Listening Into Others to Gain Influence

No matter what line of work you are in, you are likely seeking ways to be more productive and successful. And, regardless of the profession, how effective you interact with and influence other people can greatly determine your fate.

That’s because it is all about relationship, and relationships should always be about the long term.

We now live in a world that no longer tolerates disconnected forms of influence. Spam filters help block emails that are unrelated to our wants and needs. The stereotypical used car salesman is seen as merely comical and not taken seriously by anyone. Shotgun approaches to marketing are considered a waste of money.

Social networking, among other things, seeks ways to connect people and then influence them based on their connectedness. This connectedness means having your virtual friends’ influence what you do, where and when you do it, and especially how you spend your money.

Whether this is good or bad is not my concern. What I am interested in is how important this connectedness is with regard to our ability to influence others.

In a new book titled, “Real Influence: Persuade Without Pushing and Gain Without Giving In,” authors Mark Goulston and John Ullmen discuss how, in this post-pushing and post-selling world, influence should no longer be seen as something you do to someone else to get what you want.

Real influence isn’t even about what you want. Instead it’s about forging strong connections by focusing on other people’s viewpoints and giving something away before asking for anything in return. And always seeking win-win outcomes.

This seems to be a new paradigm that’s sustainable and good for everyone.

Goulston and Ullmen offer many tactics to learn how to do this, but the one I think most important—regardless of whether you’re trying to influence someone or not—is by improving your ability to listen to others. Easier said than done.

According to the authors, there are four levels of listening:

1. Avoidance Listening – Listening Over
   This type of listening is when you may be nodding or even saying “Uh huh,” but you’re not really paying attention. Your mind is elsewhere and the other person is feeling ignored despite your best efforts at appearing to be listening.
2. Defensive Listening – Listening At
   When you listen defensively you are taking things personally and are too quick to react. You listen at others by taking issue with everything they say without taking the time to consider what is being said.
3. Problem Solving Listening – Listening To
   Listening in this way is about getting something accomplished, which is a perfectly valid way to listen when the situation demands it. However, when the subject is especially complex or emotionally charged, this can leave far too much room for misunderstanding. You are separating the subject from the speaker and losing that perspective, which is so important to consider.
4. Connective Listening – Listening Into
   This is the type of listening all speakers crave. It is about listening with the intention to fully understand the speaker and also strengthen the connection. Connective listening is listening from their there instead of your here. It means listening without an agenda focused entirely on responding or helping.

I can think of many examples when I engage in the first three levels of listening. The first two I am not proud of and still struggle to avoid. Problem solving listening I do perhaps most often because I am so anxious to be productive and get something done.

But I know that when I listen in a connective manner is when I truly understand what is being said. I am giving my full attention and listening not only with my ears, but with my eyes, my heart and my body. I am also strengthening the relationship because I can feel the connection being forged.

To gain influence requires a continual focus on the long term, on the relationship, and on giving away something first. More often than not, this begins with your ability to engage in connective listening so you can truly understand their perspective and needs.

Influence should no longer begin with a self-centered perspective focusing only on the immediate opportunity. Instead, look at gaining influence in a positive and authentic manner that strengthens your connections with others for the long term.

What will you do for an Encore?

“I won’t retire, but I might retread.” – Neil Young

Just as the baby boom generation is entering retirement age, Americans are living much longer lives. For many, the idea of no longer working and retiring from a career simply does not make sense—philosophically or monetarily.

Back when a typical life span reached only into the early 70s, it made sense to stop working at 65 and take time to relax, travel, play golf or Bridge, spend time with the grandkids, and retire from the stress of a long career.

But with lifespans for many expected to reach into the early 90s, many are reconsidering how they will spend these golden years. Part of this decision is necessitated by the need to earn more money in order to pay for these additional years, but another part is the opportunity to perhaps change careers and pursue something beyond what you did for the bulk of your life.

It’s been reported that we often discover our true passion between the ages of 8 and 12, and then many of us try to rediscover what these passions are in career counseling when we find dissatisfaction in our careers. That’s because we chose a career that made economic sense rather than fed our soul.

