How to Balance Family Expectations with the Stress of Being a Leader

You have to be at work at 8:00 AM. The kids have to be at school at 8:15 AM. There’s soccer practice right after school, and the kids are ready to be picked up at 4:15 PM, but you have a crucial meeting with an investor at 4:30 PM. Daycare is expensive, and sometimes you and your spouse have conflicting schedules. You simply don’t always have enough time during the day. As a result, it’s easy to fall into the trap of working all night. You never get the chance to fully unwind, and you might not be fully present with your family, either. Let’s discuss how to balance family expectations with the stress of being a leader.

 

Meticulously Plan

Plan out your work day and your home life to a T. Lay out your schedule in advance so you can prioritize what you do and don’t have time to complete.

 

Rely on Your Staff

Many times, CEOs struggle with delegating tasks to their staff—whether it’s fear that it won’t be completed properly or they feel the need to be in charge of everything. Your staff is competent and employed to help you, so let them. Letting go of some control will be freeing, and it’ll allow you to enjoy more time with your family.

 

Determine What’s Important

Sometimes it comes down to choosing to be a parent or choosing to be a leader. You may need to make that decision each day. Both your family and work life are fulfilling, so sometimes you need to decide what activity in the moment is most important. You might feel guilty sometimes, but move on; sometimes you miss things, and that’s okay.

 

Avoid Burnout

Many think that burnout stems from being overworked, and it might, but resent also plays a role. What makes you resentful about your current position? What do you feel as if you are constantly giving up? Figure that out, and eliminate the resentful activities.

 

Work from Home

Working from home a few days a week may allow you to balance work and family life a little better. However, make sure you have a set quitting time, rather than working all night. You should avoid working nights and weekends at all costs if you can.  

 

Integration vs. Balance

Many leaders encourage the idea of integration vs. balance when it comes to work and family life. They advise that it isn’t a matter of choosing one or the other, but incorporating both into your life by maximizing your time wherever you are. Fully engage and work hard to complete tasks efficiently so you can spend the rest of your time with your family.

 

Schedule Personal Time

There’s a reason they say “You can’t pour from an empty cup.” Self-care is important. You will struggle to be a good parent and strong leader without first making sure you are well taken care of. Get adequate rest, follow a healthy diet and exercise regimen, and schedule time for yourself to complete the activities that make you happy. 

 

 

Choosing family will set an example for other people. You might miss some business events, but you won’t miss your son’s high school graduation or moving your daughter into her college dorm room, and that’s what truly matters.

 

 

 

Leap: How to Thrive in a World Where Everyone Can be Copied

It’s the age-old question: how can companies succeed and maintain that success long-term? In Howard Yu’s 2018 highly rated book, Leap: How to Thrive in a World Where Everyone Can be Copied, he strives to answer that question. He takes into consideration the ever-evolving world of business and technology. Yu argues that by incorporating reinvention as a priority into an organization’s system, businesses will be able to stay above the competition and at the top of their field. Expert companies have done it in the past, and are still doing it today.

 

To be a successful, lasting business, it’s not enough to be good in the chosen field or have a great product. Businesses must also acknowledge how easily they can be copied by their competition (and (often foreign) latecomers). Businesses have to keep changing it up and balancing the task of mastering the old and inventing the new. That often involves reimaging products and services and learning to market them in new ways in order to overpower the competition.

 

Yu uses captivating case studies that demonstrate both successes and failures in the business industry to present a model for achievement. He stresses five principles for success that can be applied to countless industries. He doesn’t just use current examples either. He details effective tactics from numerous eras. We tend to think that a strategy used in the 40’s would be ineffectual in today’s technologically advanced world, until we take into consideration that that company is still standing strong today. Yu also makes a nod at the need to use multiple disciplines to stay relevant. As a prime example, he cites top pharmaceutical companies that didn’t simply rely on chemistry, but began using microbiology and genomics to lead to groundbreaking drug discoveries.

 

The lesson in Leap is clear: leap. Make leaps and bounds in business. Take risks that may seem impossible; it may be the only way to outlast the competition and prosper in this ever-changing world.

 

Lack of Trust and Elevation, The Blocker

able to elevate

Lack of Trust and Elevation, the Blocker

 

The discussion ensued within the Executive Peer Group; “Why am I not able to elevate faster and delegate better?” became the question of the group.

To focus on higher priority opportunities, executives must elevate out of the daily grind and noise that is daily business. The question is how to make the behavioral changes in one’s self that will allow one to elevate. “How do I let go?” is echoed around the table with a tone of frustration.

