Working to Be a Leader

When a Colts fan was on her way out of the restaurant where I was watching Super Bowl XLIV, this woman made it a point to stop next to me, touch my shoulder and say with a big smile on her face and a smirk in her voice, “The Colts really are the best team.  The Saints don’t have a chance in hell to beat the Colts.”  Obviously, she hadn’t read the e-mail I had received from a friend in NOLA.

“It is hard to express the wonderful effect the Saints have had on our community – it has brought us all together in the glow of their achievement, and we are awash in black and gold and ‘Who Dat’.  I am sure the intense and widespread emotional involvement is directly related to the depth of commitment we have made to the recovery and improvement of NOLA. So many things are coming back but not there yet, but here is one area where success is palpable and was a long time coming (43 years!).  And it’s wonderful Lagniappe that Drew Brees is such a fine  human being – not just a great quarterback.”  Suzy Mague, a woman I met when volunteering in NOLA after Hurricane Katrina, pinpointed what was going to help the Saints win the Super Bowl:  the collective belief in success by those in the Gulf Coast region.

Lagniappe is a term used in Louisiana which  means “”something given or obtained gratuitously or by way of good measure.”  What the Saints gave the city of New Orleans were gifts of hope, commitment to a goal, and success against great odds to even reach the Super Bowl.  What the city of New Orleans gave back was their enthusiastic support and hope that the area’s recovery would be as successful as that of their Saints.

 The consensus was that the Colts were the better team, Peyton Manning the best quarterback ever, the defense so strong that Manning had only been sacked 10 times all season, and on and on.  My clapping and cheering for the Saints when they were behind 10-0 in the first quarter did give me pause.  Yet, as is the nature of a 60-minute game, there was still a chance.  In football, you have to play the game to the very last second even if your team is losing 54-0.  The Saints went the distance in great form.

To lead off the second half of the game, Saints’ Coach Sean Payton used a tactic that brought his team success:  a practiced  surprise.  For the first time in Super Bowl history, a team started the third quarter with an onside kick.  The Saints punter made a short kick (more than 10 yards) to the Colts, a Colts player touched then lost the ball, a Saints player recovered the ball, and the Saints earned very good field position.  The Saints had practiced this surprise over and over again during the week leading up to the big game.  The timing made history, shifted the momentum to the Saints, and helped them come away with a 31-17 victory.

Today I wish that I could call the Colts fan who told me to give up on the Saints because they didn’t have a chance.  There is always a chance, always an opportunity to succeed whether on the football field, a baseball diamond, or the workplace playing field.  Give yourself a chance by practicing a surprise that can get you noticed,  realize the potential you have as a leader and become an outstanding team player for your followers while working to be a leader.

A leader’s position carries with it responsibility to inspire followers and use power wisely.  It also includes teaching others to jump barriers and give up their silo thinking in order to explore new possibilities.

A few years ago when I was at a friend’s apartment, I noticed that her dog, a big German Shepard that stood maybe 24” high, was confined to the living room by a piece of wood placed at each doorway.  The barrier was only 18” inches high – a height the dog could have walked or jumped over with ease.

I knew this because my dog Emelie, a mix of Border collie and Samoyed raised exploring beaches and mountain paths, easily jumped the piece of wood.  In fact, she roamed all over the house, jumping or knocking down the barrier if it got in her way.  The other dog, who only got out to a small yard three times a day, looked at Emelie, whined, and after a couple of times testing her freedom and being disciplined for doing so, was too afraid to venture forth into risking another jump.

An executive coaching client recently commented to me that she values my creative input because her staff can’t see or won’t speak up about the ‘possibilities’ of a situation.  She is a ‘roamer’ but her staff uses what I call ‘silo thinking’ – confining their perspective to a narrow column of influence.   A silo is a structure used to store materials, in this picture it is grain on a farm.

Grain silos on a farm

Silo thinking in followers means that instead of looking out to the horizon, employees see the walls of the job description, the risks of speaking up, and the fear of going out of their comfort zones to explore unknown territory.  They’ll share ideas with peers but won’t speak up at meetings or with their managers.