So what if during these senior years, when the economic need for raising a family, sending the kids to college and building a retirement nest egg no longer outweigh what we are passionate about? What if we decided to pursue doing what we love, giving back, or working for social good rather than individual goods?

In Marc Freedman’s The Big Shift: Navigating the New Stage Beyond Midlife, he says we need to accept the decades opening up between midlife and old age for what they really are: a new stage of life, an encore phase. His organization encore.org wants to help make it easier for millions of people to pursue second acts for the greater good, and provide information so people can transition to jobs in the nonprofit world and the public sector.

“Millions are already in the midst of inventing a new stage of life and work—the encore years—between the end of midlife and anything resembling old-fashioned retirement,” writes Freedman. “We’re envisioning this chapter as a time when we make some of our most important contributions, for ourselves, for our world, for the well-being of future generations.”

A philanthropic organization called Social Venture Partners is built around the venture capital model to provide non-profit organizations with both funding and expertise. In addition to strengthening non-profits, SVP connects and engages individuals to provide greater philanthropic impact and collaborative solutions. Their partners are in various stages of their careers and life, but all are seeking to make a difference in their lives.

Founded in Seattle 15 years ago, SVP has more than 2,000 professionals in 29 cities around the world working to make the world a better place.

Sometimes staying in your chosen career a little longer can also be satisfying, but this may require a different role. Perhaps moving into more of a mentoring or consulting position will enable you to extend your working years. Maybe there could be more flexibility with regard to when and where you do the work. Or maybe it means moving to part-time, so you can pursue other interests and yet still keep involved in the work.

Encore.org’s Freedman has proposed some pretty radical ideas such as enabling those in midlife to quit their jobs and take a year of social security payments in order to go back to school or begin a new and possibly lower paying, but more satisfying, career. You would then delay the time when you begin taking social security payments, and thereby reduce the government’s overall cost.

The idea is to begin thinking about what you’ll want to do in these later years long before you reach them. Retirement planning should take into account that not working at all may no longer be an option or even desirable to you.

Rather than a firm end point to the work life, you may want to consider a transition time when you are free to follow what feeds your soul and eases you into non-working retirement. Your encore years could very well be the crowning achievement to your life.

Do the Work to be Lucky in Your Career

“Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.”  — Seneca

I often encounter people I admire who seem extremely lucky in getting a great job, regular promotions, and seemingly unlimited professional success.

For the most part, I believe these people earned this fate through taking responsibility for their luck. What I mean by taking responsibility is that they are doing the work necessary to be lucky in their careers.

In psychologist Richard Wiseman’s book “The Luck Factor,” he studied thousands of exceptionally “lucky” and “unlucky” people. What he found was that those who considered themselves lucky tended to exhibit similar attitudes and behaviors. And those identifying themselves as unlucky tended to exhibit the opposite traits.

His 10-year study revealed that good fortune is not primarily due to talent, hard work or intelligence. It is the attitudes and behaviors you have that can help determine how lucky you are in your career.

Wiseman identified four principles that characterize lucky people. They:

1. Maximize chance opportunities and are especially adept at creating, noticing and acting upon these opportunities when they arise.
2. Are very effective at listening to their intuition and do work—like meditation—that is designed to boost their intuitive abilities.
3. Expect to be lucky by creating a series of self-fulfilling prophesies because they go into the world anticipating a positive outcome.
4. Have an attitude that allows them to turn bad luck into good. They don’t allow ill fortune to overwhelm them, and they move quickly to take control of the situation when it isn’t going well for them.

Wiseman recommends listening to your gut, being open to new experiences, remembering the positive in situations and simply visualizing yourself as being lucky. By actively practicing these principles, he says you too can find more luck in your professional growth and development.

According to a survey from the professional networking site LinkedIn, 84% of professionals believe in career luck. And 48% consider themselves to have better career luck when compared to other professionals.

These LinkedIn professionals attribute their luck to having strong communication skills, being flexible, acting on opportunities, compiling a strong network, and having a strong work ethic.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics says 70% of all jobs are now found through networking. It seems obvious that the more you pursue the sort of people who can help you in your career, the higher the probability that you’ll meet them.

