For many people 2020 was one of the worst years of their lives. More than 1.5 million died of a disease that few took seriously in the first few weeks. Millions of people lost their jobs and many more no longer have their savings to count on.
The year was awful for me as well. My mom had to go through chemo treatment for Stage 3 colon cancer, dealing with that awful disease during covid lockdowns, which prevented us from fully supporting her during treatment. My partner’s restaurant was shuttered for several months, causing him and most of his team to be out of work. My office was closed to most employees so I had to work from home for 75% of the year!
Dozens of friends and family members found themselves positive with the virus. For most of the year I was unable to see my family or my closest friends due to our effort to contain the outbreak. I couldn’t go to restaurants, theatres, or music venues. I drank more wine, beer, and hard alcohol this year than the prior three years. Being stuck indoors and all that overindulging caused me to gain 10 lbs.
“In all respects, it was a crappy year.” -Almost Everyone
And yet…
I still have those family and friends in my life to love from a distance and hopefully soon visit in person. Mom is doing well and cancer free. That is a blessing. I have been lucky while many mourn their loved ones.
I was able to buy that wine and alcohol. I had enough food on my plate to gain 10 pounds. Those are blessings. Many people are struggling to make ends meet. It is estimated that globally as many as 115 million people may be pushed into extreme poverty in 2020 alone.
I remained employed and had a great opportunity to demonstrate the value in the work I did prior to COVID-19. Our colleagues around the world were able to successfully work from home and interact with clients through innovative new tools and cloud enabled mobile solutions. I did not miss a pay period during the year. This is a blessing considering that this year in the United States we have reached unprecedented unemployment rates. In April unemployment peaked at 14.7% which had never been seen since data collection began in 1948.
I moved to Austin, taking advantage of remote work opportunities to explore a different city and found out how much I loved it. Many people have chosen or been forced to move during the pandemic. Some are fleeing large cities out of fear that they may contract the virus or due to social unrest caused by a very toxic political environment. Others are relocating either for work or due to job loss.
I found that I was able to attend church online more than I did in person, with no distractions and the added ability to take copious notes. In a world where social distancing has become a necessity, churches have struggled to keep their doors open. Only one third of people who attend religious services at least monthly say they have done so in person and most churchgoers have opted to attend virtually.
It’s undeniable that 2020 brought a fair deal of trials and tribulations. But for most of us, certainly Gen X and older, 2020 is by far NOT the first difficult year we have encountered. Somehow we have managed to make it through those hard times in the past. And we likely found it is the difficulties that allow us to emerge stronger. And even the darkest times often have some bright spots.
That other worst year ever
When I think of 2001, I most remember the tragedy of September 11th and the lives lost that day. I think about the hit to the economy that followed. I think about losing my grandfather in a tragic accident at the beginning of the year. In my mind I recall 2001 as one of the worst years I ever had.
But then I found the little desk clock that was engraved 10-13-2001, a memento from my cousin’s wedding. I think of how much fun I had with my cousins and my family. I remember the fact that earlier that year I took one of the best vacations of my life, seeing the pyramids in Egypt and touring ruins of Luxor.
I contemplate my personal story of September 11th and how decisions I made quite possibly saved my life and certainly saved me from being in the center of harm. I think of all of the people that helped me that day including many that I did not know personally. They were a blessing and I am grateful for them.
I think of the fact that after that event and following that year, I had a different perspective on work, life, and family. I truly believe that I became a better leader. So through the trial of 2001, came an amazing 2002 and some key decisions I made shortly thereafter resulted in my current career.
None of us want to go through bad times or struggle through “the worst year ever”, but the truth is if you live long enough, you have been, and will again be, tested. You have been through hardship and have experienced pain at some time in your life. It is just a part of being alive.
If you really think about it, there was probably another time in your life when you were feeling that you were in the midst of the worst year ever. Maybe it was a very personal and private struggle. Perhaps social media and 24 hour news were not around to make it so clear to you that things were awful for everyone. However, there were likely thousands of people going through a trial just like you did that year. Somehow you, them, and I made it through.
And that is the ultimate blessing.
What will you do with your blessing in 2021?
Be well. Lead on.
Adam
We are pressed on every side by troubles, but we are not crushed. We are perplexed, but not driven to despair. We are hunted down, but never abandoned by God. We get knocked down, but we are not destroyed.
Over the years I have often said that what you see is what you get when it comes to me. My authenticity is perhaps my most consistently recognized trait. Some will love me and some may be confused by me, but pretty much everyone that has worked for, or with me would say the same thing about me. I would hope that part of the good would be imprinted on companies where I have worked and within organizations I have led.
Organizational culture has a profound and long lasting effect on performance. The culture of an organization will develop whether it is guided intentionally or not and once it has formed it becomes very difficult to change. And boy have we found how critical this is! In a year where so many office workers were forced to work from home, away from their teams, the strength of company culture has been tested more than ever.
