalate the issue with the next step.

Speak to HR or Higher Management : If the situation doesn't improve and becomes unbearable, reach out to your human resources department or a higher-level manager to report the issue and present your documented evidence at the appropriate time to support your claims.

Consider Your Options: In some cases, it may be necessary to consider finding a new job or transferring to a different department or team within the organization if the toxic environment persists and starts affecting your mental and emotional health.

* Feign is a terminology the author coined as the fourth human response to threat or perceived threat to existential wellbeing.

Dr Chuma is the founder and CEO of Apex Leadership Consult. He is a leadership, business and team coach. If you like this post, follow for more.

Is Your Boss Toxic?

Mon, 29 Jan 2024 18:55:37 GMT

Is your Boss toxic?

Few symptoms of a toxic boss:

Micromanagement : When your boss has the tendency of micromanaging every aspect of your work, it is pointing to someone who may be insecure in themselves and if not checked would most certainly project that insecurity to you by insisting on having a say in every decision you make no matter how small that decision is. For more on micromanaging see my blog on the 3 Fears of micro managers.

Lack of Communication : Toxic bosses can resort to passive-aggressive behaviours in place of open, constructive, developmental and honest communication with you.

Favouritism : Toxic bosses often work with the principle of divide and rule, choosing to show favouritism and preferential behaviours to certain employees while unfairly criticizing or ostracizing others.

Blame-Shifting : They are masters at blame shifting when things go wrong. They take credit when things are going on well but shift the blame to their subordinates, refusing to take responsibility for their own mistakes or decisions when things go wrong.

Bullying and Harassment : In extreme cases, they may engage in bullying, harassment, or discriminatory behaviours creating a hostile work environment. These symptoms are not exhaustive but are strong indicators that you are most probably in a toxic relationship with your boss.

If you like this post, follow me @Drchuma for how to deal with a toxic boss.

How to Resolve Complex Business Problems for Small Businesses

Mon, 04 Dec 2023 11:32:06 GMT

Small fishes swim in the same ocean that sharks, whales and other large aquarian creatures operate in and are exposed to the vagaries of such terrains. Similarly small businesses function within the same business environment as medium and large businesses and are often affected by the activities of the bigger ones. Business environments, as a result, affect the way small businesses operate. Some problems that medium and large businesses deal with routinely due to their sizes and resource capacities can easily become complex problems for small businesses.

Resolving these complex problems will require a structured approach. The sequence below is intended to give small businesses a structure to make sense of the complexities that come with their business environments. A complex problem, at first, might appear overwhelming to small business owners. To make sense of complexities require some sort of structure, if you like, a method in the madness, to unravel the interlocking complexities and systematically solve it. The short structure below will help you as a business owner, to deal will the ever-increasing complexities in today’s business world.

The first step is your ability to remain calm in the face of the overwhelming situation. This is easier said than done, though but an essential part of resolving complex problems. The ability to stay calm can help you stabilise and save your business, in the same way that Formula 1 drivers are able to recover from imminent crashes by focusing on where they intend to go rather than where their vehicles are heading for a crash. Then, start by trying to define the problem.

Define the Problem:

A well-defined problem is a problem half solved. Define the complex business problem you are facing by identifying the scope (size), impact (effect on your business) and urgency of the problem. The clearer the definition of the problem, the easier it becomes with the subsequent stages below. Gathering the relevant data and information to understand the problem thoroughly will help you in gaining clarity with the problem.

Stakeholder Analysis:

Identify all the stakeholders involved, including internal and external stakeholders. Understand their interests, concerns, and perspectives regarding the problem. Then prioritize stakeholders based on their level of influence and importance or power. Ansoff matrix is a useful tool you can use to do this.

Root Cause Analysis:

Analyse the underlying causes of the problem. Look beyond the symptoms to identify the fundamental reasons why the problem came about in the first place. You may be pleasantly surprised that what you though initially was the root cause of the problem is only a symptom. Useful tools like the "5 Whys" or Fishbone diagrams can help you to explore the root causes of the problem.

Data Gathering and Analysis:

Good data gathering is key to quality finding in support of your understanding of the problem. Rigorous analysis will produce quality findings to base the rest of your structure on. As Ronald Coase has noted, “torture the data, and it will confess to reality.” There are many useful tools out there to help you with your data gathering and analysis. You may find the Box and Whisker plot, Control chart, Histogram or Scatter diagram useful tools among the host of others. Data-driven insights to identify patterns and trends is a good practice in solving complex problems for small businesses.

Generation of Solutions:

Complex business problems are rarely solved by individual genius. Assemble relevant stakeholders (internal and external) for brainstorming and idea generation. Resist any form of judgment or evaluation of the ideas that are coming through at this stage. Allow for both short-term and long-term solutions.

Evaluation of Solutions:

Then lay out all the ideas and start your assessment of each potential solution's feasibility, cost-effectiveness, and alignment with business goals. Consider potential risks and benefits associated with each option. Then prioritize solutions based on their potential to address the root causes of the problems you have earlier identified.

Decision-Making:

At this stage of the process, involve key stakeholders in the decision-making process and select the most suitable solution and develop an action plan. Clearly define roles and responsibilities for executing the plan.

Implementation:

The stage of implementation is crucial as it is the stage that brings to life, the solutions you have crafted alongside your team. Communicate the chosen solution and action plan to the relevant teams and departments. Allocate necessary resources and monitor progress closely. Ensure that you make adjustments as your monitoring flags up issues along the way.

Feedback and Adaptation:

As you set the machine of solutions in motion, continue to gather feedback from stakeholders and teams. Be open to adapting the plan if unexpected challenges arise. Maintain flexibility and agility in your approach.

Evaluation and Learning:

It is time to learn. The learning you acquire in this process can be invaluable in subsequent challenges along the way. Once the solution has been implemented, evaluate its effectiveness in addressing the complex business problem. Identify lessons learned and best practices that can be applied to future problem-solving.

Communication and Transparency:

It is useful to maintain open and transparent communication with stakeholders and teams throughout the process. Share progress updates and outcomes, whether positive or negative.

Continuous Improvement:

The experience gained from resolving the complex business problem is an added asset in your toolbox that will help you to refine your business processes and decision-making strategies in future. Ensure that your organization is better prepared to handle future challenges.

I am open to your comments and contributions on how to help small businesses deal with the complex problems in a VUCA world.

Dr Chuma Osuchukwu, MBA, PhD is a business and leadership coach. He is the author of the Learning Leader and the 5 Perspectives of Change Leadership. Dr Chuma is the founder and CEO of Apex Leadership Consult.

Boosting Leadership Performance With Cultural Intelligence (CQ)

Mon, 21 Aug 2023 16:34:45 GMT

It is obvious that when leaders learn and apply those essential leadership skills, it's like adding the perfect tools to an auto mechanic's knowledge base, – their performance invariably improves. But here is what might not be as obvious; just because a leader excels at one aspect of their role, like coming up with visions or strategies, doesn't mean they will automatically be as effective in all the other leadership tasks too. It's like having a great vision-caster who struggles to connect with their team on a personal level.

Now, let's talk about a big challenge in leadership – rallying the troops behind a vision and strategies. This whole thing hinges on a leader's ability to understand and form strong bonds with their team members. This is where a crucial skill called cultural intelligence (CQ) comes in. Cultural intelligence is all about how well you can adapt and work well with others from different cultural backgrounds. While CQ is not just for leaders, it is a great asset in leaders’ toolkit, given their different levels of interactions with people in their organisations. It helps leaders to effectively harness the potentials in their teams.

Think about today's work scene – it's a real melting pot of cultures. Teams are not all cut from the same cloth anymore. It is important to note that everyone brings their cultural perspectives to work every single day. These perspectives shape how they see things, hear things, experience things, and even how they do things.

We know that leaders cannot possibly understand every single person they work with, especially when there is a mix of different cultural backgrounds. But here's the important thing; leaders should really make an effort to boost their CQ. Here are four key capabilities that can help leaders to immensely improve their game and connect better with their teams. These abilities are drive, knowledge, strategy, and action. *

Let's break them down:

• Drive is all about a leader's motivation to thrive in a culturally diverse setting. It's about embracing the fact that the work world has taken on a global dimension, and instead of trying to avoid it, leaders should fully embrace and understand it.

• Knowledge means that leaders should actively learn about the cultures present in their organizations. They need to dive into researching these cultures, comparing their similarities and differences with their own, and understanding how these cultural factors impact things like business operations, interactions between people, and even things like language rules and nonverbal mannerisms.

• Strategy is like a leader's game plan to navigate this diversity and minimize conflicts that might arise in a culturally diverse workplace.

• Action is all about putting that research into practice. It's about adjusting communication styles – things like tone, gestures, facial expressions – and adapting behaviours during interactions with others. This requires leaders to be flexible and open to change.

And let's not forget, leaders should always remember that effective leadership and a creative culture go hand in hand. They are great partners in progress.

Dr Chuma Osuchukwu is the author of The Learning Leader and the 5 Perspectives of Change Leadership, 3rd Edition. Get a copy here: https://tinyurl.com/2cahx6hc

*Ang et al, 2008. Handbook of Cultural Intelligence. New York: ME Sharpe.

Leadership Decisions and Opposing Views

Thu, 10 Aug 2023 13:36:15 GMT

Leaders’ decisions stir the lives of people within their spheres of influence in various directions. Leaders are in control of the decisions they make but what they do not have control over is the consequences of those decisions in the lives of people. That calls for careful considerations and sober reflections before major decisions are made. To mitigate some of the major outcomes of those decisions, if they turn out to be like a car swerving out of control, leaders need to bear in mind and accept that their decisions are not laws set in stone. This means that a leader must be prepared to revisit, review, refresh and revise decisions when it becomes necessary to do so. Leaders should also accept that there is hardly any major decision that have far reaching consequences for the led that will have the support of everybody. It is fair to say that leaders are aware of this, but some find it difficult to accept it. For such leaders, opposition of any kind presents a frustrating experience and may be viewed as a cog in the wheel of progress. For those leaders, opposition or disagreement with their decisions might seem like an attack on a good cause.