So what exactly is the work necessary to bring more luck into your career? I believe you can position yourself to be lucky in advancing your career by the following:

• Become more aware of what’s going on around you. The first step in any change begins with awareness. Not only of where you are, but who you are, and what you want to be. Practice mindfulness to be more conscious of the abundance all around you.

• Follow your passion and pursue those who fascinate you. Just because you’re doing one type of job, doesn’t mean you can’t talk to people outside of this niche. Don’t limit yourself just because you don’t have any experience or education in a certain field. If you’re passionate about something and have some talent in it, then find those who can help you nurture this.

• Open yourself to serendipity. A chance encounter is how so many great innovations and breakthroughs occur. Serendipity is the ability to take a chance occurrence—a surprising idea, person or event—and make creative use of it. Connecting the dots and seeing patterns can lead to novel ways of doing things and enterprising opportunities.

• Always be on the lookout and be ready to pounce. This is all about the preparation necessary to seize opportunities. It means having your elevator pitch always at the ready. And it means being able to pursue your interest when the right connections appear before you.

• Don’t count anyone out: see every encounter as potentially fruitful. You never know who you may meet who can help you take your career to the next level. Keep an open mind with everyone you meet to let them know what you’re looking for. Most people will want to help you if only given the opportunity.

• Seek out and listen to advice. Keep an open mind to others’ ideas and suggestions so you can expand your thinking. Learning should be a lifelong pursuit no matter where you are in your career. Ask questions and really listen in order to learn.

• Be nice even when others don’t seem receptive. Maintaining a positive attitude and showing appreciation is vital to attracting people and opportunities. People want to hire and work with people who are nice to be around. Make sure to demonstrate you are nice be around even when it may be difficult to do so.

• Reframe the situation. Your perspective can influence events. Crisis can mean opportunity. Getting fired from a job that is not aligned with who you are can lead to your finding the job that is. I’ve always believed that if you raise any glass high enough, it will look half full rather than half empty.

While acquiring knowledge, skills and experience are important to any career, luck also plays a significant role. And though many people think of luck as something passive that either happens or not, the lucky ones know it is much more active and requires work.

So do what’s necessary to adequately prepare and remain open to see the opportunities in front of you. Then you’ll have luck on the side of your own career development.

Collaborative Culture of the Coworking Contingent

The American workforce is going through a sea change with regard to how and where we work. The workplace of the future may no longer include nearly as many fulltime workers in cubicles, but instead provide only a gathering place for many contingent workers to collaborate on specific projects.

Contingent workers—including freelancers, temps, part-time workers, contractors and other specialists—today make up 25 to 30 percent of the U.S. workforce. By the end of the decade, they will make up more than 40 percent, according to the Intuit 2020 Report.

The report also states that “more than 80 percent of large corporations plan to substantially increase their use of a flexible workforce in the coming years.”

Our knowledge-driven economy contributes to this rise in contingent workers because organizations rely more on specific knowledge and expertise.As demand increases for highly-skilled and knowledgeable people, the expertise of contract workers becomes more attractive.

This can save the organization money as there is no longer the need to pay the fully burdened costs of fulltime employees as well as the real estate to accommodate them.

So what does this mean to the contingent worker? Greater freedom? Yes. Less job security? Maybe. Greater work/life balance? Possibly. Less compensation? Perhaps, but not necessarily.

One thing is for certain: the contingent worker will need to be a lot more intentional and active in finding opportunities, and also in collaborating from outside the organization.

A lot of contingent workers want to get out of Starbucks and other coffee shops, but they don’t want to be at home alone says Ryan Coonerty, co-founder and chief strategist of NextSpace in Santa Cruz, California.

“People like being around other people,” he says. “While they don’t miss some of the traditional office culture—like cubicles and set work schedules—holiday parties matter.”

NextSpace is one of a growing number of coworking spaces with locations in San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Jose and Santa Cruz. Coonerty says he plans to open another four to six locations by the end of the year.

Contingent workers are moving to these coworking spaces because they can find more quiet, fewer distractions, shared office resources, and collaboration opportunities. These coworking spaces can also be a lot cheaper than renting a traditional office.