What is driving the culture of your company? Did it extend to a largely remote work environment?
Studies on culture point to a powerful phenomenon where, over time, organizations take on the characteristics of their leaders. This concept of the often unconscious influence of the leadership team is known as the ‘shadow of the leader’ though given the sometimes negative view of the word “shadow”, I prefer the concept of “imprint”. The behavior of the senior team has a direct impact on the performance and productivity of the entire organization.
In his article The Organizational Shadow Impact, leadership and change consultant Torben Rick discusses the occurrence of the ‘shadow of the leader’ and how it can be used to influence organizational culture in both a positive and negative way. Rick writes “The head of an organization or a team casts a shadow that influences the employees in that group. The shadow may be weak or powerful, yet it always exists. It is a reflection of everything the leader does and says.”
Walk the Talk
Employees take their cues on what is important from the leadership team. The leaders within an organization must model the desired behaviors and let others see the company’s desired values in action. High performance leadership teams understand that their behavior casts a shadow across the entire organization which affects its culture. In order to be effective leaders they must be aware of the shadows they cast and learn to have their actions match their message.
“The culture of any organization is shaped by the worst behavior the leader is willing to tolerate.” writes Rick.
How would you say that your imprint is shaping the culture of your organization?
When a company makes statements about desired values and behaviors without modeling them within the leadership team, employees see a lack of integrity. Not only is it unlikely that employees will adopt the desired values and behaviors, the message being received is likely to affect the organization’s culture in a negative way. In order to build a winning culture the top teams must be seen as living the values and walking the talk.
Making a Good Imprint
The most important cultural influences come from the top starting with the CEO and their team. The highest level of leadership will influence their teams, who will make their own imprints and influence their reports in turn. The core values of an organization must come from the top.
While each level of leadership must be responsible for the imprint they themselves make, how effective their influence is will be either limited or empowered by the prints being cast by higher levels of leadership. A high performing leadership team will imprint resilience and positive culture throughout the entire organization.
What intentional or accidental imprints are affecting your organization? Are they weak or are they strong? Here are five things to watch to gauge effectiveness and look for opportunities to improve.
1. Teaming
An organization is a collection of individuals who are organized into teams. These teams must work in harmony with other teams as a cohesive unit which is cooperative, responsive, and functional. High performing organizations understand the value of teamwork and building a successful team requires work.
Organizational leaders need to model the traits of good teamwork. Instead of seeing themselves as the one in charge, they need to include themselves as part of their team to demonstrate the importance of working as a group. There is further opportunity to model positive qualities when interacting with leaders of other teams and when working on cross functional teams.
2. Sharing
Sharing on an organizational scale most often refers to the sharing of information. In an environment where knowledge can be viewed as power there can be a tendency to hoard information, especially when the culture supports it. In order to be responsive, inventive, and functioning at their best an organization needs a free flow of information.
It is important that leaders prioritize the dissemination of information to their reports to demonstrate the importance of information sharing. As decision makers release information to the leadership team, it must be delivered to all team members in a timely manner. Failure to share information may force people to rely on the grapevine which can not only be inaccurate, but gives the impression that there is a need for secrecy.
This watch area is incredibly important in the new heavily remote work environment.
3. Caring
Every company wants employees that care about coworkers, clients, and organizational success instead of having employees that are only showing up for a paycheck. So how can an organization make employees care? Caring is a two way street. If an organization expects employees to care about organizational goals and values it must show employees that they are cared about.
If the leadership team is making employees feel that they are nothing more than a means to an end, employees will have little motivation to care about the organization they work for. It is important for team leaders to consistently demonstrate that people come first. Caring employees feel that the organization cares about their wellbeing and recognizes that they are human beings with real lives outside of their places of work.
4. Honesty
Honesty is perhaps one of the most important values that any company needs to embody. If an organization doesn’t conduct itself with honesty and integrity it can’t expect its employees to be honest either. A company must live the value and be transparent and honest with all company stakeholders.
If the organization and the leadership team consistently demonstrate honesty, then the only thing employees need in order to adopt the value themselves is a little trust. Team leaders need to show employees that they are trusted to do the right thing. Honesty can’t grow when employees are micromanaged in an environment of suspicion.
5. The Little Things
Organizational leaders can make a major imprint on the organization by living the core values of the company and making sure their interactions with employees and other stakeholders consistently demonstrate those values. Some ways that team leaders can do this are structured and obvious. Other ways are more subtle and yet just as effective.
My out of office reply says “If this is urgent, important, and can only be addressed by me, you should still contact one of my direct reports. Otherwise please follow up with me when I am back from my holiday.” The reality is that of course I am available to take critical calls. However, it is really important that I demonstrate my respect for time away from work. It also signals that I trust my team and truly want to highlight and promote potential successors.