Constructive opposition carries a message. It is part of the leadership process and makes for good governance if engaged with appropriately. This is because no leader has the monopoly of wisdom to possibly cover all the dimensions of an issue while making a decision. Often opposition highlights those loopholes in the issue under discussion. Leadership can quickly degenerate into dictatorship in the absence of opposing voices. Therefore, the value of opposition in leadership is high and demands attention. It acts as a check and a balance for the leader, which is a good and safe thing for all concerned. It helps the leader to reflect and refine decisions made. Though it may be uncomfortable for the leader making the decision, it makes room for modifications on decisions or even a change of plan. For the dissenting voices, modification of leadership decision makes that decision easier to buy into. Take for instance, the various voices that have been raised on the Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) policy from the office of the Mayor of London. The conflicting voices have come from various quarters. The leaders of different boroughs, the Labour party, the Conservatives, protesters on the streets, climate enthusiasts, the courts etc, all have their own views on the decision the Mayor of London made in terms of scope and timing for the implementation of the ULEZ policy. As a result, few changes appear to have been made to the initial decision. That is the value of collective leadership.

In situations that create conflicting views and clash of authorities, it serves the leader and the people well when the leader sets apart personalities and personal considerations. This helps the leader to focus on the messages of the opposing voices with a view to achieving a win-win situation. Achieving that win-win situation, requires few paradigm shifts for all concerned but more for the leader who takes the final decision. The leader needs to detach emotionally from the initial considerations that led to that decision. At that point the decision should cease to be ‘my decision’ and become ‘our decision’. As long as it remains ‘my decision’ the emotions of and attachment to that decision are still with the leader and it will be difficult for that leader to look at that decision objectively because the leader still owns it. It should be emphasised that it is a strength, not weakness for a leader to reconsider a decision made when factors that were not in view when that decision was made come to light, often from the opposing voices, for the greater good of all concerned. This can only happen if the leader adopts the mindset of negotiation that is not hinged on defending the decision already made but with a view to reviewing that decision through the lenses of others in the negotiation. The way to achieve this position, is contingent on two broad ways: First, the leader should adopt the Learning Leader’s mindset and second, use perceptual positioning to get into every party’s shoes with a view to fully assess and understand their perspectives. When practiced on regular basis, this will help the leader to make effective decisions that enrich the lives of people. This is the value in good governance.

Dr Chuma Osuchukwu is the author of T he Learning Leader and the 5 Perspectives of Change Leadership, 3rd edition . Get your copy here: https://tinyurl.com/2cahx6hc

Key Strategies to Upscale Your Coaching Business

Sat, 13 May 2023 17:54:46 GMT

Reaching a significant level of success in your coaching business involves a combination of personal development, professional expertise, and effective marketing. Here are some key steps to help you on your journey:

Master your craft: Continuously learn and develop your skills in coaching, leadership, and business management. Stay up to date with the latest trends, research, and best practices. Attend workshops, conferences, and seminars, and consider pursuing relevant certifications.

Develop a niche: Identify and specialize in a specific area of coaching where you can leverage your strengths, passions, and expertise. This will help you stand out in the market and attract clients who are looking for specialized guidance.

Build your personal brand: Cultivate a strong personal brand that reflects your values, expertise, and unique selling proposition. Establish a professional online presence through a website, blog, and social media platforms. Share valuable content, insights, and success stories to demonstrate your credibility and build trust with your target audience.

Network: Build relationships with other professionals in your field, as well as with potential clients and referral sources. Attend industry events, join professional associations, and participate in online forums and communities. Networking can help you learn from others, gain visibility, and acquire new clients.

Develop your coaching skills: Hone your listening, questioning, and communication skills to become an effective coach. Learn different coaching methodologies and tools to facilitate the growth and development of your clients. Practice empathy and emotional intelligence to better understand and support your clients.

Create a results-driven approach: Focus on delivering tangible results for your clients. Establish clear goals, develop tailored action plans, and track progress. Continuously refine your approach based on client feedback and results to ensure your coaching remains relevant and impactful.

Offer a range of services: Diversify your offerings to cater to different client needs and preferences. Consider providing one-on-one coaching, group coaching, workshops, webinars, or online courses. This can help you reach a broader audience and increase your income.

Leverage testimonials and referrals: Encourage satisfied clients to share their experiences and success stories. Request testimonials, case studies, and referrals to help build credibility and attract new clients.

Automate your systems: This eases your operations and ensures that other people can get involved in your business and replicate what you do. Perhaps, this is one of the best keys to upscaling your coaching business.

Personal development: Set aside time for self-reflection, meditation, or journaling to maintain your balance and growth.

Seek mentorship: Find a mentor or coach to help you navigate your own professional journey.

Continuous improvement: Learn from your experiences and regularly evaluate your coaching practice to identify areas for improvement.

Invest in your own growth: Seek out mentorship, coaching, or professional development opportunities to further your own growth as a leader and coach. Reflect on your successes and challenges, and continuously refine your approach and offerings.

Stay persistent.

Different Faces of Organisational Crisis - Part 2

Tue, 10 Jan 2023 20:06:06 GMT

In part one of this series, I mentioned that every organisation is susceptible to crisis but that your mindset as a leader is fundamental in determining the organisational approach to every crisis . I also suggested that your mindset can in some cases be the trigger for the crisis . The importance of a leader’s mindset is underscored by the impact it can have on the organisation if it becomes a bigger problem than the crisis itself. The leader’s view and approach can turn the crisis into an opportunity or threat for the organisation. As demonstrated in part one of this series, every crisis changes your organisation in some way but the course of that change is linked to your mindset as a leader. The change your organisation experiences is a good and desirable one, if it makes your organisation better than it was prior to the crisis.

In this part two , I will be highlighting a leader with a different mindset from that of part one in relation to organisational crisis. This will, hopefully, help you to assess whether your approach to your organisational crisis, past or current, is the bigger problem than the crisis itself and if so, what you can do about it . If you are working to either stem or use crisis moments as opportunities for the development of your organisation, I will invite you to explore this brief article with me .

Clear and Compelling Vision

Image yourself leading an organisation that has a very clear and compelling vision but only on paper. The vision is so good on paper only because no one cares about it or follows it in the tactical or strategic decisions made in the organisation. The consequence of this lacklustre organisational attitude to its vision is low staff morale, employee underperformance, unresolved conflicts across the organisation and blame culture among other toxicities. Everyone adopts the herd instinct for fear of victimisation and reprisals. This complicated situation can be best described as a house of confusion and despair. This paints the picture of an internal crisis as opposed to the crisis in part one. It is doubtful if you as the leader of this organisation will view this crisis as an opportunity given the overwhelming, intricate and interwoven issues here, yet it could be.

Leadership Mindset

Your mindset as the leader of this organisation is possibly that ‘the vision of the organisation is clear enough for everyone to understand and follow.’ Your assumption is probably that ‘I paid them to do the job, they better get on with it’ or you could be assuming that all the employees are self-motivated and will instinctively know what to do to achieve the organisation’s vision once they see it. This good intentioned belief could well be the problem. It is most probably the main issue because you have overlooked the fact that a vision only works if it is worked on. The leader may also have ignored the process that translates the vision into reality. A vision may be the organisational compass, but it needs hands and legs to take the organisation to its destination. Limited or no actions will, therefore, frustrate the good intentions of the leader as well as the organisation as a whole. With this mindset, it is difficult to see how the leader can view this crisis situation as an opportunity even though there may be some opportunities there. The point I am trying to make here is that a leader who chooses to adopt a Laissez faire attitude towards running your organisation can easily precipitate an internal crisis irrespective of how good your vision is.

Confronting The Situation

To confront this situation and successfully turn it into an opportunity, a different mindset is needed. The mindset that created the problem will not be sufficient to solve it. I will suggest a mindset of accepting responsibility and accountability as the creator of this problem in the first place and resolving to fix it. So, a mindset of ‘I created this mess, I will clean it up’ will go a long way. It is a mindset that brings positive changes to the organisation and if this mindset engenders some actions towards the resolution of this crisis, then the crisis is an opportunity rather than a threat.

With this mindset in place, you and your executive coach can then begin to make sense of the whole situation by isolating its various constitutes to analyse them in depth, synthesize them and devise a workable plan to respond to the situation accordingly. This approach will enable you to see opportunities in an otherwise threatening situation. The opportunities can range from a critical review of the organisation's vision, barriers to its effective implementation, change of attitude to work, to prompt and effective conflict resolution. The opportunities in here are many and can be tapped into with a different and effective mindset.

Different Faces of Organisational Crisis - Part 1

Tue, 06 Dec 2022 15:04:27 GMT

Different Faces of Organisational Crisis – Part 1

Organisational crisis is inevitable. Leaders, even the very best of us, have experienced that overwhelming feeling when crisis hits their organisations. A closer look at crisis moments can reveal some benefits they bring along with them. So, what may appear initially as a threat could end up becoming an opportunity for you as a leader and your organisation when you engage constructively with the crisis. For one, every crisis, changes your organisation in some way and that is a good thing if that change makes your organisation better than it was. In many cases, what determines whether a crisis in your organisation is a real threat or an opportunity for you is your mindset and attitude towards the crisis and the conditions that brought it about.

In a 4-part series, I will explore with you, what I mean by your mindset and attitude when confronting crisis situations in your organisation. Each part of this blog will highlight a leader with a different mindset in relation to crisis. This will enable you assess whether your approach to the crisis is the bigger problem than the crisis itself and if so, what you can do about it. If you are working to either stem or use crisis moments as opportunities for the development of your organisation, may I invite you to explore this together with me.

Working With Maximum Capacity

One of the ways to invite crisis into your organisation is when you are leading an organisation that is operationally sound but strategically deficient. Strategic deficiency refers to lack of attention being given to strategic thinking, planning and development either by omission or commission. In that state of operation, an opportunity that calls for strategic development or utilisation will appear as a threat because it will seem to disrupt the operational efficiency of your organisation. Take for example, a situation where, you have everything under control and efficiency is high at the operational level. This means that on day-to-day operations, your organisation’s policies and procedures on recruitment and selection, training and development, employee engagement, employee performance and reward system are well entrenched and functioning at capacity. It may even be that because of the level of your operational efficiency in your organisation, your bottom line is rewarding of your leadership efforts as everyone is busy taking care of tactical and short-term objectives.