According to Deskmag’s Second Global Coworking Survey completed last fall by more than 1500 people from 52 countries, “individuals increase their productivity and networks by joining a coworking space.”

The survey found there are now more than 1,100 coworking facilities worldwide, and that number is likely to increase dramatically.

It’s not entirely clear how an increase in these independent workers will change an organization’s culture. Contingent workers could help make companies more responsive to customers and market trends by bringing in a fresh perspective.

And just as outside consultants can often ask the hard or sensitive questions internal employees may not, contingent workers can focus on the objective at hand rather than let the internal politics get in the way of meeting those objectives.

My concern is how well these contingent workers will be able to effectively collaborate with fulltime employees. How quickly can rapport be established if the interaction is primarily via email and phone calls? How can trust be developed when there isn’t the time to regularly work side by side?

These contingent coworking professionals will definitely change the culture of organizations. And how organizations adapt to this less tangential and potentially more collaborative culture will determine whether this transition is successful or not.

Would You Hire a Remarkable Employee?

At a time when employers can be especially choosy about hiring, should they now pass on great employees and hold out for those who are truly remarkable?

While great employees may be reliable, dependable, proactive, diligent, and demonstrate the ability to both lead and follow, remarkable employees are all these and can also make a major impact on performance.

In Jeff Haden’s recent Inc. Magazine article “Eight Qualities of Remarkable Employees,” he defines these follows:

1.      They ignore job descriptions – Think on your feet, adapt quickly to shifting priorities, do whatever it takes, regardless of role, to get things done.

2.      They are eccentric . . . – Think out of the box, question the status quo, unafraid to stretch existing boundaries. 

3.      But they know when to dial it back – They know when to play and when to be serious; when to be irreverent and when to conform; when to challenge and when to back off.

4.      They publicly praise . . . – A compliment from a peer in group settings can be especially powerful when this is someone others look up to.

5.      And they privately complain – They bring up sensitive issues or concerns in a private setting to avoid disrupting the larger group. 

6.      They speak when others won’t – Remarkable employees have an ability to understand what concerns fellow employees and speak up for those who may be intimidated to speak up publicly or privately.

7.      They like to prove others wrong – This is the intrinsic drive to exceed other’s expectations because it’s deeper and personal.

8.      They’re always fiddling – These people are rarely satisfied (in a good way) and are constantly tinkering with information and processes.

Haden writes that while great employees follow processes, remarkable employees find ways to make those processes even better because they can’t help it.

I suspect many of these same qualities may actually inhibit employees from getting hired in the first place. When you think of the traits beyond skills and experience necessary for a job in your organization, how do these eight stack up?

Finding a job candidate who appears eccentric, challenges existing processes, and complains about anything may raise red flags during an interview. If the person gives examples of how he or she constantly fiddled with information, wouldn’t this raise the question as to what more important things might not have been getting done?

While all these traits of remarkable employees might fit in some organizations in some positions and at a particular point in time, I suspect they might be ill-suited for many. Perhaps only the start-up company is where they are best suited.

Not only that, but it may ultimately take a remarkable boss and a remarkable company to enable these remarkable employees to get hired and to thrive in the work environment.

Instead, for most organizations, I believe settling for these great employees who demonstrate reliability, dependability, pro-activity, diligence and the ability to both lead and follow is the best course of action. Finding and hiring more great employees would benefit every organization.

If remarkable traits surface from among the great employees you’ve hired, perhaps they could then be encouraged and nurtured. Your organization will be better served in the near term and, over time, it may benefit from greater performance simply due to having so many great employees.

Effective Leading Means Continually Growing

A plant, an animal, a human being all continue to grow or they begin to die. The same is true for leaders and entire organizations.

More than 20 years ago, Peter Senge wrote “The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of The Learning Organization,” and he defines a learning organizations as “…organizations where people continually expand their capacity to create the results they truly desire, where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, where collective aspiration is set free, and where people are continually learning to see the whole together.”

In “Great Leaders Grow: Becoming a Leader for Life,” a new book by Ken Blanchard and Mark Miller, the authors explain how leaders who stop growing can no longer be effective. As they write in the introduction “. . . the path to increased influence, impact, and leadership effectiveness is paved with personal growth.… Our capacity to grow determines our capacity to lead. It’s really that simple.”