As most executives understand, delegation of tasks, operational duties, decision making, and spending need to move down into the organization for the executive to move on and up. Logic says this is so true and is seen when viewing another successful executive delegate. Yet there are emotion issues and behaviors that come into play and limit the ability to let go.

There are many barriers, yet we are addressing two key ones that can move any executive to a great elevation and faster letting go behavior.

“Where does my worth come from?” is often the unasked question of the executive. Moving from a frame of “what I do is who I am” to “what my team does is who I am” can be daunting for some. When one has looked to their personal accomplishments to define their worth, what I have accomplished with my own hands defines that worth for years; now to transition valuing your worth on the basis of others accomplishments can become a challenge.

Instead of instant gratification from a task completed, the executive must wait for a much longer time to experience success and the feeling of completion. A few ideas to aid this transition are having a very clear future vision to focus on which allows one to be above the “noise” of the day. In concert with the clear vision, what is the cadence of communication on progress towards the vision? Having a process of communications with the team, such as a weekly update and problem-solving meeting, can help the executive stay on top of the progress, see progress and build trust in the team’s capabilities. This also allows the executive to see challenges and weak areas and address them in a timely manner.

We find successfully elevated executives have such a process in place. This helps them to let go sooner and in the proper sequence.

“What don’t I Trust?” is the question that came from the executive group. This is a very telling question for the executive because if I fully trusted the person or team, would there be any hesitation about delegation?

Any executive that hesitates in delegation and elevation needs to be asking this question. Now the answers are many. Do they have the experience I have? Are they capable of getting the job done right? Will they have the right solution? Will their choices hurt the company? What skill sets are they missing? Will they give the business away? and many more.

Whatever the answers are, the executive needs to be clear and honest about it. Then get into action and address those trust areas so they can then trust, delegate and elevate.

In our work with hundreds of fast growth executives, owners and CEO’s; these two barriers seem to provide the greatest impact on their ability to elevate faster and drive the company forward vs being caught up in the noise of operations.

If you are an executive, consider these two points in moving yourself forward. Investors, are your founders caught in this barrier trap? Ask them these questions and help them move forward.

Of course, giving us a call would be another option.

 

 

Author:

Harlan Goerger is President of H. Goerger & Associates Inc. dba CEO Solutions and is focused on developing CEO/Founders of fast growth companies for scalability and profit. Utilizing peer groups, individual coaching and multiple other tools to develop the capability and capacity of growth-oriented CEO/Founders. www.CEOSolution.net

 

Fighting Conformity and Fostering Originality

In Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World, Adam Grant acts as a masterful guide to sparking creativity and change. A professor and expert on finding motivation and meaning in life, Grant has been recognized as one of the world’s 10 most influential management thinkers by Thinkers50. He also made Fortune’s list of 40 under 40. Originals, a New York Times bestseller, was released in 2016 and has acted as an effective guide for leaders and teachers nationwide.

 

In Originals, Grant addresses the idea of changing the world by becoming original and saying goodbye to conformity and outdated traditions. There’s an obvious challenge to originating new ideas, policies, and practices without risk, but he stresses the importance of championing new ideas that go against the grain.

 

The stories included in Originals will leave you feeling inspired and motivated—no matter your field. Grant includes stories about an entrepreneur who pitches his start-ups by naming reasons not to invest, a woman under Steve Jobs at Apple who challenged him anyway, an analyst who overturned a secrecy rule at the CIA, a financial guru who fires employees when they fail to critique him, and a television executive who saved Seinfeld from being cut but had no prior comedy experience. From these stories, you’ll learn that success doesn’t always come in all areas, but broadening your perspective and stepping out of your comfort zone can make you more predisposed to success, satisfaction, and innovation.

 

For instance, Grant introduces the idea of middle status conservatism, or middle level mediocrity. This becomes an issue when you are too familiar and comfortable in your field and lose creativity. Middle management often suffers from this, while those at the top and bottom rungs of the ladder are more likely to avoid conforming.

 

Grant offers a unique, unexpected perspective—touting artistic pursuits that will encourage innovation in other areas and noting the benefits of procrastination (it triggers creative and productive results because it lets the brain process a problem or project right up until the deadline). He doesn’t just stop at adults, either. He uses his teaching expertise to discuss the merits of teaching children to foster a sense of originality.

 

These stories and studies will teach you to explore different ideas, understand when they are good, and recognize when they should be acted on. Many people struggle with speaking up for fear of being shut down, but Originals will teach you how to effectively speak up and build a team of allies that will support you.