Change

Having trained your staff to think and function operationally without seeing the need for or encouraging your team members to think and work to develop strategic capabilities alongside operational efficiency, any external intervention like a government policy, for instance, is most likely to destabilise your smooth- running machinery. This external intervention would of course not sync well with the functional framework that has been producing results for you. It will, therefore, constitute a crisis because your organisation has not developed a flexible and robust capacity to accommodate this new development on a practical level. The omission of engagement with strategic developments will become obvious to any casual observer. Since strategic capabilities take a while to develop out of scenario planning, the external intervention or intrusion will come to you as an emergency and most of your thinking and action at this point will be on how to ‘fight the fires.’ It is highly unlikely, therefore, that you will view this development as an opportunity. The smooth operational functioning of the organisation, as good as it is, without the complementary strategic development will be unable to withstand emergencies because that has not been factored in within the operational scheme of things.

In general, organisations that focus on operational efficiency at the expense of strategic thinking, planning and execution run the risk of falling into crisis unexpectedly. Operational efficiency without strategic effectiveness is a clear invitation to frequent crisis moments that will leave you constantly operating on emergency mode. I am not implying here that changes are easy to deal with or that opportunities will automatically come with every change. What change means here, is that it demands that important decisions be made to accommodate it. This introduces the possibility of identifying opportunities within the change. If, however, you view change as an intrusion or disruption of the smooth running of your organisation, you are unlikely to view changes favourably and will, therefore, be preoccupied with developing survival strategies instead of growth and development strategies.

Leadership Mindset

The challenge with change, is less of the crisis it causes in your organisation but more of your mindset that is dictating your actions and leadership of your organisation. You know from your experience that an organisation is the lengthened shadow of the leader. This means that the crisis in your organisation may be a function of your mindset which may be on the lines of ‘don’t fix it, if it is not broken.’ In other words, you may be unconsciously communicating your management team and staff members that there is no need to do anything about the state of your organisation since you have been having good enough outcomes especially on the bottom line as things stand.

On the face of this mindset, there is nothing wrong with it except that it keeps you and your organisation on the platform of being a good organisation. If this is your goal, then you don’t need to do anything except to keep maintaining the status quo. If, however, your goal is to become a great organisation, then you will need to listen to and incorporate the wisdom of Jim Collins that said that good is the enemy of great. To move from good to great, strategic thinking, planning and consistent development is a sin qua non for your organisation. If you are happy with the status quo and investing time and resources to maintain it, it will be useful to also bear in mind that ‘what got you here, [may not] get you there,’ wherever there is for you because we live and operate in a dynamic environment where change is a constant. Running an organisation with the mindset of ‘don’t fix it if it is not broken’ could be the main problem you have as a leader rather than the challenges of the crisis you have experienced, currently experiencing or will experience. A different mindset may avert the crisis entirely or minimise its impact on your organisation.

Dealing With the Situation

To turn your crisis into an opportunity, it is important that you consider incorporating a different mindset. This is the place where you may need to work with an executive coach who will explore the intricacies of these with you and hold you accountable to the changes and the implementation of your action plans. If I were to work with you, as an executive coach, one of the preliminary inputs I would suggest you consider adding to or activating in your portfolio of mindsets, if it is not there or activated yet, would be the ‘what if…’ mindset.

This mindset is anticipatory of changes and possible solutions before the changes occur. It is a proactive mindset and will produce a compelling need for you to maintain or even improve the level of your operational efficiency and at the same time, invest some resources into thinking, planning and developing the strategic capabilities of your organisation. These strategic capabilities will then accommodate unexpected changes in your organisation and make them less severe if they occur because you have given it a serious thought and developed probable solutions prior to their occurrence. Your approach in the event of a crisis will then be to assess the situation and its likely impact and duration in the light of the pre-planned framework for possible adjustments in the functioning of your organisation. You will then be in a good position to focus on the cost-benefit analysis and engage with it from an informed position rather than from a point of fear, overwhelm and uncertainty. This approach will enable you to find opportunities in an otherwise threatening situation.

UK Recession: Is Executive Coaching the Way Out?

Mon, 07 Nov 2022 15:47:48 GMT

Following recent reports from major print and digital news media like Reuters, Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, BBC, Sky, CNN, etc, the UK economy is on the edge of recession. Some of them even claim that the UK is already in recession. The Financial Times of November 3, was very direct when it reported that ‘the BOE’s [Bank of England’s] 0.75 percentage point increase to 3 percent took interest rates to their highest point since 2008.’ It further added that ‘even if interest rates stay on hold at 3 percent, the BOE still forecasts a recession for five quarters, based on higher energy prices and mortgage costs.’ This means that the recession is likely to remain with us till the first quarter of 2024 at the least, following the BOE’s forecast. The question then is, what does this mean for leaders in all sectors of the UK economy and how can executive coaching intervention help leaders and organisations to wade through this wave of recession that has now become a reality?

Recessions compel leaders and organisations to adopt the usual cost cutting measures like, laying off staff, minimising or suspending capital expenditures, renegotiating terms with suppliers, putting new investments on hold, etc. These short-term strategies are designed to buffer the immediate effect of the recession, which on their face value are good measures but there is corporate existence after recession. Going by previous recessions, many leaders seem to focus entirely on the survival of their organisations during recessions but could there be other ways apart from survival strategies to ensure that organisations thrive after recession? There are pertinent questions that must be addressed as the short-term measures are being put in place. For example, would leaders be able to hold in tension, the short-term decisions of organisational survival and strategic decisions of organisational growth and productivity? Yes, growth in a period of general economic decline and less consumer demand is possible! In the survival strategies, how would the core staff members be motivated enough to shoulder increased responsibilities as a result of layoff of their colleagues, and still maintain their mental health? The panic that results from the effects of recession on organisations can sometimes lead to actions that sabotage organisations’ performance, productive and progress.

The good news here is that, contrary to general expectations, recession is not all about bad news of shrinking GDP, price increases, lowering of production of goods and services etc. The impact recession has on an organisation is dependent on the measures or lack of measures that are put in place as it is becoming evident that recession is here with us. It needs to be borne in mind that recession does not affect every organisation in the same way. While some decline, others thrive in recession and the question is why? What do the organisations that thrive in recession do or avoid doing that others that decline are not aware of? While the leaders that panic and take short term decisions and actions at the expense of strategic decisions often get adversely affected, the leaders that do what sometimes appears counter intuitive, take advantage of the opportunities that recession creates. During this recession, that is likely to be more than a year-long in duration, if the forecast of Bank of England is correct, leaders that are creative and innovative with their decision making, those that focus on holistic thinking, will be well positioned to take advantage of great opportunities in the recession. For such leaders, one of the major things to focus on at this time is leadership development. This is where executive coaching comes in. Executive coaching has been shown to be a very effective leadership development intervention in and out of recession. The leaders who do not engage with executive coaching may not have familiarised themselves with the benefits that personal experience and research have validated as being incredibly useful to leaders and their organisations in times like this. These benefits include:

• Enhanced performance in relation to direct reports. Leaders who engage in executive coaching not only experience higher and better performance themselves, they engage better with those they line manage.

• Executive coaching challenges leaders to think creatively as ‘desperate situations demand desperate measures.’ In times of recession, leaders would need to enlarge their capacity by engaging with ‘external brains,’ that is, executive coaches that are not in the situation with them so that they can bring in fresh perspectives to activate the minds of the leader and collaboratively create new ideas and new outcomes for the organisation.

• Executive coaching enhances the influence and authority of the leaders who carry their teams or organisations into creative solutions at a faster pace, sometimes through unorthodox ways, to keep their organisations afloat and progressing during this period of economic downturn. Whatever format, sounding board, challenger, professional mirror, facilitator, etc, the executive coach helps the leader prioritise competing demands.

• Executive coaching is a cost effective intervention that returns huge ROI and delivers on specific strategic objectives. The return on investment is quantifiable and easily assessed to determine its contribution to the development of the organisation.

• It brings about the development of a coaching culture within the organisation. The purpose of this is to create more leaders, not followers. In the coaching culture, things get done because every leader is taking initiatives towards the realisation of the organisation’s vision even in precarious times.

• Leaders are assured of high confidentiality and personal attention on complex matters during this crisis period. The leader’s confidential matters are sealed and help give the organisation, a competitive advantage in normal as well as in crisis times.

I can go on listing all the benefits of executive coaching for leaders and organisations, many of which you already know or have benefitted from. The important thing, however, is that from experience, it is better to start working with an executive coach who can think creatively and innovatively with you to put the necessary strategies in place before the wave of recession gets to your organisation.

Is this helpful?

Dr Chuma Osuchukwu is an experienced Executive Coach. He is a former diplomat and the CEO of Apex Leadership Consult, London. He can be reached on Drchuma@apexleadershipcentre.ac.uk. Want to know more about Dr Chuma, read here .

Do Leaders Really Need Executive Coaching?

Tue, 04 Oct 2022 17:49:52 GMT

A Case For Self Discovery and Higher Performance

A leader asked me this question one week ago and we had a long discussion on this. I then decided to write this article to express my views on this question to as many leaders as possible who may be asking themselves this same question. Hope you find this one minute read, worth your time.

A Leader’s Perspective

“I never cease to be amazed at the power of the coaching process to draw out the skllls or talent that was previously hidden within an individual, and which invariably finds a way to solve a problem previously thought unsolvable.” – John Russell, Managing Director, Harley-Davidson Europe Ltd.

Credible Media Perspectives

Executive coaching is like the proverbial taste of the pudding resting in its eating. Some executives might be wondering (especially in the United Kingdom, where coaching is just picking up pace as opposed to the United States where the value of coaching is well known), why they should invest in executive coaching. This line of reasoning comes because some of the leaders got to where they are currently without the help of coaches. Consider for a moment these three remarks from Business Wire, Harvard Business Review and Fortune.

Business Wire put it this way:

“The Business demand for coaching is nearly doubling each year. Out of the $80 billion being currently spent on corporate education, FLI Research estimates that $2 billion is spent on executive coaching at senior executive levels in Fortune 500 companies.”

Prior to the Business Wire report, the Harvard Business Review had written this:

“Many of the world’s most admired corporations, from GE to Gold Sachs, invest in coaching. Annual spending on coaching in the US is estimated at roughly $1 billion Dollars.”

Fortune , then brought in the statistics:

“In a recent study, training alone improved leadership skills by 22%. When combined with Executive Coaching, improvement jumps to 77%.”

Why Executive Coaching?