Continual growth and lifelong learning are what separate those leaders who sustain their effectiveness from those who do not. Great leaders grow as naturally as they breathe. They don’t get caught up in ego-boosting accolades or the current high stock price. Instead, they remain humble to the ignorance of what they still do not know.

Perhaps no other skill is more vital in the 21^st century than the ability to continually learn and grow. And this is true not only for leaders at the top of organizations, but for all who seize leadership opportunities no matter where they reside on the organizational chart.

Individual employees need to continually learn and grow in their business and technical skills as well as their interpersonal skills; team members need to learn and grow so they can overcome conflict and dysfunction to be more effective as a group than they are as individuals; and entire organizations need to learn and grow so they can continually innovate and quickly respond to customers and market conditions.

This growth for the individual can be accomplished in many ways. Blanchard and Miller break it down into the following:

Gain Knowledge – know your strengths and weakness, know the people around you on a deep level, know your industry extremely well, etc.

Reach Out to Others – look for ways to invest in the growth of others, seek mentoring relationships with emerging leaders, frequently use teachable moments, share what you are learning with others, etc.

Open Your World – be on the lookout for ways to grow at work, seek new experiences outside of work, look for additional opportunities to lead everywhere, etc.

Walk Toward Wisdom – be honest with yourself regarding your leadership, actively seek feedback from other truth tellers, seek the counsel of others for important issues, master the art and discipline of asking profound questions, etc.

Each of us is capable of determining our own deficiencies and growing edges. Regardless, seek out feedback opportunities not only with your immediate supervisor, but with co-workers, customers, suppliers, friends, and anyone who can give you an honest appraisal of your strengths and weaknesses.

And don’t rely exclusively on standard, corporate-mandated training. Seek out the books, presentations, training, mentors, experiences, and opportunities that will serve you in your quest to continually learn and grow.

Take charge of your personal growth and take charge of your leadership potential. This is good for your career and it is good for the organization where that “collective aspiration is set free” and it can thrive in the new economy.

Working for the Best Companies

Fortune magazine’s recent “100 Best Companies to Work For” list made me curious as to how they determine such a list. I also wanted to know what traits these companies look for in potential employees.

The 100 Best Companies list was compiled through a partnership with the Great Places to Work institute, and they determine ranking based on the results from survey questions sent to a random sample of 260,000 employees from the 280 companies that participated.

To be eligible for the list, a company had to be at least seven years old and have more than 1,000 U.S. employees.

Two-thirds of the questions from the institute’s Trust Index Asseessment & Employee Survey were related to attitudes about management credibility, job satisfaction and camaraderie. The other third were based on responses to the institute’s Culture Audit, which includes detailed questions about pay and benefit programs and a series of open-ended questions about hiring practices, methods of internal communication, training, recognition programs and diversity efforts.

This is obviously not a list compiled based on popularity, exceptional salaries or who has the most celebrated CEO at a given time.

The goal of the list is to help “tie Trust Index metrics to your organization’s Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) so that you can understand the relationship between your organization’s business goals and your employees’ workplace experiences.”

This sounds like a worthy goal, especially in light of recent news about the deplorable working conditions in the Foxconn factory in China.

Companies are are broken down into groups such as the number of employees and include sub-groups such as job growth, low turnover, no layoffs, percentage of women, percentage of minorities, and all stars—companies that have been on the list every year since its inception in 1998. This includes 13 companies like SAS Institute (3), Wegman’s Food Markets (4), REI (8), Goldman Sachs (33), Microsoft (76) and Nordstroms (61).

Best perks can include things like health care (14 of the companies pay 100% of their employee health-care premiums), child care, work-life balance, telecommuting, sabbaticals, and unusual perks (Google has nap pods and in-house eyebrow shaping).

In this economy perhaps most important is the category of who is hiring and most of these companies are now looking for talent. In fact, there are more than 56,000 openings currently available in these 100 companies.

Human resource and recruiting personnel at these companies say they are looking for candidates with traits like passion, attitude, communication skills, collaboration, an interest in learning and values that align with our organization.