The influence of their corporate climate, consequences of making a mistake in front of others, and their own ‘mental training’ are just some reasons for their ‘silo’ thinking.  It could be age – never being asked before for creative ideas – or conditioning over the years by being told what to do, how to do it, and when to do it instead of being empowered to individualize their work.  Or the fact that people don’t want to expand for fear of the repercussions of what new activities they might be asked to participant in or that they would have to move out of their usual role to take on leadership themselves of an initiative.

My client consistently strives to inspire, model creative thinking, and provide opportunities for staff input.  She is persistent in efforts to overcome her staff’s ‘silo thinking’ and resistance to jump barriers.  However, with each subtle shift in behavior from individuals, my client gains confidence to continue her efforts to engage her staff in barrier jumping behavior.

On Monday evening, November 9, I attended the Mary Travers memorial service at Riverside Church near the Hudson River at 120th Street in Manhattan.

Mary Travers, the Mary in the Peter, Paul & Mary folksingers, activists, and life enrichers, died in September from complications of  leukemia.  However, her spirit was very much alive when Peter, Paul, and a host of celebrities, politicians, spiritual leaders, and friends spoke about her gifts as a singer but most of all her passion and dedication to helping others.

After a video montage was shown on a large screen above the altar of the gothic church, Peter and Paul took center stage to welcome over 1,200 in the audience who came to pay tribute to the role Mary had played in their own and others’ lives.  As the singers warmed up their guitars, they said how hard it was to sing without Mary’s voice and invited the audience to sing her part while they sang harmony.

The song they chose was quickly recognized and as I joined in singing “Leaving on a Jet Plane,” I felt chills go through my entire body.  I, like everyone else it seemed, knew every word in every verse from decades of hearing it sung in person or on the radio or through speakers.

The New York Choral Society

I first saw Peter, Paul & Mary in-person when I was a student at the University of California at Berkeley.  And their songs followed me through my career.  Mary with her singing partners had been performing for nearly 50 years at concerts throughout the world, fund-raisers for human rights causes and political candidates running for office, and gatherings on the Mall in Washington to lift their voices to support Martin Luther King, Jr. and others who brought light to areas of growth for America.

President Barack Obama sent a note that Peter read to the audience, former President Bill Clinton appeared in a video, and former presidential candidate and senator George McGovern got up to thank Mary for her role in his career.  Another former presidential candidate, Senator John Kerry (D-Massachusetts) also went to the podium and told us how a fund-raiser early in his political career where Peter, Paul & Mary sang was the turning point to staying in a political race and continuing on his path.

To see a full list of speakers and performers, click here.

The evening together lasted four hours, exhausting emotionally and physically since like others in the audience we were up and down to give  standing ovations, sing along, clap, and sway with the music.  Whoopi Goldberg offered moments of laughter when she went to speak and said to the effect, “Forget those serious tunes.  I like ‘Puff the Magic Dragon.’  That’s my favorite song!”  Also, near the end of the program when Peter noted that the potted plants on the altar could be taken by anyone in the audience (Mary would have liked that no cut flowers were used, he said), before Peter finished his speech Whoopi got up from the front row, walked to a ledge below the stage, and picked up a potted plant then returned to her seat as the laughter gently rolled back and up from those who could see what she had done to the back row of the balcony.

Toward the end, Judy Collins sang “Amazing Grace” and triggered my thinking about the role performers play in society and the larger culture.  Mary’s legacy lives on not just by the lives she changed but by her commitment to use her power and influence in causes that promoted justice and harmony.

A leader’s legacy is not built in a day.  It is earned over years of positive contributions to the greater good.  I can’t say that I supported every cause that Mary did.  But I can say that I know the legacy she leaves is one that will inspire me to make the most of the life that I have in using my gifts as an educator and coach to help others reach their full potential.