Getting to the top of a leader’s career is an incredible feat but remaining at the top very challenging. Pushing to the top is a goal that requires laser focused determination, and a good number of senior leaders would attest to a certain sense of emptiness or confusion that shows up, albeit, temporarily, as soon as they get to the top of their careers. The question that often envelops the mind of some leaders as soon as the goal of getting to the top is achieved, is, so what’s next? This can be an agonising experience that can linger for days, weeks, months or even years in the mind of a leader. That question is so powerful that it could keep some leaders awake at night because it creates an uncomfortable feeling and a certain sense of emptiness around the leader. The reason for this is obvious. The leader is trying hard to draw from his/her past experiences to make sense of the new challenges that are confronting them. Paradoxically, this sense of not knowing is one of the most productive feelings for a leader to have because it creates discomfort and attempts at resolving this discomfort gives birth to creativity.

Experiential Leadership and Executive Coaching

From experience, many leaders can attest to times in their careers, where things or processes that were once effective, no longer works. This means that what took you to where you are currently, may not be able to keep you there. This is the dilemma of leadership but a great place be in order to re-calibrate for the next intentional and deliberate move. An executive may choose to stay there until he/she figures out how to procced or enlist the services of an executive coach to serve as a facilitator or a midwife to help the leader give birth to the greatness within. Leaders who want to let go of some of their old assumptions and presumptions in order to embrace new ways of thinking and performing have a need for executive coaching. This is because a competent executive coach will take you to where you may not be able to take yourself to. This is not because the coach knows more than you but because he/she understands how to get you to access your internal resources. The role of the coach is to help you to learn not to teach. Executive coaches do not teach, they facilitate. They are your special aides enroute to a greater you.

You may be a great leader, but to maximize your capabilities, you must become a learning leader.

A competent executive coach is aware that the abilities and skills you have relied on to get to where you are is only the tip of the iceberg. The coach knows that you have reservoirs of abilities that you have not yet accessed and may not be able to tap into them on your own. The job of the executive coach, therefore, is to focus on your potentials to draw them out and power your performance. A competent executive coach is a skilful user of questions to stir and help you discover your unexpressed abilities.

You Get What You Chose.

The Power is in your hands to choose what you want to get out of an executive coaching experience. It is important to determine from the outset in your contractual terms with your coach what you would like to get out of your coaching experience. Doing that would enhance clarity for you and your coach. It is important to define clearly the approach you want the coach to adopt. Are you looking for typical coaching processes, a sounding board/sparing partner, advice or mixed approaches (integrative approach)? This will position your coach to focus on the direction you are willing to go or the direction you are not willing to go but need to go in order to achieve your desired outcomes. The choice is yours and the benefits of your coaching experience, that of your organisation and those you lead.

Is this helpful?

Dr Chuma Osuchukwu is a Business and Executive Coach. He is a former diplomat and the CEO of Apex Leadership Consult, London. He can be reached on Drchuma@apexleadershipcentre.ac.uk. Want to know more about Dr Chuma, read here.

Challenges for CEOs Hired From Outside The Organisation

Mon, 05 Sep 2022 15:37:34 GMT

Secrets of Thriving Within 100 Days in Office

Having explored some of the challenges a Chief Executive Officer promoted from within the organisation could face in the last post, we now turn our attention to the Chief Executive Officer who has been hired from outside an organisation and the likely challenges those undertaking the role could face in carrying out their responsibilities.

Some of the challenges we identified with the CEO promoted from within, may still be applicable to the CEO who is coming from outside of the organisation. However, there are some unique challenges that the CEO coming from outside should be aware of and the need to mitigate them. We will highlight these unique challenges here in today’s post.

You don’t know what you don’t know until you know what you should know. Leaders can only function consistently with the knowledge they have. As a leader coming from outside of the organisation, you are the new ‘kid on the block.’ Every other person in the organisation knows the system well and may have settled into it except you. So, you are coming into a system with a number of blind spots. Quality information gathering is, therefore, very crucial for you at this early stage of your engagement.

As a newly hired CEO, you might discover that:

• the culture of your new organisation differs radically from what you were used to elsewhere. This compels you to learn at a very fast rate how this culture works and what you need to do with it. You may wish to go with it, moderate aspects of it or change it entirely. No one reserves any time for you to learn before delivering results expected from you. This is a huge challenge.

• different pressure groups within the organisation would be scrambling to connect with you at the earliest possible time of your engagement with their ‘goodwill messages’ and perhaps, their ‘hidden’ agenda. Knowing where to ‘pitch’ yourself or who to rely on at this critical stage of your tenure can be quite challenging. It could set your tenure on the right course or create a bumpy ride for you. Evaluating the various voices, you hear and coming up with your unique ways of doing things can also be a challenge. An independent voice is useful at this point to help you think through issues and reflect on the various things that are happening at the same time.

• you may be confronted with internal stakeholders who would want you to run the organisation in line with the system they are used to. Doing the contrary could produce passive resistance which you must find a way to resolve or overcome.

• you would be juggling the expectations and interests of major external stakeholders

• everyone is eager to hear your vision for the organisation. At what point do you unveil your vision for the organisation?

Have you had the time to study the peculiarities of the current vision and why there should be a change of direction?

• You may need to adjust your executive presence to have a strategic fit with the organisation you are now in.

• your board members have different ideas of how things should work in your organisation. How do you deal with that? You need an effective board to be successful in your tenure. So how do you do proceed with these challenges if you encounter any of them or even all of them?

An external executive coach, who has the qualifications and the experiential knowledge of what you are experiencing would be a good ally to work your way through this crucial period of your engagement with a new organisation. The executive coach will create the enabling environment for you, explore things with you, challenge you and help you to think and reflect at a very deep level on these leadership existential issues. The coach is there to offer you an honest, objective platform to view the complexities of your role and explore the various components of your leadership matrix. An external executive coach is a trusted ally who you can rely on to explore and evaluate your thoughts and ideas with a view to collaboratively develop and achieve your desired outcomes.

These are challenges no doubt, but often times, they are not as daunting as they appear at first glance when you have the right resources.

If you would like practical help on this or on related issues in your organisation, I will be happy to help.

Dr. Chuma Osuchukwu is a former diplomat, a business and executive coach, Leadership and Management consultant, an academic and the author of the best selling book ‘The Learning Leader and the 5 Perspectives of Change Leadership' (2nd edition). He is a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, Fellow of the Institute of Leadership, Fellow of the Institute of Management Consultants, etc. He is the CEO of Apex Leadership Consult, a coaching and mentoring organisation. He can be contacted through Drchuma@apexleadershipcentre.co.uk

Challenges for CEOs promoted from Within the Organisation

Tue, 30 Aug 2022 22:24:36 GMT

The role of a Chief Executive Officer is desirable and prestigious.

Now that you have assumed that role, what’s next?

When the euphoria of the appointment wanes, the prospect of the enormous responsibility that rests squarely on your shoulders and the need to confront them can be terrifying. This fear seems to be present in some CEOs and not in others for people who have been promoted from within because of the following challenges that could confront them:

In the role of an in-house CEO, you might discover that you could:

• manage outgoing CEO and interests.

• manage former peers and perhaps senior colleagues and the challenges that could come up as different kind of relationship develops

• manage change resistors to win them over to your side

• manage those who wanted the position you got and the challenge of harmonising their own visions with yours and incorporating them into your team

• manage the interests and agendas of those that helped you to get the role

• manage sponsors and mentors whose interests may be different from the direction you want to go.

• manage the expectations and interests of major external stakeholders

• create clear and compelling vision and KPIs that are able to get detractors to buy-into them for traction

• manage primary stakeholders to gain, sustain or improve performance

• establish executive presence which could differ from your former persona

• have a paradigm shift from personal, departmental interests to organisational interests as primary focus.

• struggle to establish credibility with a unique signature within 100 days in office through new programmes and policies

• discover that the implementation of the programmes you relied on to get the job could be more difficult than you anticipated

• be disagreeing with your board members and senior management team because they disagree with the direction you wish to go or your pace if you decide to change the status quo, etc.

Being the repository of different expectations and hopes of everyone in your organisation, which could be conflicting sometimes, could make you feel like those expectations and hopes are beyond your control. You could feel that those expectations and hopes are unrealistic and cannot be met. Unless you manage these expectations well, they could lead to disillusionment soon after your takeover of the helm of affairs in your organisation. This is what creates the trepidation for some CEOs and this is where an external executive coach can be useful to you. The coach is there to offer you an honest, objective pair of lenses to view the complexities and explore the various components in your leadership matrix. Often times, these are not as daunting as they appear at first glance. Someone who you can explore the thoughts and ideas in your mind and who will be able to provide that safe environment for exploration towards desired outcomes, is a crucial asset you need at this time.

Dr. Chuma Osuchukwu is a former diplomat, a business and executive coach, Leadership and Management consultant, an academic and the author of the best selling book ‘The Learning Leader and the 5 Perspectives of Change Leadership' (2nd edition). He is the CEO of Apex Leadership Consult, a coaching and mentoring organisation. He can be contacted through Drchuma@apexleadershipcentre.co.uk

Financial Performance Index

Mon, 01 Aug 2022 15:35:06 GMT

The Critical Success Factor in Business Part 1

How well is your business doing? This is not a cliché.

I would like you to think about it before you respond to my question. This is because 57.4% of small and medium sized businesses fail every year because their owners overlooked 4 main areas of their businesses. I will discuss these four areas in turns and in different posts. The bit I will focus on today is the Financial performance index.

I am Dr Chuma Osuchukwu, a transformational business coach. I have helped over 70 businesses in the last year alone to avoid the pitfalls that many businesses fall into. I have been the CEO of Apex Leadership Consult since 2006 and have consulted for hundreds of small and medium sized businesses since then. I have also been a senior academic, teaching in and leading business programmes in various UK universities over the years. I am currently an external examiner to two top UK university business schools.

The financial performance of a business and its role in meeting the interests of its stakeholders is easy to see. When we speak of financial performance index, we are referring to the measure of your business performance deduced from the financial information your business generates.

'What you cannot measure, you cannot improve' is a popular saying in business. It is applicable more in the financial side of your business than in any other area. Due to its quantitative nature, your financial side of business is easy to read and understand. You can tell how well your business is doing based on your business' financial ratios among other things.

Through the outcomes of your financial ratios you can see where your business is in relation to your short term obligations, its ability to generate revenue and the profitability of your individual item sales. It is also useful for you to compare your business position with your competitors and your industry standards.

All financial ratios are important, but I will recommend that you keep an eye on the following areas; operating efficiency (cost control), solvency (meeting your debt obligations on ongoing basis), liquidity (easy conversion of assets to cash to meet debt obligations) and profitability (net margin).