Here are some examples:

At Google (1)“. . . in addition to looking for strong cognitive ability and meaningful work experience,” says Yolanda Mangolini, director, global diversity, talent & inclusion. “We also want people with interesting and unique accomplishments—sports, music, starting a business, or writing a book, for example. Cultural fit and diversity are very important to us.”

Whole Foods Market (32) say they hire for attitude and train for skill. “If we can find applicants who have strong customer service skills and high energy, and are enthusiastic about the organic and natural foods industry (and who love food), then they are a fit for us,” according to Janet Lapaire, CHRP team member service coordinator.

Adobe’s (41) VP of global talent acquisition Jeff Vijungco says, “We want candidates to share some of the biggest failures that have shaped who they are as a leader because we celebrate failures as defining moments in an employee’s professional development.”

Intel’s (46) greater Americas staffing manager Cindi Harper, says they look for candidates “with behavioral characteristics that extend beyond their specific educational training.”

Brent Bultema, director of recruitment strategies at Mayo Clinic (71) says “strong candidates are people whose personal values align with those of Mayo Clinic. Individuals who are collaborative, collegial, professional, respectful and passionate will be a good fit.”

“Cisco (90) looks for people who are strong collaborators and communicators,” says Bronwyn White, director of human resources. “We look for people with a track record of continuous learning and who are prepared to question the status quo within their discipline. We value flexibility and promote work-life integration while making sure that we focus on results.”

“I have the great fortune to work with people everyday that love what they do and where they work” says Jack McCarthy, a recruiter at CarMax (91). “We want to see that same passion from candidates throughout our entire interview process. My advice to candidates is along the same lines; figure out what you do really well and enjoy, and find a company that has the right culture fit.”

In addition to general technical competency for the specified job, all of these Top 100 Companies are looking for candidates who have behavioral competencies also known as emotional intelligence or EQ.

The EQ traits they look for can include things like interpersonal communication, collaboration, empathy, creative problem solving, and conflict negotiation and resolution. And these companies want people who fit in with their organization’s values and culture because that is what keeps them on this best companies list.

EQ traits are not easily conveyed via a resume and therefore it is vital that they be demonstrated throughout the interviewing process. If you are serious about joining one of these companies, keep this in mind as you navigate the opportunity.

10 Tips to Improve Workplace Communication

In the spirit of year-end top ten lists, here are my top ten tips to improve communication in the workplace—for this and every year. Better communication is important because it can provide more engaged employees, higher workplace morale, and greater efficiency and productivity.

As I wrote in a previous post on how to improve listening, communication skills include reading, writing, speaking and listening. All of these skills are important in most workplaces and each of them should be considered.

My top ten tips to improve workplace communication are as follows.

1.  Clear & Direct. Be certain the information you need to convey—whether it is spoken or written—is clear and directly communicated. Use language that is specific and unambiguous. Check that the receiver understands the message as you intended. Avoid acronyms when there’s a chance they will be unclear.

2.  Actively Listen. Becoming an active listener means you make a conscious effort to truly hear what the other person is saying—in their words as well as their body language. Practice holding off thinking about how to respond or interrupting until you have thoroughly heard what they are saying. It should come as no surprise that the best communicators are also the best listeners.  

3.  Paraphrase. The goal of paraphrasing is to ensure you are clear about what has been said and let the speaker know that you care about what he or she is communicating. Both are equally important in effective communication. Use a variation on “What I hear you saying is . . .” to accomplish this.

4.  Face-to-Face. Whenever you have difficult information to convey or sometihing that could result in many questions, choose to have a direct face-to-face conversation. You will also have the huge benefit of non-verbal communication cues including tone of voice, facial expressions and other body language.

5.  Be Respectful. This means using the other person’s name, looking them in the eye, and nodding to aid in demonstrating you understand what they are saying. If you are communicating in writing, reread before sending your message to ensure that it could not be misinterpreted or taken as disrespectful. When on the phone, don’t multitask even if you think the person on the other end of the line does not know that you are.