Keneth Chenault, CEO, American Express, was the subject of The Colvin Interview in the C-Suite Strategies series in Fortune Magazine’s October 26, 2009 edition.  Geoff Colvin, senior editor at the magazine, started his profile by writing, “American Express CEO Ken Chenault is one of the few Wall Street chiefs who have come through the financial meltdown and recession looking good.”

Colvin’s article describes how Chenault lead his company through the worst economy since the Great Depression when, in the CEO’s words, ”The reality is that we were on the verge of an absolute disaster and collapse.”

During his first year in the job, Chenault learned and used crisis management skills on and after 9/11 that he could apply to the economic crisis.  Although the article focused on the financial challenges he faced and his outlook for the new economy, it also includes insights from the CEO that other leaders might find of interest.

1.  Leaders should continue to deal with the basic issues of their companies while planning for long- and short-term growth based on future obstacles as well as opportunities.

2.  Chenault feels that “the hardest time to bring about change is in good times.”  In other words, leaders need to be focused and decisive in good times to be ready for the less-than-good times.

3.  Transparency.  The CEO used that word in reference to proposed new financial services regulation and the impact the government’s intentions could have on the economy.

4.  On the topic of executive pay, Chenault said that he believed not in short-term packages to compensate executives but multiyear packages.

5.  After the company and growth opportunities, his third reason for staying at AMEX even though he was considered for a leadership role at another financial services company was “I like the people.” 

I liked what I learned from this article and suggest you might find it of interest yourself.

Bruce Wasserstein, Chairman and Chief Executive of Lazard, died earlier this week.  Just 61, his career spanned worked on some of the largest high-profile deals during the past thirty years. 

Wasserstein’s style?  “He frightened people,” according to Felix Rohatyn, the former senior Lazard partner is quoted as saying in The New York Times.  Known for his hostile takeovers, the Brooklyn-born Wasserstein approached deals not from a relationship building perspective as Lazard had for more than a century; he approached a deal as war.

I left Lazard before Wasserstein was brought into Lazard as a partner and then navigated his way into taking it over in 2005.  Yet, even though I never met the man, I felt very sad to hear of his death.  Why?  His age?  It’s close to my own.  The fact that he was responsible for raising his sister’s child after the noted playwright Wendy Wasserstein died in 2006?  Yes, that touched me to see a young girl lose another parental figure. 

Steven Golub is the interim leader of Lazard and may be Wasserstein’s permanent successor.  A long-time member of the firm, Golub’s style was not one to frighten people.  My experiences as his temporary secretary—and observations of him on the 32nd floor—while Michel David-Weill ran the firm confirm that a new culture is beginning at Lazard.  (To read more about the Lazard culture when I was there, read “Temping with Tycoons”.)

I send my condolences that a chapter of the Lazard culture is passing into the history books.

MGT 3300:  “A Management Approach to Organizational Behavior” is one of eight courses that Tameka Vasquez included in her article on “Courses that feed your brain” published on October 5, 2009, in The Ticker, Baruch College’s student newspaper.

Ms. Vasquez says that students “find themselves especially attentive, although it is required for most of them.”

My students taking MGT 3300 are attentive, engaged, and eager to learn as much as they can.   One student had to very reluctantly withdraw from the class after he found out he would not get credit for taking the class since it was outside his major.  He complimented me on being ”humble and cooperative”—words that I will remember.

“I love your lectures” wrote one of my students included in an e-mail to me.  “I love this class,” commented another student who is being challenged to demonstrate her public speaking abilities.

It’s rewarding as a member of the faculty at the Zicklin School of Business within Baruch College to hear these words.  What is more rewarding is to see the growth of my students on their diet of ”brain food.”

Why are students so engaged?  The topics resonant with their own experiences of working at retail shops, financial services companies, pharmacies, food stores, etc.  Topics, as Ms. Vasquez points out, which include ”individual attributes, workforce diversity, motivation, leadership, organizational culture and organizational change.”  Topics that students know learning these will benefit them on every part of their career path.

Mine is an interactive class.  The technology in the classroom is limited to a PC, a projector and access to the internet that I use.  The interactivity comes from conversations, comments, interchanges of ideas.