 

As an executive and CEO, what are you doing to be “original” in your thinking? Many have found our coaching assistance to help develop such thinking and action.

7 Words CEOs Should Avoid When Giving Employee Feedback

Your team is important to you. They’re your backbone. So the last thing you need is a team that’s upset with you for using words or phrases that make you appear passive aggressive or worse, weak. As the boss, discussing job performance with your employees is inevitable, but you can avoid offending them by throwing these 7 words (and phrases) out of your vocabulary.

 

“If you want to succeed”

There are many definitions of success, and your employee might define success differently. Your definition of success does not determine how or if your employee is successful. Not only can this phrase come off as passive-aggressive and offensive, it may also sound threatening if it’s used in a job performance review.

 

“Fine”

‘Fine’ can make you sound weak and mediocre, not to mention indecisive. No employee wants to hear that the project they’ve been working on all week is just “fine.” It also doesn’t provide the employee with much of a gauge as to how to improve, or if they even need to. Try being more specific instead.

“Seems”

Using “seems” seems to be weak and indecisive, much like using the word ‘fine.’ It’s weak if you’re using it to avoid being honest about employee work not being up to par, and it’s indecisive if you’re using it because you can’t make up your mind about how you feel about something. Try saying exactly what you mean instead.

 

 

“Be more like”

They say that comparison is the root of all evil. Don’t compare people, especially not your employees during a performance review. If you think an employee would do better if they behaved or worked a certain way, get to the root of the problem and provide concrete examples for improvement.

“Always”

‘Always’ is a strong word, and you should avoid it when speaking to your employees. It’s probably not true that they are “always late” or “always moody” or “always forgetting to save files to the network.”  

 

 

“Never”

Just like with the word ‘always,’ avoid speaking in absolutes whenever possible. You immediately lose credibility when you tell an employee that they’ve never done this or never done that. Soften your word choice and use something like ‘rarely’ or ‘often’ or ‘consistently’ instead.

You

It might seem impossible not to use the word ‘you’ or some variation of it when providing feedback. After all, you are speaking directly to someone. However, constantly saying ‘you’ or ‘your’ puts the employee on the defensive; it comes off as accusatory. It might sound awkward and unnatural to refrain from the word, but it makes difficult feedback a little easier to swallow. Consider using “I’m noticing a lack of communication and I wonder if it’s because the workload is too high” versus “You are not communicating and I think it’s because you can’t handle the workload.” See the difference?

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/8-words-avoid-when-giving-john-blakey/

 

 

If necessary, write these phrases down so you remember to avoid using them. Better yet, write a script or bullet points about what you’re going to say so that you aren’t making it up as you go along. Even practicing your feedback out loud can be helpful. Oftentimes, hearing the words out loud sounds differently than how they did in your head.

It Doesn’t Have to be Lonely at the Top

 

As CEO of your company, the buck stops with you. You have an executive team you rely on to help your business function, but you know that at the end of the day, you are the bottom line. There is only one CEO in the company and, at times, it can be hard to find not only the emotional support you need, but also resources from like-minded individuals for decision-making and success. The good news is you’re not alone; there are CEOs all over the world in similar positions and that’s why there are CEO peer groups.

 

Resources for Success

While picking the type of group, keep in mind your goals for your growth. This group can help you grow your worldview, collaborate on problem solving, be a sounding board for ideas, and share best practices. At the same time, this is a community that will hold each other accountable for goals and decisions and be willing to tell each other the “hard truths” that they can’t hear in their own companies. Some groups will have members facing similar challenges as you are and you can work through them together while other groups may have some members from differing industries or with opposing worldviews who can help guide and challenge you.

 

 

The Other Support You Need

While helping make decisions is one key function of a CEO peer group, another function is the emotional support a peer group can provide. Often, your company is more than happy to celebrate your successes with you, but the hard decisions that every CEO must make often come with little fanfare or celebration. In fact, those hard decisions, the ones that may mean your employees’ jobs are on the line, are the ones most likely ridiculed by the people you see daily.

Your CEO peer group is there with you for that. Besides helping you come up with the best solutions for those hard times, your peer group is there to help you with the emotional trials employees or even leadership teams can’t see. Your peer group understands what you are going through because they are going through it too. They can offer a level of emotional support no one else can. Humans are emotional creatures, even if the CEO has to project otherwise at times to their company. A CEO peer group gives you a place to still be a person, not just a CEO.

