10 Ways to Ask One of the Most Important Questions Of A Leader

I was walking a senior team through a feedback session on how each team member could improve their overall performance both with the team and with others in their organization.  Two of the senior members of the team got the same feedback - ask more questions and stop “telling” so much.  The key question the two were encouraged to ask of others was, “How can I help you?”  It’s a basic question, and can be asked in ten different ways.  

As a leader, I encourage you to pick a different question below for each person who reports to you.  In one week’s time, ask each of your direct reports the question you chose for them.  Listen carefully without trying to solve the problem right then and there.  Write out a summary of what you learned and report out to your team the next week what you learned.  I bet you will get more engagement, more connection, and more energy than you have seen for a while.  Keep it short and let them know, “Here’s what I learned and here’s what I want to do about it.”  Let the team respond and if you can’t answer an individual’s question right then and there, tell them you promise to get back with them and have an answer.  

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Transforming Ambition: Moving From Self-Centered to Other Centered

Abraham Lincoln’s law partner and eventual biographer said that Lincoln was “a little engine that knew no rest.” In other words, he was ambitious. Ambition is a key that unlocks our drive to make a difference. If you are not ambitious, you will probably not make the sacrifices necessary to channel endless amounts of energy to a productive outcome. And you may miss the opportunity to impact the world.

Ambition evolves in people. In childhood, the ambitious person has natural desires that say “I want to be great,” “I want to be famous,” “I love control,” or “I want others to adore me.” These self-centered drives and fantasies are often the undeveloped roots of ambitious people. For some, these desires never grow to a higher order of development, and as adults, these people become very sophisticated at disguising their true intent for fame, power, adoration, or control.

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Diving to New Depths As A Leader

I like a quote an entrepreneur friend recently used to describe why he was investing so heavily in employees to improve their work experience -

“What We Do in Life Echoes in Eternity.”

What you create in business or your personal life continues to vibrate out, in small or big ways.

One of my favorite writers, David Brooks, said in a speech at the Aspen Ideas Festival in July, that to build a powerful impact on people, leaders will be more effective if they pursue the development of moral depth.  That’s a bold statement coming from a New York Times columnist.  What does Brooks mean by this and how does it apply to increasing the impact you can have on others as a leader? 

Brooks says we live out two competing value sets, which he refers to as “resume values” and “eulogy values.”  Resume values are centered around achievement, winning, competing, getting high marks, and being at the top of the class.  Eulogy values are what friends and family will voice at your funeral.  For instance, when my dad past away at 90 years of age, we all sat around the family room after the funeral and reminisced on great sayings from dad.   The themes were love, sacrifice, perseverance through suffering, a “never give up” spirit, dedication to family, and integrity in all things.  For dad, integrity meant that any time you make a choice to compromise what you know is right, even if it doesn’t hurt anyone else, you diminish your soul.  (Now that is a deep thought worth pondering.)   

Eulogy values vector at a different plain than achievement values, and if underdeveloped or compartmentalized between work and family, they leave a leader stranded in the shallows of moral character. We all have met the stranded leaders.  Work is ALL about winning, it’s all about achieving, and it’s all about dominating.  Certainly resume values are important and critical for a life well lived, but if that’s your core focus, it leaves a hollow feeling in the connection with others.  People with moral depth can feel the lack of heart or “soulishness.”  It just feels shallow.

The best leaders I have met are the leaders who integrate resume values and eulogy values first within themselves and then within their company culture.  They are comfortable talking about love and humility and also being aggressive and willing to fight hard when necessary for what is right.  Service to others who are vulnerable or who need assistance is a given.  Respect and careful listening to each and every person, no matter where they sit in the organization, is a given.  The leader understands the value of each “touch point” with a person and how that “touch point” will shape the company’s culture for the better or the worse.  These leaders are passionate about doing great things and being great people at the same time.  It’s a both/and proposition.  For them, there is no other choice but to pursue relentlessly a depth of moral character, and as a result, build a powerful voice that echoes into the future.  It’s not corny, it’s not ethereal.  In fact, it’s the most practical and most basic step a person can take to becoming not just a successful leader, but a great leader.

Questions for a team discussion -

1. What would you say are the three most important eulogy values you aspire to? 

2.  How do you as a leader integrate these three values into the workplace? 

3.  What one character quality of the eulogy values do you want to develop more of?