There are 31 students in my class but during each one-hour fifteen-minute session I call on each person at least once.  I want to hear their voices, I want to understand what they know and think about a topic, I want to share my relevant experiences and I want to learn from their experiences.

 A diet of “brain food” is good for us all.

No matter where you are in your career, it is important to be proactive, to fill a gap, to meet unmet needs.  Here’s an example of what I mean.

At the end of the spring semester, a former student called me up and shared with me her frustration over not being able to find a job in her major of human resources—or even an unpaid internship.  She started to cry and, after reassuring her she would find something, we talked about specific ways she could move forward.

That and other phone calls from students past and present inspired me to propose teaching a class during the summer to help alumni and students in their job searches.  The Chair of the Management Department at Zicklin School of Business at Baruch College considered the idea a good one and got the needed approvals.

The class went very, very well.  Everyone was engaged, open, and willing to trust each other.  They participated in mock interviews, role playing the interviewer or potential client.  They networked with each other and honed their elevator speeches.  Resumes were reviewed as were rules of etiquette in the job search process.

What I did was fill the need for a way students could actively work on their job search.  The experience was a win-win-win:  I won because my idea for a class was supported; the students won because they learned practical career skills; and the Management Department won because they met their students’ needs.

On Saturday, October 17, the Management Dept. will once again offer “Supercharge Your Job Search.”  During one day, we will cover the topics you need to start your job search and take the next step in getting a job or positioning yourself to change careers.

Baruch alumni and students can register and pay for the class by calling Linda Moore at 646-312-3625.

Here’s a couple of comments from two who attended:

—Sharing and doing exercises pushed me to realize the important of networking and maintaining relationships.

 —After a role-playing exercise, I got instant feedback from the class members and instructor on my interviewing skills.

Remember to think about ways that you can be proactive to move forward in your career search.

Dear Student, er Graduate:

Today you will be one of 3,000 students receiving a degree during the Baruch College Commencement Ceremonies at Madison Square Garden.  Baruch, the nation’s most diverse campus, is part of the City University of New York (CUNY), a group of 23 colleges and institutions serving 480,000 students in New York City.

As one of your teacher’s in the undergraduate Management Department at the Zicklin School of Business within Baruch, I congratulate you on your achievement and wish you the best as you begin a new phase in your life.

In your journey of working during the day, going to school for three or more hours of classes on two to four nights a week, then returning home to hug a child, kiss a spouse, embrace your parents, pet your dog, you’ve prepared yourself for the new leg of life’s journey as a college graduate.

Your hunger for knowledge, curiosity about how to reach your potential, willingness to push yourselves out of your comfort zones made my job as your instructor that much easier and a challenge.  A challenge that made me a smarter, wiser, and more informed person.

You are a future leader, someone who will have followers seeking answers, making requests, needing your time, being curious about their futures.

You are stepping into a world that needs your energy, your enthusiasm, your commitment to others that I saw you demonstrate in class.

We need you, I need you, the world needs you to value your degree, to make the most of the entry level jobs and administrative work you will do as you climb the career lattice, moving sideways and upward on your merits and demonstrated capacity for growth.

Future leader, I offer you two pieces of advice. 

#1:  Know yourself, what is meaningful for you, how you want to be known in the world.

#2:  Keep smiling through the tough times, the good times, the down times, and the up times because a smile is contagious and invites others to come into your world.

Thanks for letting me be part of your world.

Now, future leaders, go out and continue working to be the best possible leader you can be—we need you!

Best regards,

Prof. Henderson

Working to be a leader means that you are always seeking out information to inspire and motivate yourself and enhance your performance.

For me, working to be a leader includes reading a variety of publications such as newspapers and magazine plus e-newsletters from organizations that specialize in leadership and workplace issues.

My daily source of information is The New York Times.  Although I often print out an article, I’m most likely to tear out the piece so that I can read it again, place it in a pile on my desk so I can look up the research mentioned and use it to illustrate a point in my own compositions, file it in its appropriate folder that I’ll go to when asked to give a talk on ”cultural transformations of the workplace,” or leave it in my diary so that I am reminded to forward a link to this relevant article to a client.