 

Find Your Group Now     

As CEO, you likely put the needs of your business before your own personal needs. But, as you can see, joining a CEO peer group doesn’t just benefit you, the CEO, but helps your business by making you a better CEO.  Can your business afford to wait one more day for you to join a CEO peer group or, better yet, can you wait?

Benefits of Being a Part of a Peer Group for CEOs

able to elevate

You don’t have to go it alone. It may start to feel lonely when you’re on the top of the ladder. Peer groups aren’t just for teenagers in high school. A CEO peer group helps high up leaders by providing support, guidance, and advise. Here are some benefits to collaborating and meeting with other CEOs:

 

  1. Know how to scale

Within a group, there are people who have been through it all. Mismanaging growth causes many businesses to fail. Another CEO will have valuable advice on how you can properly manage the ups and downs of your business.

 

  1. Don’t be Blinded

This group will have your back. There will always be something that sneaks up on when you are running a business. A group will can give you honest feedback and tough love to help you conquer and improve in any areas that sneak up on you.

 

  1. Accountability is Key

This is one of the major traits of having a successful business. In a CEO peer group, all CEOs act as partners and check in to see how and where the business is going.

 

  1. It Gets Personal

It is so hard NOT to bring personal problems into the work place, which can have an effect on your business. By being a part of a CEO group you are with people who understand and are dealing with the same things you are. 

 

  1. Access to Additional Resources

Having a strong network is key. The bigger your network the larger your pool of resources is. Running a business is all about options, and by being a part of a group made up of people who own and run businesses, the options are endless.

 

  1. Brilliant Ideas

A peer CEO group is a way of creating a board of ideas. The best idea is a well-tested idea. A group is a perfect setting to narrow down what ideas other CEO’s have implemented to know what went well and what didn’t.

 

 

Being a CEO of a business is a roller coaster ride. Although roller coasters can be scary, they are tolerable and even fun when you have someone to ride them with you. Being a part of a peer group for CEOs opens the door to friendships and partnerships that will help get you through the ups and downs of business. 

CEO Solutions: A Success Story

5 years ago, shortly after graduating from North Dakota State University, Jake Joraanstad and Ryan Raguse started working with CEO Solutions. Together, the two founded Myriad Mobile, a company that specializes in mobile and web technology solutions. They came looking for leadership training and advice; they’ve been part of the CEO family ever since. Through our strategic view, CEO Roundtable, and coaching, Jake and Ryan learned valuable tools that have aided them in their own success. We’re proud of our members and want to share their success story!

Located in Fargo, North Dakota, Myriad Mobile have become leaders and experts in their field. They take ideas and bring them to life through strategy and consulting; they work on things from web and mobile development projects to project management strategies. Myriad Mobile’s business strategies mimic what we value at CEO Solutions; their success is a direct result of hard work and fresh perspectives.

Recently, Myriad Mobile launched a farm relationship management tool called Bushel. Bushel has raised $7 million in funding from agricultural investors and software moguls. The Bushel mobile app platform has brought the agriculture industry it’s first tech product that simplifies the grain industry’s relationship between elevators and their growers.

The app gives farmers information at their fingertips. Having access to the information while in the field helps farmers make decisions on-the-spot. When you’re trying to decide which side of the field to harvest or trying to avoid shipping wet crops, being able to record and manage that information when the decision has been made will save time and improve efficiency.

 

Jake and Ryan took what they learned with CEO Solutions and applied it to real-world situations. Their approach to business merges integrity with decision-making to create a company that brings innovative ideas to life. CEO Solutions takes pride in the strategies we help our members develop and our members tell us they learn valuable lessons about what to do, and, sometimes more importantly, what not to do through their membership with CEO.

 

Congratulations to our friends, Jake and Ryan at Myriad Mobile, on their success! CEO Solutions is celebrating with you and we’re excited to see what new and brilliant ideas you breathe life into next!

Breaking the Employee Disloyalty Cycle: How to Retain Our A Players

In almost every client session I have these days, the top area of concern is staffing. We all want to know how to attract the best talent and how to keep them around. Almost invariably, the conversation drifts into the ‘kids these days’ realm as we discuss generational differences in working style and company loyalty.

 

The challenge I have with this conversation is that it is unproductive. It’s true that employees are less loyal to single companies. 41% of Millenials expect to be in their current job for 2 years or less. (source: https://blog.accessperks.com/millennial-employee-engagement-loyalty-statistics-the-ultimate-collection0). But it’s also true that companies are less loyal to employees. In fact, the average salary for a millennial today is 20% less than a boomer had at the same age. (source: https://smartasset.com/retirement/the-average-salary-of-a-millennial) This is a chicken and egg problem; in essence, a Disloyalty Cycle. Which came first, the lost loyalty of employees or the lower value from the employers?