6.  Message & Medium. Some of us are better communicating in writing and some are better at speaking. Some of us are better reading information and some at listening to information. In most cases, it depends on the message being delivered and received. When you need to deliver a message, consider whether it should be spoken or written depending on the content as well as the preference of your receiver.

7.  Tailor Conversation to Audience. Communicating with your boss, co-worker, customer or supplier may require a slightly different style. With your boss, be careful to pick the right time, and ask for what you need and what you expect they can reasonably deliver. For a co-worker, be direct, transparent, and open-minded. And if a customer or supplier calls with a problem, listen carefully, apologize if necessary even if it wasn’t your fault, and offer a solution.

8.  Effective Texting. More and more of our workplace communication is done via email, voice mail and text messaging. There are advantages and disadvantages to each of these, depending on the message and the audience. Texting can be especially effective when a quick question or answer is required without further explanation or repeated follow up, e.g., “What time is the budget meeting?” But don’t text when it cannot effectively communicate your message.

9.  Make the Most of Meetings. Way too many of us spend time in meetings that are unproductive and often unnecessary. Demand that those calling a meeting provide an agenda, hold to the appointed start and end time, and have only the right people in attendance. Ensure that the work done in the meeting warrants the time and resources taken away from those working independently.

10. Stay Positive. Regardless of the conversation, try to keep it positive. Even the harshest feedback can and should be delivered in a positive, supportive, team-centric manner. Stay focused on behavior or performance and not character. When you are on the receiving end, avoid getting triggered by difficult messages. Keep in mind the bigger picture and the long term implications.

These ten tips for improving workplace communication can be implemented and perfected by anyone. Take an honest look at your own communication skills then choose one of the above to improve upon. 

The work you put into improving your communication skills will pay dividends both at work and at home.

What CEOs Look for When Hiring

Earlier in my career I was fortunate to work for a CEO who I admired and respected. When he first interviewed me, he said he was looking for two qualities in the people he hired. These were integrity and a sense of urgency. Since that time, I worked for many companies with employees who demonstrated one but not the other, and I discovered how important these both were to me.

Legendary investor and philanthropist Warren Buffett says he looks for three things when hiring people: 1) integrity, 2) intelligence, and 3) a high energy level. But, he says, if you don’t have the first, the other two will kill you.

In a new book by New York Times columnist Adam Bryant titled “The Corner Office: Indispensable and Unexpected Lessons From CEOs on How to Lead and Succeed,” Bryant interviewed more than 70 CEOs and other leaders to uncover what he calls five essentials for success, qualities that most leaders share and look for in people they hire.

These five qualities are 1) passionate curiosity, 2) battled-hardened confidence, 3) team smarts, 4) a simple mind-set, and 5) fearlessness.

What Bryant discovered is that these traits are not something we’re born with, but they can be developed through the right attitude, habit and discipline. He contends that these qualities will make you stand out and make you a better manager or leader; they will also help you move your career forward like nothing else.

Passionate Curiosity
All CEOs are expected to have the right answers and be decisive in how they execute their strategy. However, asking the right questions may be more important than anything else. This curiosity may not show up in the usual public forums for the boss, but behind the scenes, this can be a natural way of being. It is about showing a genuine interest in the people around you as well as questioning the way and the why things are done. CEOs look for this quality when considering leadership positions.

Battle-Hardened Confidence
Failure is too often hidden in job interviews. Top CEOs are not looking for those who avoided failure throughout their careers, but those who have overcome adversity and learned from it. It demonstrates that you are capable of owning a problem rather than passing the buck. Many of the stories in Bryant’s book bring to life the concept of a “locus of control,” which refers to people’s outlook and belief about what leads to success and failure in their life. These are the folks who take on any assignment without question and get it done. They can be relied upon when the going gets tough.

Team Smarts
Team smarts refers to the ability to recognize the players a team needs and how to bring them together toward a common goal. “I need people who are going to be able to build a team, manage a team, recruit well and work well with their peers,” says Susan Lyne, chairman of the Gilt Groupe. “The people who truly succeed in business are the ones who actually have figured out how to mobilize people who are not their direct reports.”