This week’s clips were all from The New York Times.  Reading through the list, you might find an article that catches your interest as you, too, are working to be a leader.

Monday, May 4:  “Marilyn French, Novelist and Champion of Feminism, Dies at 79:  Gaining controversial stardom in 1977 with ‘The Women’s Room.’”  Note:  French’s book was instrumental in helping women of my age cope with a major cultural transformation as we moved from housewives to career women.

Tuesday, May 5- “Waist Deep in a Big Birthday Party,” Music Review by Jon Caramanica on the front page of the Arts Section and ”Still Singing” Appreciations by Lawrence Downes on the Editorial Page.  Note:  These two articles were used to gather specific facts for my previous blog on “Pete Seeger’s 90th Birthday.”

Thursday, May 7- “Facebook Status?  In Town and Wondering What to Do: Social media offer benefits no travel agent, online tourist site or guidebook can match.” “All You Need to Know to Tweet on Twitter.”  Note:  On June 5, I’ll be co-presenting a program on social media and can use information in these articles as resources for those in attendance.

Saturday, May 9 – “At 8.9%, Unemployment Still Rises, but Pace Slows:  539,000 Jobs Were Lost in April, but Some Economists Say Worst May Be Over; ‘This isn’t recovery,’ an economist warns. ‘ It’s a slowing recession.’” ”Losing Job May Be Hazardous to Health.”  Sunday, May 10 – “More Than a Numbers Game:  Does being fired hurt any less if you’re just one of many?”  Note:  I continue to receive positive responses from  those who have read LTR’s level playing field special report, ”Temping with Tycoons,” my educational and inspirational story about how I used an investment bank as the business school I could afford in the recession of the early 1990’s.  Reading about the toll our economy is taking on individual careers reaffirms my commitment to offer my report free of charge and to continue to find ways to motivate and inspire others to stay engaged and optimistic through workshops, teleseminars, and organization-sponsored presentations.

Sunday, May 10 – “Backlash: Women Bullying Women.”  Note:  A very, very interesting article on many levels.  There is a growing awareness about the different ways that women lead.  I’ll use the information in the article in future presentations of the talk I’ve given to Women M.B.A.s and other college students on “The Fractured State of Women’s Leadership:  Why That’s a Good Thing.”

Enjoy a good week of reading and working to be a leader.

In honor of Mother’s Day, I feel moved to pass along one bit of advice that I got from my mother. This advice is relevant to girls/women and boys/men on a career search — or the ambitious employed who want to stay employed or get a promotion.

Although Mom died in 1968, I can, at times, still hear her voice reciting one of her many pieces of advice.

“Don’t be like all the other girls,” she’d say if I wanted a pair of white boots just like all the other girls were wearing in TEEN magazine.

“Don’t be like all the other girls,” she’d say then proceed to tell me about the twin girls who used to live down the street and who had their own way of dressing and being in the world.

“Don’t be like all the other girls,” she’d say on any occasion to encourage me to be who I was and not someone else.

Mom was right.  When I left for college, all I wanted to be was normal and like all the other girls.  A bit of a challenge to figure out what normal was since I wound up at the University of California at Berekley during the height of the Free Speech and Vietnam War protests.

As I’ve gotten older, however, and worked my way into leadership roles and developed a business providing leadership coaching to executives, I embrace the essence of her message.   Her message: to be fully present and let others know the unique qualities you possess and the great skills you bring to the table.

Today with the economy the worst since the Great Depression, women and men looking for work—or working to keep their jobs—have to stand out, to not be like all the other girls/boys, to demonstrate their unique brand of passion and how they will contribute their skills, abilities, and talents to the workplace.

Mom would like the person that I am today.  I’m not like all the other girls.  And not like all the other women I know.  I’m me.  And that’s a good thing.

Sit back and reflect on how you stand out with your own unique brand.

Then wish your mother and other nuturing women in your life a Happy Mother’s Day!