 

Asking who to blame is asking the wrong question. You know that there are great people out there of every age. It’s about understanding what motivates and inspires your employees to do their best, regardless of age. The right question is, “How do I end the cycle and build a company where people want to work?”

 

At the end of the day, business decisions are about money. But personnel decisions are rarely that cut and dry. For the CEO or business owner, how much to pay an employee is a business decision. This role is worth X to my business. For an employee, working for company A or B is about more than money. After basic financial needs are met, where to work is a personal decision about one’s quality of life. 78% of millennials say workplace environment affects their decisions to stay at a job, and 88% of millennials want their coworkers to be their friends (source: https://blog.accessperks.com/millennial-employee-engagement-loyalty-statistics-the-ultimate-collection).

 

With the average cost of replacing a salaried employee at 6-9 months of salary, retaining key staff is incredibly important. So how can you bridge the business to personal gap? How can a CEO build a culture that attracts and keeps the best and brightest in a generation motivated by overall quality of life?

 

With CEOs paying more and more attention to culture, new members are being added the executive leadership team to reflect this business priority. You may be familiar with the CPO as a Chief Procurement Officer, but there’s a new CPO in town. The Chief People Officer.

 

For some organizations, the title of Chief People Officer (CPO) has simply replaced the title of Chief Human Resources Officer (CHRO) as the head of a department responsible for recruiting, hiring, on-boarding, training, and firing staff. But at some emerging growth companies, the CPO role is less about traditional HR business operations and more about organizational design, executive coaching, and implementing learning and development programs.

Another title for this role is Vice President of Culture, and these members of the executive leadership team are responsible for building a culture designed to improve employee retention as well as aid in talent acquisition. In addition, the CPO or VP of Culture works to develop an ROI model for your business’s hiring and retention efforts, helping you understand the exact impact of the wrong hires on your business.

 

This shift has helped business’s stray from the ‘need a body’ hiring mentality and into the investing in the right staff mentality. It shifts us from seeing our workforce as a red entry in our business ledger to a black entry – from a liability to an asset. And when we treat our employees as an asset to protect, we break the disloyalty cycle. And save our businesses money and time in the long-run.

Executive Evolution: How 2-D diversity helps accelerate growth.

The diversity conversation has changed. The old view of diversity, focusing on adding women and people of color to an organization, missed the mark in a big way. By focusing on physical characteristics, the well-meaning became the irrelevant. The current culture asks for authentic identities and potential clients can quickly locate mimics in the digital era.

 

Businesses have taken note.

 

With many chief diversity officers, as well as greater involvement from the CEO, background diversity, rather than physical diversity, has climbed up businesses priorities, and there is a method for how. It’s called 2-D diversity.

 

According to the Harvard Business Review, the model for 2-dimensional diversity is gaining a full head of steam as of late. In the 2-D model, there are two forms of diversity: inherent and acquired. Inherent diversity refers to an individual’s gender, or ethnicity. Acquired diversity is gained from unique experiences Companies that have three traits from inherent diversity and three traits from acquired diversity are considered as 2-D.

 

The benefit of 2-D is to capture markets in different demographic, as customers are more likely to buy from members that have a deeper understanding of their general background. In certain cases, 70% of businesses that practiced 2-D captured a new market, according the Harvard Business Review.

 

Employees within the company are also more confident to express new ideas. Leaders encourage their teams to be innovative and to make themselves heard. They search for the authentic market, and the authentic market requires the authentic voice. Companies that value difference are sure to support ideas from outside the usual perspectives, making funding for diverse employee projects attainable. The effect trickles down, as members from diverse backgrounds that take on larger roles set an example for entry-level employees.

 

Essentials of the 2-D model include:

 

  • Allowing each employees voice to stick.
  • Apparent support for the proposal of original ideas.
  • Giving team members the authority to make impact decisions.
  • Sharing credit for team achievements.
  • Offering abundant feedback.
  • Allowing and acting on critique from teams.

 

Companies that stress the importance of diverse output can see a greater response from their current staffs. It is not a process that requires to reach for rosters exclusively outside of their business, although, it may draw better prospects in.

 

True 2-D diversity impacts decision-making and builds implicit trust between team members and layers of management. It opens new markets, new ways of thinking, and creative problem-solving for your company. What could be better for a high-growth oriented, driven company?