A Simple Mind-Set
Senior executives want people who can present concisely, get to the point, and make things simple. Yet few people can deliver the simplicity that CEOs are looking for. All too often, unfocused thinking leads to lengthy and exhausting details. Demonstrating how much you know about a particular topic is not nearly as important to an executive as conveying the critical information and a clear strategy for moving forward. In the Internet age, with the ability to easily gather information, there is now a premium on the ability to synthesize, connect the dots in new ways, and ask smart questions that lead to answers and opportunities.

Fearlessness
CEOs are looking for people to do things, but not only what they’re told to do. Calculated and informed risk-taking is also important. “One of the things that I characterize as fearlessness is seeing an opportunity, even though things are not broken,” said Ursula M. Burns, C.E.O. of Xerox. It is risky to shake up the status quo, of course. But if you operate with the best interests of the organization in mind, you can open up new opportunities for yourself and your company. This is what separates those who follow directions and do things right from those who lead and do the right things.

These five qualities help determine who may be chosen for more responsibility and promotions, which then requires more learning through trial and error. And that continual learning, I believe, is another essential element of leadership.

Integrity and a sense of urgency are very important qualities for employees throughout most organizations. But to become a successful leader, the five essential qualities above can often be the difference between who the CEO sees as a leader versus another good manager.

First Why: Then How and What

In Simon Sinek’s book “Start with Why,” he writes that great leaders inspire people to take action by starting with an answer to the question of “why” as opposed to “what” and “how.” A simple idea, but one that is rarely implemented.

According to Sinek, all too often leaders and organizations focus on what and how: the strategy, product or service, distribution plan, goals and objectives. However, not starting with why leads organizations to rely on manipulations in the form of price, promotions, fear, and peer pressure to find customers.

And these manipulations are popular because they work. They can lead to sales and repeat business. They won’t, however, lead to loyalty. That’s because loyalty happens when your customers come back to you even when manipulations are offered by your competitors.

“Loyalty, real emotional value, exists in the brain of the buyer, not the seller,” writes Sinek.

Organizations who clearly articulate a why that resonates with others have the potential to inspire employees to come to work, customers to purchase, and shareholders to invest.

Making money is not an answer to why, but only a result. The answer to why is much more profound and inspiring. When that why resonates with customers, they flock to and remain loyal because it becomes part of their own beliefs.

Think of Apple, Harley-Davidson and Southwest Airlines as examples of companies with a clear sense of why. All of them are able to inspire their customers because they feel an emotional connection.

I was inspired by Sinek’s book so I decided to elaborate on my own why. This why is centered on the services I offer in workplace communication, organization development and leadership. What I do in my work is based on the following beliefs I hold to be true.

This I believe . .

• The role of a great leader is not to come up with great ideas. Instead, a great leader should create an environment where great ideas can happen.

• Everyone has the capacity for leadership no matter the position within the organization.

• Leadership development should not be restricted to executives, but implemented throughout every level of the organization.

• Most people want to do their very best at work.

• More autonomy for how the work gets done leads to greater employee satisfaction and higher productivity.

• A high level of trust in the workplace is directly related to greater productivity, higher profitability and more engaged employees.

• Getting the right people focused on the right task is the most important objective for any organization to reach its goals.

• Focusing on employees first is what will make customers happy and this leads to satisfied shareholders.

• Great companies don’t hire skilled people and motivate them. They hire motivated people with skills and inspire them.

• The biggest challenges in organizations are not business issues or technical problems, but interpersonal relationships.

• Loyalty between employees and employers is not an outdated twentieth century notion. Loyalty exists when there is mutual trust and respect.

• Organizations that focus on internal collaboration rather than competition have greater communication, innovation and trust.

• New technology breakthroughs for communicating do not eliminate the need for the basic requirements for real communication to take place.

Identifying the answer to your own why can help you navigate your personal and professional journey. This clarity around your own raison d’etre means you have a clear sense of purpose that inspires you to reach your goals and attract others to follow you.

For organizations, a compelling answer to why has the potential to build a brand that inspires and breeds loyalty among employees, customers and shareholders. And that makes good business sense.

What about you? Does your organization have a clear sense of why it is in business? If not, does it have loyal employees, customers and shareholders anyway?