Company culture is an integral part of organizational success, yet there are no easy answers when it comes to shaping it. Leaders must see themselves as role models and understand that what they do, and how they do it, affects either with intention or by accident their imprint on the organization. The leadership team needs to have a solid understanding of the core values that the company wishes to embody and then live those values by demonstrating them every day in everything they do.
How strong is your imprint?
Be well. Lead on.
Adam
Covid is still an issue. Please stay safe and wear a mask.
Adam L. Stanley
Connections Blog Technology. Leadership. Food. Life.
I continue to hear a common refrain from people I do not know, some friends and colleagues, and even some within my family. The words are different from person to person, but the message is pretty much the same. “The people speaking up about police brutality and racial justice are not saying anything about violence in the cities. They want to have demonstrations at sporting events, but nothing about black on black violence.”
It seems that only the black man must choose one or the other cause to support, or one organization. We should not allow the media or society to dictate we must choose one or the other.
There are THOUSANDS of single-issue community organizations. If you follow or watch any one of them, and only one of them, you will ALWAYS conclude they seem to ignore every other issue. It’s like saying, “I hate the Christian church because they only focus on Jesus and not the other spiritually important figures of the world, like Buddha or the prophet Mohammed.” Of course CHRISTian churches focus on Jesus! The most effective organizations pick a cause and stick with that one cause.
That does not mean that an individual can only support one cause. Yes, you will notice I reference #BLM or Black Lives Matter from time to time on my social media streams. And, yes, this particular movement focuses almost exclusively on racial justice and policing reform. But that is only part of the story. Certainly only part of my story.
I support non-violent protests of police criminal negligence and racism. AND I support any and all efforts to end violence in our neighborhoods, including black on black crime. And many many many people do. There are VASTLY more organizations dedicated to ending violence in inner cities – supporting troubled youth, improving education, getting guns out of the hands of those who should not own them, and uplifting neighborhood communities – than there are dedicated to racial equality and effective policing. And the combined giving to inner city youth programs, by the athletes and celebrities people tend to reference most often, is exponentially greater than anything they do for Black Lives Matter. Find your local Boys & Girls Club and you will find an athlete or celebrity behind it. The media may only cover the closed fists in the air, the protest marches, and the #BLM social media banners, but we would be remiss if we judge them on only what is shown on TV.
Has anyone actually researched the types of organizations Colin K supports? Unlikely!!! They just notice the kneeling and the #BlackLivesMatter movement the media talks about.
Being the change you wish to see does not require you to choose only one cause!
What’s in your wallet?
Your role as a citizen of the world is to build a “portfolio” of causes that matter to you and will allow you to get the greatest return on your investment of time, talent, and treasure. That is your challenge: Can you find a way to live the life God wants you to live and spread love the way so many spread hate? Be the change YOU want to be, not simply doing what society wants you to do.
For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall much be required; and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more. Luke 12:48
Be well. Lead on.
Adam
Covid is still an issue. Please stay safe and wear a mask.
Adam L. Stanley
Connections Blog Technology. Leadership. Food. Life.
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“What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?” is the title now given to a speech by Frederick Douglass delivered on July 5, 1852, in Corinthian Hall, Rochester, New York, addressing the Rochester Ladies’ Anti-Slavery Society.
I share this for my fellow Christians out there that seem to be amongst the most vocal of the “All Lives Matter” crowd. Yes, all lives matter. If you are a true Christian, please join me in praying that this can one day become reality.
The Parable of the Lost Sheep (Luke 15:1-7 NIV)
15 Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus. 2 But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”
3 Then Jesus told them this parable: 4 “Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Doesn’t he leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? 5 And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders 6 and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.’ 7 I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.
When Black lives are systemically devalued by police, corporations, and society in general, the reality is a portion of “All” is being shown as not important to the rest of “All”. Black Lives do not seem to matter to many, and therefore the cry of Black Lives Matter must serve as a reminder to everyone that for All Lives to Matter, BLACK LIVES MUST MATTER. Incidents like the deaths of George Floyd simply serve to stoke the anger and make the everyday reality for some become visible to most. The outrage justifiably focuses attention on Black lives.
Put simply, when All Lives Matter, there will be no need for a chant of Black Lives Matter.
Nothing good comes from being in the middle of the road. It’s funny we often take for granted little things that have overarching meanings in our everyday life. Take driving. Learning the rules of the road and using them keeps us and others safe while sending a clear message about the direction we’re traveling. What happens when we forget these rules? Ever seen the person flying onto an on ramp and merging into traffic without signaling? Or the person who wants to straddle the line on a thin dual-direction road? On the road and in life one thing is clear: you cannot both be coming and going at the same time. We can do either but the rules of the road force us to make a choice.
