Be the Duck!

Last week I was asked how I manage conflicting priorities, aggressive deadlines and daily firedrills and remain successful.

I have not mastered time management, but I have routines that allow planning and prioritization especially important when dealing with aggressive deadlines, conflicting priorities and daily fire drills.

After I stopped laughing, I realized her question was genuine and for a brief moment I felt quite the fraud.  But then I typed,"Be the duck."  There it is.  Quick.  Concise.  Visual.

For those of you who have not heard me talk about my mom, let me introduce you to a Sandyism.

For years, my mom would tell my brother, sister and I to "be the duck".  It became humorous as our friends would ask, "why be a duck?" or "whats up with your mom and the duck?"  At one point, she even cut out a cartoon and put it on our refrigerator.  Not quite like below, but same message.

I remember the day, at a local pond, when she pointed out the cool composure of the duck.  Just gliding across the water.  From the surface, duck is calm and collected.  But underneath the water, the duck's feet are paddling, working with the water to move in the intended direction.  She extended this to people and those that always appear to have their stuff together compared to those that appear to always be in a state of chaos. 

My siblings and I knew that when Mom said, "Be the duck" it meant to demonstrate composure and grace through steady control over emotion. 
Daily I am challenged with all the above and daily I remind myself to be "the duck". 

To help me "be the duck" I have implemented three simple productivity tools into my daily routines:   1) Years ago, I started using a Personal Kanban to organize my work.  Kanban is so simple to implement.  It allows me to prioritize my work and ensure my work in progress stays in balance.   I love that our Architecture Oversight team has embraced Kanban using Jira and has rolled it out for the Patterns Development work as well as our transformation work.  Check it out here.
2) Another technique I use is the Pomodoro Technique which is a simple way to focus exclusively on one task / project for a set amount of time (traditionally 25 minutes) and then take a break (traditionally 5 minutes) and then going back in for another 25 minutes.  I use this in the mornings and lunch for email.  Basically, I turn off distractions (IM, text, and other), set my cell phone timer for 25 minutes and open up email and hyper focus.  When the timer goes off, I stop, save what I was working on to draft and take a break.  After the break, I repeat.  It is amazing how many emails I can respond to without distractions and with a time limit. 

3) Finally, I am a firm believer in setting intentions with agendas for meetings.  When asked to attend a meeting, I will ask for the intention and the agenda.  This helps me ensure I am ready for the meeting or in some cases address the need without having a meeting.

Happy Thursday!

Blasted Question #2

Interesting admission, this week I was asked to answer five questions for The Architect Newsletter.

The questions came to me in email, so I decided to use the Pomodoro Technique to quickly answer and meet the deadline.

The Pomodoro Technique is a simple way to focus exclusively on one task / project for a set amount of time (traditionally 25 minutes) and then take a break (traditionally 5 minutes) and then going back in for another 25 minutes. I use it every mornings and lunch for email.

Basically, I turn off distractions (IM, text, and other), set my cell phone timer for 25 minutes and open up email and hyper focus. When the timer goes off, I stop, save what I was working on to draft and take a break. After the break, I repeat.

So, anyway, I decided to use the Pomodoro Technique to answer the questions which I successfully did sans one question. My first pass, I answered question one then skipped two and went on to answer three, four and five hoping to circle around to the question. But my 25 minute timer went off as I stared blankly on question number two. Break time.

Five minutes later, I stared at question number two:

  2. What are the top competencies necessary for you to be effective in this role?

Several attempts, finally at the deadline I recalled one of my first managers at Wells Fargo telling me that social intelligence, emotional leadership and prudence are competencies that differentiate leaders from managers.

• Social intelligence is the ability to successfully build relationships and navigate social environments. Think for a moment about your protoconversation. You know, the micro expressions, voice intonations, gestures and pheromones that our brain is “taking in” for every conversation. These impact how we respond to others (social awareness) and how we have effective interactions (social facility). Both are instrumental and often show up when triggered (and think about them triggered when blindsided!).

• Emotional leadership (or emotional intelligence) is the ability to accurately perceive your own (an others) emotions in order to see the signals and how they impact relationships. Essential when influencing towards a common goal, individuals with this competency can create an “emotional contagion” that sets the tone for group level dynamics.

• Prudence is wisdom or common sense. Prudence as described in the Cardinal Virtues is the ability to discern the appropriate course of action to be taken in a given situation at the appropriate time.

These three are, in my opinion, the most critical competences to have in business regardless of role.

So my response was: One of my first managers at Wells Fargo told me that social intelligence, emotional leadership and prudence were the most critical competences to have in business regardless of role.