The following financial tools are useful if you wish to use them in your business: ratio analysis, comparative financial statements, common size statement and Benchmarking analysis.

Did you find this helpful.

If you would like practical help in your business, book a free strategy session today https://calendly.com/plans-and-packages/15min and we will respond to your needs.

info@apexleadershipcentre or call +44(0)800 689 5717 (free toll).

Where are You on Your Customer Satisfaction Barometer?

Wed, 22 Jun 2022 11:57:56 GMT

My first article on the four cardinal points every business should pay close attention to if it's goal is to succeed is Financial Performance Index. Today, I am focusing on the second area which is customer satisfaction.

There is no business until the first customer buys from you. There is no sustainable business until you have repeat patronage. There is no repeat patronage until you have a satisfied customer. What then is customer satisfaction?

I am Dr Chuma Osuchukwu, a transformational business coach. I have helped over 70 businesses in the last year alone to avoid the pitfalls that many businesses fall into and have, therefore, helped to improve their efficiency, performance and profitability. I have been the CEO of Apex Leadership Consult since 2006 and have consulted, coached and mentored hundreds of small and medium sized businesses since then. I have also been a senior academic, teaching in and leading many business programmes in five UK universities for 19 years. I am currently an external examiner to two top UK university business schools.

Customer satisfaction is simply an evaluation of what your customers think of you and your services. For want of space, I will just highlight few things for you to think about on this topic.

Your customer has expectations. They are not blanks who are happy with anything you present to them. We all know that the days of monopolistic market are on their last leg. For every service or product you provide, millions of other businesses also provide them. It is, therefore, important to keep in mind that while your customers make rational decisions in buying your products or services, they also pull in their emotions in those decisions. They will judge your products and services on three levels. First, the quality of the products and services. Second, implicit comparison of your service quality with perceived value (read my previous article on perceived and real value). Third, on the quality of your competitors' offerings.

The satisfaction of your customers begin or end with the purchase of your products or services. Post-purchase affective behaviours kick in as soon as they buy from you. They range from positive indifference (satisfaction), through delight, negative indifference (acceptance), to dissatisfaction. These affective behaviours will lead to compliments or complaints. Satisfaction governs loyalty and loyalty propels performance. Where there is no repeat patronage, there is no loyalty.

Your main goal as a business is to achieve positive disconfirmation (better than expected) rather than negative disconfirmation (worse than expected) outcomes for your customers. There are a number of ways to ensure this as well as measure the level of your customer satisfaction. We are happy to help if you need help with this.

Did you find this article useful?

Book a 'Fit for Purpose' Strategy session https://calendly.com/plans-and-packages/15min

Email:info@apexleadershipcentre.co.uk

Tel: 0800 689 5717

The Starting Point In Diagnosing Your Underperforming Business.

Mon, 20 Jun 2022 09:49:53 GMT

When your business is underperforming, chances are that you may think that your employees are responsible because they are not meeting their targets, could be. You may think that it could be because your business needs more capital, maybe. You may think that there is something wrong with your suppliers, could be. You may think that your clients/customers are useless, maybe. You might be thinking that it could be your systems or lack of systems, maybe but is it? Read more: https://www.apexleadershipcentre.co.uk/blog

Let me summarise a story book I read to my son, many years ago when he was in the primary school to illustrate my point here. A man was sleeping on his chair in his living room, when his ‘mischievous’ grandson came back from school. The little boy who loved to play with his grandad, rubbed a piece of cheese on his granddad's moustache and went away. When the old man woke up from his sleep, he smelt something nasty and was wondering where the foul odour was coming from. He left his living room and went into his kitchen to get a bit of fresh air but the kitchen had the same smell. All his rooms he went into smelt the same way.

He then decided to go outside to have some fresh air. To his utter surprise and disappointment, his garden was still smelling the same and in desperation, he screamed that the whole world stunk. It is probably clear to you by now where the problem was. Your business is like that.

Your business is a reflection of you. Everything in your business takes a cue from you. The first question then for you is ‘how am I doing?’ If you can put yourself right, it will be a lot easier to fix your other business problems. How much work have you done on yourself in the last six months of this year? Think about it. The most difficult part in diagnosing and fixing your business problems is fixing yourself. It is a hard task. Often business owners and leaders rely on the SWOT analysis which is a useful tool but does it really take care of your unconscious incompetence side of you? The good thing here is that you do not have to do it alone, and on your own. You live behind your face so without a mirror you cannot see how your face looks. This is one of the reasons why business coaches exist. If you would like some help with working on yourself or working on your business for optimum performance, I am happy to help. Did you find this helpful?

Book a 'Fit for Purpose' Strategy session https://calendly.com/plans-and-packages/15min

Email:info@apexleadershipcentre.co.uk

Tel: 0800 689 5717

Perceived Vs Real Value

Sun, 12 Jun 2022 08:59:22 GMT

Have you ever gone into a shop to buy a bottle of water, saw the price on it, picked it up, looked it over, and put it back? Did it ever occur to you that you just made a far-reaching decision about that product that will affect that shop, and the producer of that bottled water?

I am Dr Chuma Osuchukwu, a transformational business coach. I have helped over 70 businesses in the last year alone to avoid the pitfalls that many businesses fall into. I have been the CEO of Apex Leadership Consult since 2006 and have consulted, coached and mentored hundreds of small and medium sized businesses since then. I have also been a senior academic, teaching in and leading many business programmes in various UK universities for 19 years now. I am currently an external examiner to two top UK university business schools.

To the producer of that bottled water you kept back on the shelf, the price on that bottled water is what it cost the business to produce that bottled water plus the profit margin. This is known as the REAL VALUE of that bottled water. This is simplified for understanding purposes. There are different kinds of costings but we are not going into that here. For the shop owner, that price on the bottled water is, for illustration purposes, a combination of his/her buying price plus the profit margin. So far, that is the headache of the producer and the shop owner. What concerns you, here is that the producer and the retailer are hoping that you will buy that bottled water at the price you saw on it. This is where your decision is very important to them.

But here is the problem for the producer and the shop owner. You, as the consumer, do not care about the real value of that product. You will buy or not buy that bottled water based on what is known as the PERCEIVED VALUE. The perceived value is what you think that the bottled water is WORTH to YOU. As you are looking at that bottled water, you are cognitively assessing the value of that bottled water in relation to the price on it, as well as the money you wish to spend on it.

If the perceived value is less than the real value to you, you will simply walk away from that water. If, on the other hand, the perceived value matches the real value, you will buy the water all things remaining equal. The third scenario is what happens when your perceived value is higher than the real value. If that happens, you immediately think that you have a real bargain and that could make you to buy more of that product than originally intended. Do you remember going into a shop and seeing discounted products? Sometimes, you end up buying more than you intended and turning your house into a refuge bin for the shop for those products you could not use before they got spoilt ��. This principle applies to the bottled water as well as buying a car or a house or anything for that matter.

The obvious goal of the business owner is to present to the prospective buyer, as much value and benefits, as they can to raise their perceived value of the product or service on offer. Reiterating, your customers do not buy your product or service at its real value, they buy at their perceived value.

Your target as a businessperson, then, is to create products or services and present their values in ways that the prospective buyers' perceived value will either equal their real value or exceed it. For businesses that understand this simple business psychology, they take time in highlighting the benefits their products will offer you, on their product packaging.

Is this useful to you?

Book a free 15 minutes 'fit for purpose' strategy session if you would like some practical help in your business: https://calendly.com/plans-and-packages/15min

info@apexleadershipcentre or call +44(0)800 689 5717 (free toll).

The #1 Key to Your High Sales Figures

Sat, 04 Jun 2022 15:51:07 GMT

If someone should ask you this simple question; what are you offering to your clients/customers? Would your response be like the various ones I have heard over time. Many have said something like, I offer my customers, cars, clothing, shoes, food, electrical products, stationeries, properties, etc. The responses businesses give to this question is often collaborated in their marketing copies.

When a product or service is not properly defined and communicated consistently through marketing messages, that product or service is likely to struggle in gaining traction in the marketplace. This is because you are leaving your customers/clients to figure out what to do with what you are offering them. Few clients/customers have the time to do that.

I started working as a business mentor to this particular client in December last year. Here’s what he said to me in our first meeting; ‘Dr Chuma, my staff and I work very hard and we have a high quality product but I don’t understand why we are not meeting our sales targets. From your experience working with other businesses, could it be a reflection of the general economic climate following COVID?’ I paused for a while, studying his worried disposition, and then asked him my usual question. James (not his real name), what do you offer to your customers? He explained in great details the product the company offers to its customers. I was impressed with the attention to details in the production of this high quality, high value product, which ordinarily should not be difficult to sell. Then I asked to see the company’s marketing copy. When I looked at those documents, it became obvious what the problem was. ‘James, I said, people don’t buy products and services, they buy the benefits, those products and services provide to them.’ James and his team took action and made the necessary adjustments. I am happy to report that not only did James’ business exceed its profit projection in the first quarter of this year, the profit margin is 37% higher when compared to the same time period last year. Little actions can make a huge difference in business!

Here’s an example of what I mean. You can write the best book on earth for all you care, but unless you show the buyer what that book you are selling can do for him/her, you are not likely to make much of a sale. No one is going to buy it, expect maybe, family and friends who feel sorry for you and want to encourage you .

The critical question you should ask yourself is, what benefits am I providing to the buyers of this book or my product/service? Is the book, for example, offering them a solution to their lack of consistency that sabotages everything they do? Is the book or your product giving them the solution to improve their negotiation skills to enable them close better business deals? Is the book or your product creating a step by step process on how to gain confidence in their ability to attend interviews and get those jobs? The benefits your product or service provides, are what your marketing messages should highlight. Is the car you are selling creating comfort or luxury to your customers? Is it creating or enhancing their social status? Do you get the point?

I should insert a little caveat here to say that this is not the only thing that gains you traction but a key thing to look into in your business if your goal is to increase sales in your business.

Now over to you. Take a second look at your business and the products or services you offer to your customers.

Dr Chuma Osuchukwu is a Transformational Business Coach and the CEO of Apex Leadership Consult, Contact: +44(0)800 689 5717. Email: info@apexleadershipcentre.co.uk; Web:www.apexleadershipcentre.co.uk

What Does Life Coaching Really Mean?

Thu, 30 Dec 2021 23:56:57 GMT

What has life Coaching got to do with drawn carriages?