And in our career, what happens when we refuse to choose? Many believe we can straddle the professional line without anyone noticing. With one foot in our current role and the other waiting for the next best thing, we remain unaware that our ambivalence reeks.
It is important that we pick a side.
PICK A STRUGGLE
Adam wrote a blog a while back that was titled Don’t Miss your Bernie moment. The message was in general for leaders of organizations that have gone through major periods of change. The Bernie message was one of transition. It was saying to his supporters that the time has come to move on, united against a common evil, and rally together on a new shared mission. That blog was for leaders at the top of newly merged or fundamentally changed organizations. And it should absolutely resonate for many of you out there.
But there is another message and this is for everyone in the organization under such leaders. And the message is basically that once a leader has articulated the new shared vision for the organization you have a decision to make. Either align with that leader and support the mission, helping to drive the continued success of the organization. Or decide that this mission is simply not yours and move on. You need to pick a struggle. You need to pick a side. Just like being in the middle of the road while driving is not a viable option, being in the middle of the road as a member of a team is unacceptable.
Let’s be clear here. We are not at all saying that adherence to the mission of an organization requires a level of abject acceptance of any decisions that are made and any directions that are delivered. The value you bring to an organization is of course diversity of opinions and the ability to provide input into decisions driving the future of your organization. Never change that. However, there is a base level of acceptance that is required of any player on a major team.
Adam is a very big fan of Arsenal Football Club and anyone who knows the English Premier League teams knows that to some extent each team is fundamentally different than other teams. Their leaders are different and their style of play are also different. If someone joins Arsenal, the expectation is they will bring new talent, new ideas, and new strength to the club. However, they will still play under the style and direction that has been developed over dozens of years. They cannot come in and try to be a rock superstar constantly fighting against the leadership or their fellow team members. It simply does not work.
So, you’re at a Crossroads. You joined the company and you worked for a particular leader for years. You respected that leader and admired his or her vision for the future of the company. You now have been placed under a new leader and you dislike your new mission.
It is time to decide.
Our advice for you:
1) Consider what makes you happy at work. Be very honest and open with yourself. Be sure that you are not letting personal friendships or biases get in the way of sound judgment. I have worked for people who are fantastic people that I truly respected and I liked. But they were not always aligned with me strategically or going in the direction that I actually thought was best for our company.
2) Ask lots of questions and truly get to know the new leader. If you suspect there is a fundamental misalignment with your view of strategic direction for the company, do your research. List out your perceived differences and ask questions that get to a point where you can confirm one way or the other. You may actually be surprised both at your misunderstanding of the misalignment or in your leader’s interest and ability to change based on strong feedback
3) Check the grass on the other side. Research other players in your industry and see if they are going in a fundamentally different direction. It could be that your ideas are not aligned with the way the world is shifting. You could be the one on the wrong side of the road. And hey, we’ve all been wrong sometimes. This exploration of the other side will also help you and your decision to stay or leave for another company. If, after all, other companies in your industry will be going in the same direction, you might be left all alone.
4) Change your way of thinking. Adam wrote a blog on Allies on a Tour of Duty, about investing in talent for the long-term. The concept there was around each role being a different opportunity for you to build on particular skills and learn new ones. Never considering that any would be permanent. Change your way of thinking so that this new strategic direction under this new leader is another Tour of Duty. It’s an opportunity for you to prove that your intellect and your skills are transferable and can be applied under different fields of battle.
5) Determine your time horizon. There is a particular amount of time that you will wait it out and try to make it work before one of two things happens. Either you will become so despondent and disengaged that you will be miserable at work and miserable to work with. Or, your performance will suffer and your contributions will decline and instead of leaving on a high you will leave with an impression a failure. When not happy at work, your performance will suffer and your reputation can as well.
6) Just Leave. If you’ve come to the conclusion that it’s simply not going to work or you don’t want it to then you should do yourself and the organization a favor and respectfully exit. Fortunately, we are not tied to any one company and where we decide to work is a choice. Choose to be solid teammate and manager, productive and most of all happy…elsewhere.
Choose Your Side
Staying in the middle of the road is not good for any players involved. Your leadership will be disappointed in your performance and your attitude. Your peers will notice your lack of Engagement. And those that do not know you well will brand that as part of your personality and your skill set. And you will be unhappy and feel increasingly disengaged and alone. That is a position that no one wants to be in at work. Therefore, we encourage you to pick a struggle. Pick a side.
Let us know what you think. Have you been in a situation where your colleague was clearly straddling the middle line? Have you managed someone like that?
Be well. Lead On. Adam
This blog was coauthored with Apriel Biggs-Coker. These are our views and not necessarily those of the company.
Adam L. Stanley Connections Blog Technology. Leadership. Food. Life.
4) Change your way of thinking. Adam wrote a blog on 