What has life Coaching got to do with drawn carriages?

It is obvious that 'Life coaching' is a composite word; life and coaching. Zoe is a Greek word meaning among other things ‘life’, in English. Life, itself, is an existential term that describes the capacity of animate beings to function, grow, develop, reproduce, interact with their environments and respond to change prior to death.

The word coach, on the other hand, started gaining prominence around the 1500’s showing up in different languages like the French ‘coche’ and the German ‘kotsche.’ According to Oxford English Dictionary, (1989) the Hungarian ‘kocsi’ which translates to ‘carriage of Kocs’ is said to have been the origin of that word and that it was derived from the name of the village that produced carriages in Hungary. From these various roots of the words, ‘life’ and ‘coach’, a couple of things appear self-evident. These various renditions of this word ‘coach’ may not hold much meaning to non-native speakers of these languages until we draw in the Greek ‘proponitis’ which literally means trainer or instructor in English. When taken collectively, a number of things fall into place.

First, the word ‘carriage’ from Hungary is designed to convey a container that carries things and/or people. Second every carriage travels in a given direction to deliver its content. Third, carriages require some kind of force to pull or push it in the direction it should go. Horses and other kinds of animals are often used for this purpose. Fourth, both the carriage, its contents and the animal pulling or pushing it requires intentional guidance. I will refer to this intentional guide as the instructor, trainer or coach, who must be familiar with the destination and the means to guide the carriage to its destination to deliver its contents.

With the above picture in mind, we can appreciate the merging of these two different but integrated concepts of life and coaching. To contextualise this phrase ‘life coaching,’ that is often used in the helping profession, we can then understand it as a process of guiding or working with people on how to get to their desired predetermined destinations (goals) using tried and tested platforms in the form of strategies, models, methods and tools.

Missing Link In Life Coaching

For the purpose of illustration only, think of a carriage as an individual loaded with gifts and talents but requires a bit of help and guidance to get to its destination and unleash the treasures within it. From professional and personal experience, I have seen and worked with many individuals whose missing link is not the gift, talent, drive or goal setting but purpose. Purpose is the knowledge of, and an intentional pursuit of a given goal. It does not only link life and coaching together, it creates direction for both the coach and the coachee (individual being coached). It is the skill of helping people become a better version of themselves.

A life without a purpose, is like a ship on the high sea without a compass and a navigational wheel. The definition of frustration is being the captain of this ship that has motion but no real movement and hoping that it will take you to a predetermined destination called ‘success.’ I have encountered a good number of well-meaning people who live their lives without purpose and are enthusiastic in their hope for successful outcomes in their endeavours. A purpose driven life measured in mini goal achievements creates a measurable advancement in life pursuits as well as a sense of accomplishments. It may, however, sound paradoxical to say that having a purpose is not enough to achieve the success you need in the different areas of your life. The reason for the preceding statement is because some people have a purpose, they know that purpose but do not know how to accomplish it. Having a purpose is a good place to be but that purpose must be worked on for it is to be realised.

Choosing Life Coaches

Those who work with people helping them to achieve their goals of becoming who they wish to become in life are referred to as life coaches. They work from both experiential perspectives and trainings. They are therefore in a position to impact transferable skills to those they coach. Like football coaches, who having played football themselves in their younger years, understand the game and having trained as coaches, know how to manage players and bring out the best in them. Football coaches understand how to pull out the gifts of footballers to make them better and impact the skills the footballers need to become better versions of themselves. Similarly, your life experiences, talents, desires and motivations are the raw materials great life coaches work with to empower you to get to where you want to be.

To choose a life coach, therefore, it is important that the pedigree of the coach matches where you want to go. You will need to know what life experiences they have had and what training they have acquired to help you get to where you wish to be.

When Do You Need A Coach?

You need a coach anything you find yourself:

• Creating motion but no real movement. When you are always busy but cannot see any tangible results or achievements from your efforts.

• Making other people wealthy but getting poorer

• Doing good things but not the right things

• Making too many excuses for your lack of achievements

• Being indecisive on your job, business, relationships, etc. You cannot change anything in your life that you tolerate because you lack the courage to confront it. If you hesitate on what is right, you are unlikely to do it.

• Prioritising the needs of others and lacking the time to execute your own needs

• Being comfortable as an average person

• Fearful of your future

• Feeling overwhelmed and not knowing where to start

• Having a big change in your life that you need to work through.

Last Line

As 2021, winds down, it is our opportunity to reflect on what the year has been for each of us. It is a perfect time to see areas where we have sabotaged ourselves by the decisions we took or did not take this year and decide how 2022 would go for us. What would you permit in 2022? What would you ‘will’ into existence and what would you wish to do in 2022 that you have been putting off for the past two years? In the wordings of the James Kelly’s 1721 Scottish proverbs, ‘if wishes were horses, beggars would ride’, it is time to quit the lane of wishes and take the necessary decisions now to make 2022 a better year than 2021. Next year, must begin with intentional purpose and actions. Behind every great leader is a capable coach. Every great athlete has a great coach. Find a coach for yourself and soar like an eagle in the new year. See you on the other side of 2021.

Dr Chuma Osuchukwu is a former diplomat, leadership consultant, lifecoach, author, educator and businessman. He is the CEO of Apex Leadership Consult, one of UK’s leading coaching and mentoring organisations. He has published extensively and one of his widely acclaimed book is entitled ‘The Learning Leader and the 5 Perspectives of Change Leadership’ (2nd Edition). You can contact him at: Drchuma@apexleadershipcentre.co.uk

5 Leadership Insights From COVID 19 Outbreak

Wed, 24 Jun 2020 15:57:16 GMT

5 Leadership Insights From COVID 19 Outbreak

Before the financial crisis of 2008, world leaders watched with apathy as the subprime mortgage market depreciated in the United States in 2007. They watched as the Asian market started collapsing and probably reasoned that the United States being the biggest economy in the world could handle its internal problems. Documentaries were being made to show how investments were being wiped out overnight. The collapse of the Lehman Brothers added to the developing hazard. Little did world leaders realise that what started like a little ripple in the ocean of world affairs in America would ultimately become a tsunami and throw the world into a financial crisis in 2008 threatening human existence on a global level. Lives, properties and investments were lost and the world moved on again.

Fast forward to December 2019, the outbreak of the Coronavirus (COVID 19) was announced in China, the second largest economy. World leadership again, watched with indifference like it did in the American case and now the global effect of that outbreak in China, is threatening human existence on a global scale. The critical questions here are, do world leaders learn from experience? Are there any reflective world leaders at all? Are they reflective enough if there is any reflective leader left to learn from history in order to forestall a repeat of our mistakes or oversights? In 2020, it is C-19, how will our leaders respond to another developing hazard in 2021? What are we learning from the current Coronavirus (COVID 19) that the world health organisation took its time to finally declare the virus outbreak a global pandemic?

The aim of this piece is to highlight 5 glaring lessons the latest global evil, the C-19 has impressed on leaders that hopefully will guide the actions of leaders in the event of future developing hazards.

1. Selfless Interventions

It does appear that leaders of various countries forget that the concept of globalisation is not limited to economic gains only. It’s wider implication is the collapse of national boundaries, meaning that what affects one nation has the propensity to affect all others with time. Though the world is broken up in trading blocks and members of these trading blocks tend to protect only the interests of its members understandably, but they often overlook the bigger picture of fighting off a threat that has the potentials of engulfing the whole simply because, it did not originate within their sphere of influence. Could it also be that in these two cases, the apathy was the lack of political courage to engage and confront the two biggest economies for fear of economic consequences? Problems of global proportion are not about to end with the Coronavirus outbreak but how ready is world leadership to disregard political and economic considerations and collectively nib threats like this in the bud irrespective of its country of origin? This writer is aware of certain limitations imposed by national sovereignty but this is why the United Nations, the security council, chapter VII and article 42 of the UN charter exist if the political will permits. It is the personal conviction of this writer that if global intervention had been activated sooner, this outbreak would most probably have been contained within China. Has any lesson been learnt here?

2. Clear and Compelling Vision

One has observed with great admiration how the fight against C-19 in almost every country where it has made a landing, is being driven by national leadership with the full cooperation of opposition parties. This united front, bellied the usual political rancour of divisive politics between governments and opposition parties at least at the initial stage of the fight. This unity at the top encouraged most citizens of these countries to follow the instructions of the various governments on lockdown policies even when these were uncomfortable for people. The relevant question here is why was there good compliance with governmental policies and instructions? My take is that there was a huge threat to our collective existence and there was confusion everywhere. Again, the led saw the unity at the top and a sincere commitment by leaders to do something that had the interest of the people at heart. This leads one to conclude that leadership that creates a sense of direction in a confused situation will invariably obtain the unquestioned cooperation of the led. This is the leadership that followers or subordinates crave for. Extrapolating this situation, when leaders cast clear, concrete and compelling visions that harbour the interest of the led, followership does not need much persuasion and influencing to go along with those visions. The fights between governments and opposition parties that culminate in wasting of precious national time and resources emanate from parochial visions, visions that do not really touch on the meaningful existence of the people. Do we not think that if our leadership will cast clear and compelling visions that tangibly affect the population, the machineries of government will run smoothly and efficiently and there will be less of opposition in our parliaments?

3. Paradigm Shifts

It was quite heart-warming as well to observe national leaders recognising that their subordinates in other fields of expertise are also leaders in their own right. The war against Covid 19 (WAC) has been led not by politicians but by medical professionals and scientists. This paradigm shift in the thinking of world leaders can only lead to the benefit of all. It is important therefore, that leaders recognise and make this mental shift from being the all knowing who have the answers to every problem to realising that ‘no one has the monopoly of wisdom’. Allowing anyone who has the expertise in any given situation to lead in providing the solution to a problem is the hallmark of matured leadership. That a subordinate leads in a given area does not diminish the main leader in anyway. It is therefore imperative that leaders recognise their limitations and provide that political will for others even from the opposition parties to help solve national problems. This writer’s favourite analogy is that you do not lose the ability to drive a car, if you have learnt how to drive car simply because someone else is giving you a lift in their car. C-19 compelled national leaders to learn this simple lesson of leadership. One hopes that the trend of this situational leadership will continue long after C-19 pandemic is over.

4. Flexibility

Prior to the outbreak of C-19, remote working was considered a privilege for a select few in the corporate world. Who would have thought that everyone can work remotely and be as effective, if not more effective than commuting and seating in the office for 8 or more hours daily? Who would have thought that every university in the world would become online providers of knowledge to their students? The lockdown has taught leadership that there are always more ways than one in achieving a desired outcome. Flexibility is the key to innovation. The overused cliché of thinking out of the box remains effective but this was driven home for all to see, not just leaders but all to see alternative ways of doing things. Can world leaders therefore try and do things differently when the next disease or virus or nuclear disaster is breaking out, irrespective of the country where it is coming from? Can the UN live up to its charters and purpose of existence by rallying its security council members to intervene faster in countries where these threats may be emerging from and neutralise them before they gather enough momentum to threaten the world?

5. Family Time

Due to the huge demands on leaders, often their families take the brunt of it all. ‘It seems normative that leadership success at the professional level spells disaster at the home front.’ History is replete with examples of highly successful leaders at the professional level but who are unmitigated disasters at the home front often leading to broken marriages, dysfunctional family dynamics and emotionally deprived children. Though there have been huge economic implications for the lockdown in different nations of the world, it has on the other hand led to ‘forced’ situations for spouses to be together and iron out their differences and for once have lengthened family time together. This does not in anyway, assume that people staying physically together are emotionally connected. However, C-19 has provided that opportunity for leaders who crave for family time to have a start at mending broken fences, if any. The vital question, however, is, do leaders need a virus outbreak to make time for their families?

Last line : C-19 has been like a mirror that magnified leadership eccentricities rather than creating sometime new. Just before the lockdown is lifted in every nation, it will be a good idea for our national leaders to reflect on the leadership lessons of COVID 19.

I welcome your thoughts on this.

Dr. Chuma Osuchukwu is a former diplomat, a Leadership and Management consultant, an academic and the author of the best selling book ‘The Learning Leader and the 5 Perspectives of Change Leadership' (2nd edition).

4 Keys to Organisational High Performance: The MTTP Model

Wed, 24 Jun 2020 15:53:11 GMT

In this microwave culture of getting what we want within the shortest possible time frame, I often get asked in my conferences and workshops for quick keys that can lift the performance of a struggling organisation. I always offer these four keys I am about to share with you. The caveat, however, is that though these keys can be memorised within a very short time they take a while to implement and obtain the results every leader is looking for. MTTP simply stands for M indset, T eamwork, T echnological Support and P hysical support.

1. Mindset

This write up is on organisational performance but observe that a leader’s mindset is the first key in the matrix of organisational success. The reason is obvious. Where there is no leader there is no organisation. A leader has influence over the functioning of every organisation. Like a steering wheel in a car, though part of many important parts that make up a car, it is mainly instrumental for the direction the car goes. Similarly, a leader, though part of many other people and systems and structures in an organisation, has much influence in the direction an organisation goes.

A combination of the leader’s attitudes, basic assumptions, beliefs, norms, values, visions and other cognitive processes is what is meant by the leader’s mindset (see decision and general systems theories). Many of these cognitive and emotional processes though invisible to the human eyes, but they can easily be seen through the leader’s words, actions and behaviours. As a result of the pivotal place the leader occupies in an organisation, the emotional contagion often flows from the leader to the rest of the people in the organisation. For every leader therefore, it is imperative to recognise that your mindset is one of your greatest assets. Your mindset can be positive or negative. It empowers or dis-empowers those around you. It is important that you are conscious of the fact that your team rides on your energy and drive. Agreed, that often when things are going downhill for you and your organisation it is difficult to maintain that positive mindset that empowers others. It is nevertheless important that you keep that mindset positive even when things are not working out well. One of the ways to achieve this is to have people outside of your organisation who you can detour to and bounce around ideas with and who can see things differently from you because they are not in the pressure cooker with you at the same time.

To a very large extent, your mindset, determines the level of success you achieve in your organisation. A high achieving mindset invariably dictates the direction, the drive and the demands you permit in your leadership.

Success or failure is conceived first in your mind before it is delivered in your organisation. Mindset of success keeps you restless because it is always dreaming of another level. A restless mindset is a learning mind set. This is often referred to as ‘a growth mindset’. Having a restless mindset, means driving for innovation and creativity, pushing the boundaries for results and empowering for achievements individually and teams.

2. Teamwork

No organisation can rise beyond the quality and positioning of its team members. Have you got the right people who are happy to flow in the culture of your organisation? Have you got a team in place that is self-sustaining and self-demanding? Do members of your team challenge themselves and hold each other to account even when, you as the leader, have not placed such demands on them? Who wins, when you win attitude will drive team performance.

You may have good individual members of the team but may have positioned them out of their areas of competence and expertise often for political reasons. In a nutshell, get the right people in the right places within the right culture and you are ready to drive your organisation forward.

3. Technological Support

A great automobile repairer with no tools is as useless as the person with no automobile repair skills in the face of a broken down vehicle on a motor way. Your mindset may be incredibly positive and your team able and willing but if they lack the technological support in this fast-paced environment of change, the organisation will under-perform. Every high performing leader has to invest in technology to give your team members the wings they need to fly.

4. Physical Environment

Environment can keep a motivated team motivated and even more importantly motivate an unmotivated team. It feels great to work in a great environment. It builds and sustains energy. A great environment carries the propensity to keep your team physically and psychologically healthy. A physically healthy team is a productive team. Take care of your health and your body will support your mind and together, your organisation will thrive.

Note that finance is not included in this model here. It is rather implied. Every organisation needs money to function effectively but get the four keys in place and money becomes a great facilitator. In your organisational audit, ask yourself, have we got the right mindset, the right team, the right technology and the right environment to carry our structure, staff, skills and shared values in the organisation?

Do you agree?

Dr Chuma Osuchukwu is an academic and the founder of Apex Centre for High performance Leadership and the author of ‘The Learning Leaders and the 5 Perspectives of Change Leadership’. He can be contacted through info@chumaosuchukwu.org

3 Effective Ways of Leading The Rebels Within the Team

Wed, 24 Jun 2020 15:49:02 GMT

‘That man is a rebel. Honestly, he irritates me, I just can’t stand him. He is always derailing our meetings. I will prefer him not attending any of these meetings at all if I had my way.’ He had hardly closed his office door behind us when he started foaming. He invited me to help resolve the organisation’s malfunctioning team, so I was allowed to sit in one of their team meetings. My client’s anger and frustrations were palpable and I could understand where he was coming from having observed the dynamics within the team on first hand basis.

After what seemed like eternity, he blurted out; ‘How do I get rid of this man from my team since the big boss has refused to fire him?’ With that question, we then settled down to work out the many facets of the team’s problems. What he thought was his main problem was hardly the problem at all.

The exchange I had with this gentleman is a common feature in many team-based organisations. Relationships within a team are both dynamic and complex. Dynamic, because it is constantly changing and complex because they are far from being linear. I have explored part of this complexity in my book ‘The learning leader and the 5 perspectives of change leadership.’

To achieve positive synergic outcomes in leading teams, it is imperative that you, the leader, understand and carefully manage the composition of your team. It is rare to have a complete homogenous team where everyone thinks and acts alike. If you find such a team you will observe that it does not make much progress in the absence of the leader who is often the life and the driving force of such teams. To maximise the assets within your team while allowing diversity of opinions and variegated thinking, here’s 3 effective ways to do that:

1. Make a Paradigm Shift in Your Thinking Orientation

Many team leaders are inclined to think and expect every member of their team to think unitarily. The leader who thinks predominately in a unitary mould expects every team member to share the same goals, aspirations and values within the team. On the face value of this thinking pattern, organisational progress should be exponential and projects completed on schedule. Those who flow with this thinking pattern of the leader are considered loyal and rewarded in some ways for their loyalty. Often when such a team is observed from the outside, it seems to work like a well oiled machine but on closer scrutiny, it is not unusual to detect fear and discontentment within the team. The reason is straightforward; some of the team members are disenfranchised. Team members are to be seen not heard unless you are echoing the sentiments of the leader. The problem with unitary thinking is that it is not only unrealistic but also unsustainable in the long term. It entails control and enforcement of disciplinary measures to bring about compliance. Another downside of this thinking pattern is that it frustrates and discourages creativity and innovation in the team. Rather it encourages and accentuates groupthink behaviour that places huge responsibility on the leader, who must consistently maintain the cohesion of the team. This approach places huge demands on the leader to keep the team functioning. The unitary style of thinking is low level leadership and is often fashionable with leaders who favour dictatorial style of leadership and leaders who are severely handicapped on grounds of knowledge. This style of thinking is therefore a way of compartmentalising complexity into manageable structure. This is the thinking that creates frustrations in dealing with ‘deviants.’

An alternative to unitary thinking is the pluralistic form of thinking. A leader who adopts this thinking style, works with the understanding that people are different and see and think differently from others. The leader is consciously aware that the membership of teams are largely heterogeneous with variegated skills, opinions, expectations and world-views. This calls for the accommodation of other thinking patterns. A leader who operates with this mindset seeks to acquire and consistently update on skills that encourage negotiation, co-operation, coordination and influence sharing. A team with such a leader is a breeding ground for innovations and creativity. It is a team that is idea driven and self – propelling. The leader’s role then becomes the facilitation of the team. Thinking in a pluralistic pattern, however, requires a leader who is self assured and is constantly updating to remain relevant in the team whenever it runs into hitches. A leader who thinks in a pluralistic pattern favours a consultative or democratic form of leadership. This is a higher level of leadership.

2. Meet the ‘Rebels’ Mid-way

Every rebel has a cause. When someone is persistently opposing an idea, that person embodies something different from what is being opposed. A sensitive team leader must go beyond the effect in order to access the cause. The oppositions and indifference you observe in this ‘rebel(s),’ is simply a cry for attention. Agreed, it may be done in an annoying way, but going beyond the behaviour which is merely a symptom to the root cause will not only benefit the entire team, it will improve interpersonal relationships within the team. Often it is beneficial to engage in constructive negotiation with the ‘rebels’ outside of the team, in order to understand the main reason(s) behind the behaviour. Sometimes you will discover that the ideas of the rebels are worth more than all the other team members’ ideas put together. It takes courage to stand alone and therefore worth the trouble of listening to the voice of the ‘dissidents.’ They are worth hearing in many cases and what they have to say may positively influence official policies, values and even the mission of the organisation as a whole.

3. Measure Performance, Not Loyalty

Don’t misunderstand me. Loyalty is desirable in organisations and organisations that genuinely engender loyalty among team members could be a good place to work. However, team members often conform and do what the ‘boss wants’ because they are focused on the rewards of loyalty. If you continue to reward on the basis of loyalty alone, you could be rewarding mediocrity at the expense of high performers. ‘Rebels’ are aware that they are not ‘liked’ very much in the organisation and as a default, they endeavour to perform at levels high enough to stay above board and avoid being ‘picked on’ by the leader. It will therefore be beneficial to reward performance irrespective of who achieves it. Give the ‘rebels’ a chance, they could be what you need to transform your organisation for the better.

Thank you for reading. Please leave your comments, ideas, suggestions or contributions below. What is your own experience and observations? I will love to have your feedback comments on this article. Happy to learn other things not included here.

The 3Es of Getting the Best Out of Supersmart Team Members

Wed, 24 Jun 2020 15:47:21 GMT

The 3Es of Getting the Best Out of Supersmart Team Members

Supersmart people. The eggheads. Chances are that you have seen or been with them. They pop up in families, schools, workplaces, teams, boardrooms etc. They are everywhere you care to look. You are probably one of them. Sometimes, they ‘appear’ disruptive in teams because they ‘seem’ to live in their own world, the rest of us don’t understand. What do you do when you find such people in the team or organisation you are leading? Leaders’ responses to these people vary from a secret desire to be like them, through disrespect, dislike to outright disregard. Agreed, some of them may not have well-developed ‘social skills’ as we know them but many of them are not deliberately ‘rude.’ It’s just the way they are wired. A sizeable number I have encountered think laterally. Lateral thinking means that they have the ability to use their imagination to engage with problems and come up with solutions in new and refreshing ways. I’m not making any excuses for their lack of social skills which of course they can learn if they choose. The challenge however, is that they are more occupied with creative things than societal ‘niceties’. It needs to be acknowledged that their benefits outweigh their costs to any organisation. They require minimal supervision and create high value for any organisation that is able to tap into their brainboxes. The onus is on leaders to devise ways of bringing out the best in these eggheads for organisational optimal performance. May I offer 3 effective ways you can lead such valuable organisational assets?

1. Empower Them

Every team member is different. Adopting the core skill of flexibility in your leadership will guarantee that you treat each member of the team uniquely. For the supersmart in your team, emphasize the ‘what’ and minimize the ‘how.’ Provide the goal which is the ‘what’ for them and leave them to figure out the ‘how’ to achieve it. Spelling out the details of how to get there demotivates and frustrates them and worse still, denies the organisation, the benefits of their creativity and insights into alternative organisational frameworks. Emphasizing the ‘how’ limits them to your own way of thinking which is likely to impair theirs. This approach will deny you and your organisation their best. Leaders who struggle with supersmart people are those who fail to recognise that many of these mavens are eccentric by nature.

2. Encourage Them

I have been privileged to discuss with a number of these unique individuals on personal levels. Often they harbour fears and doubts about themselves and their behaviours. Some of them think that there must be something wrong with them since majority of people do not think like them or understand things they way they do. An effective learning leader will do well to encourage the supersmart in the team to belief in their own abilities and that it is alright to be different. To assist their self belief, their self –esteem, a team leader can deliberately match people that the supersmart are comfortable working with. This feeds back to them that they are not after all that weird. At least some understand where they are coming from.

3. Engage With Them

Leaders need to understand that occupying leadership positions does not necessarily mean that they are smarter than all their subordinates. Often leaders forget this simple fact and assume the disposition of ‘all knowing, all wise, all seeing’ leaders. With that mentality, they feel threatened whenever the supersmart show up. The presence of the supersmart debunks that illusion of being omniscient and their egos are bruised. In this position, leaders often resort to competing with their subordinates. A resort to competition can prove detrimental to organisational well being. A better recourse would be to learn from, rather than oppose the supersmart. With people like that, you learn through probing (see chapter 4 in “The Learning Leader…”). This is the act of using purposive questions as learning tools. I need to emphasize that learning from such persons will not make you a supersmart in their fields but it can help you achieve mastery in your own area of strength. The word is mastery rather than competition. In competition you are focused on the other rather than on yourself but in mastery you focus on yourself and become the best that you can be in your area of strength. Competing with these eggheads within your team is a recipe for frustration, professional jealousy and outright failure. Empowering, encouraging and engaging with them, however, unleashes their ingenuity and the organisation benefits from being a resourceful, innovative and cutting edge establishment. These eggheads are the hub of every organisation and the catalysts for creativity and innovation.

3 Fears Of A Micro-Manager

Wed, 24 Jun 2020 15:45:18 GMT

You have probably been micro managed, micro managed others or observed a micro manager at work. I wonder if you have stepped back from all the buzz about micro managing and tried to understand the psychology behind this approach to staff management. With better understanding, you may be able to develop a cordial working relationship with them or adjust your own approach rather than the resentment and frustrations micro managing creates. It is important to understand that micro managers have good intentions. They want to be high performers, successful, relevant and managers of high performing teams like every other manager. Therefore the problem does not lie with the intention but the expression of that intention. The challenge is in the HOW (the approach) not the WHAT (the task). The micro manager’s expression is often rooted in a transactional framework which suggests that ‘I’m Ok, you are not’. As a result, ‘I have to micro manage you to ensure that you get it right.’ Psychology will underline this form of behaviour as a product of inadequacy, though the variants differ from person to person.

It is important to acknowledge the necessity of micro managing subordinates for a given period of time in some cases. In these peculiar cases, micro managing becomes desirable and beneficial to the manager, subordinate and the organisation as a whole. A case in point is when a member of staff is new to an organisation and his/her specific duties are both technical and sensitive in nature. This write up is not focusing on such micro managing but on managers who habitually micro manage as their default style of staff management.

I have had discussions on formal and informal levels with some of the micro-managers within my sphere of operation. Those discussions inform this write up which is aimed at unveiling some basic underlying assumptions and fears that fuel such micro managing behaviours. The aim is to induce managerial reflection and improve the relationship between the manager and the managed for enhanced performance in organisations. I need to add that I have the permission of some of my close associates to share these observations on grounds of anonymity. The identified fears and assumptions underpinning micro managing behaviours among senior managers include the following:

Fear of Failure

The micro manager is terrified with the prospect of failing in any project. Understandably, no manager is happy to fail in projects but the meanings different managers attach to failed or failing projects differ and therefore affect the way they relate to members of their team. For the micro manager, there is a deep rooted belief that failure is synonymous with incompetence and inefficiency. The overarching assumption of micro-managing therefore, is encapsulated in the saviour mentality; ‘if I am not closely involved in handling this project, it will fail.’ The effect of this fear is that subordinates buy into it as well and that stifles every form of creativity and innovation in the team. Team members are indirectly discouraged from trying out new things or approaching issues from new perspectives other than the tried and tested methods. This process consigns the organisation to one person’s line of thinking. The staff get dissatisfied, de-motivated, hoard initiatives and wait for the micro manager to give orders before anything can be done. The irony in all of this is that the micro manager is more frustrated than any other person in the team because goals are hardly met without him/her bearing the bulk of the pressure. One micro manager blurted out in frustration as I sat with him in his office; ‘ I have no idea what else to do with these bunch of staff I have here who will never engage with anything except I hold them by the hands like kindergarten children. Nothing ever gets done if I am not involved. They are driving me mad.’ He had hardly finished the sentence when one of his staff walked in to ask for guidance on what, I thought was a very simple process and needed nothing more than common sense. He stared at me for what looked like eternity, after the young man had left his office, as if to say ‘what did I tell you?

Fear of Criticism

A follow on from the above fear of failure is the fear of criticisms. This fear is induced and sustained by the ever present imagination of the worst case scenarios of fatal losses and associated streams of criticisms. Many micro managers I have come across, detest any form of criticism. They feel attacked when any critical remarks are made on their performance. When a micro manager is sensitive and touchy on a personal level, this often translates into work environments. Due to this fear of criticism, the micro manager becomes a hands-on and regimental manager. Consequently, poor decisions are made because the manager is constantly under pressure. Staff engagement is low keyed and even when it is apparent that a wrong instruction has been passed down, team members are reluctant to point that out for obvious reasons. In such organisations the labour turnover is high. In the subsequent discussions I had with the gentleman referred to above, I pointed out to him that this fear of criticism informed the action of the young man who came in to ask for guidance on a very simple matter. The action of the young man was predicated on avoidance of criticism if anything should go wrong. Fear of criticism hinders improvement and impairs confidence in decision making.

Fear of replacement

Some micro managers are afraid of being replaced by their subordinates. They feel insecure in their thoughts that top management could do without them if their subordinates can function effectively without their direct involvement in tasks under their supervision. Micro managing therefore becomes an insurance policy for job security for such managers. The ones who entertain this sort of fear often claim credit for achievements or ideas generated by subordinates and are quick to make scape-goats of their subordinates when things go awry. The whole idea is to make them look good and efficient in position. The problem with this level of fear is that it slowly and gradually permeates and erodes the whole organisation inducing stiffness in the organisational culture. Micro managers gripped by this kind of fear hardly go on annual leave or any form of protracted leave of absence. By avoiding leaving their posts for a considerable length of time, they seek to create the impression that they are hard working managers but the primary driving force is the fear of replacement by more competent persons. In addition to the negative consequences highlighted above for the micro manager, subordinates and the organisation, perhaps the most damaging effect of micro managing is the atmosphere of mistrust that pervades the organisation.

Outcome

Some micro managers I have interacted with, say the right things to their subordinates but their behaviours contrast sharply with their words, leaving their subordinates confused and suspicious of their intentions. As mentioned earlier, the underlying assumption of these managers is that ‘people cannot be trusted to do their work except they are closely monitored’. The McGregor’s theory of X, you would say. In actual fact, it is more of the insecurities of the managers than of those of the subordinates that create the mistrust in the organisation. I recently worked with this fine gentleman who realised the need to let go of micro managing because it was leading him to nervous breakdown. He became aware that he was losing on a personal level more than he was gaining with this approach. I also pointed out to him how the organisation was losing as well. When I set up the system that clearly empowered his subordinates with commensurate authority to function, he was able to see how unnecessary his micro managing behaviour had been. He claimed that he felt more relaxed and saw a dramatic increase in productivity and wondered why he hung on for so long with such debilitating fears. There is so much to learn and gain from your subordinates when you empower them with the right approach to staff management.