If those are foundational, then I would add to be successful as an architect, additional competencies include:
• Communicate - to describe technology to your audience whether it be someone highly technical or in layman’s terms.
• Inquire – to probe and ask questions to get to the “facts”
• Conceptualize – to take all that you have heard and pull it together into a consumable artifact whether that be a diagram, design, model, or something else.
• Execute – ability to take what you have designed and make it a reality.

Do you agree? Disagree?

What would have been your response to question number two? Inquiring minds want to know.

Happy Thursday!

How Do You Show Up?

My friend, Sherrie Littlejohn, is a life coach and speaker.

She also is my previous manager, a wife, mother and beautiful human being.

She is an avid blogger and I find motivation each time I read her thoughtful reflections.

In today's blog, she writes, "Success in life is more about how you show up than what you know or even who you know. Yes, each is important. However, would you agree that the foundation for success starts with you? Your attitude, your behavior, your mindset, your commitment, your passion, your enthusiasm, your courage, your confidence, your conscious awareness of yourself provides this foundation. When we start with ourselves, then and only then, can we learn, attract, and be our very best for ourselves… and then for others."

There is so much truth in this paragraph!
My attitude
My Behavior
My Mindset
My Committment
My Passion
My Enthusiasm
My Courage
My Confidence
My Awareness

How I choose to show up and behave allows me to be my best self.

Powerful reminder that I am in control.

Take a visit to Sherrie's site at https://littlejohnleadershipcoaching.com/ and tell her Stacy says hello!

Happy Thursday!

You Steer Where You Stare

I was introduced to the saying “you steer where you stare” last week in my book club.  After some self-deprecation and admission of being directionally challenged with an unhealthy dependency on GPS, I spent some time thinking about the true intention of the saying. 

 

“You steer where you stare.”

 

Sounds like an important saying for drivers training, doesn’t it? 

 

But, over the past few days this saying has presented itself to me on many levels.  Like, when my son was supposed to send me something quickly, but did not and when asked about it admitted to getting sucked into social media.  Or when I was late for an appointment, because I picked up the home phone “quickly” when I really needed to be on the road already.  Or when my other son did not get his chores done, because he was tending to a friend’s “crisis”.  Or when my trainer called me to tell me she had stayed out too late, overslept and would need to cancel my scheduled workout.  All great examples of getting distracted by [add reason here], taking their eye off of the commitment, and in doing so missing the intended result. 

 

Off track.  Distracted.  Simply because a redirection of one’s gaze.

 

Bringing it to work, at our daily Stand Up when you articulate your goals for the day; at the end of the day, did you deliver?  Admittedly, somedays, at the end of my day, I have so many excuses why I didn’t meet my goal.  I absolutely need to reset my gaze and recommit.  Without recommitting, days become weeks that become months and before you know it you are off track. 

 

You steer where you stare. 

 

So simple, yet transformational thinking. 

 

Let’s stare at those Big Rocks.  I mean, truly let’s lock them in our gaze. 

 

I want to challenge us all to use the Stand Up to truly articulate what it is you will focus on delivering for the day and tie it back to the Big Rocks.  At the end of the day, I encourage you to celebrate the accomplishment (or recalibrate for tomorrow).

 

Success achieved day by day by having our eyes on the prize. 

 

Happy Thursday!

Great Managers Do

"Be the change you wish to see in the world." - Gandhi

After a recent blog regarding a few back to back tough weeks, I received a wonderful note from a prior team member along with an article entitled 10 Things Great Managers Do by Steve Tobak.

Within the article, the author describes ten behaviors great manager exhibit that make work a better place. Using my words, not the authors, these attributes include being human, having a sense of humor, checking egos at the door, having the teams back, sharing of yourself, demonstrating integrity and rolling up your sleeves to get the work done.

During my first pass through the article, I had to remind myself to stop editing words in the article and just read it and enjoy. For example, the overuse of “subordinate” or the use of “employee” (I wanted to replace each with team member).

By my next pass, I took a moment for self-reflection and reviewed the list for the items I pride myself on and those that I need to focus on and demonstrate more of. #4 and #5 resonate with me as they are about being authentic at work as we are outside of work. A good friend of mine, Robert Thompson has said that when he drives into work “he sees dead people” and elaborates by discussing how he sees folks going to work removing their outside work mask and replacing it with the work mask.

I read it one more time while sitting in my chair on the hill with the rabbitts. I don’t know if it was the change in environment or the playfulness of the rabbitts, but I had come full circle and recognized that the list isn’t just for good managers, but leaders everywhere.

The lesson in the article is not to look up to management to demonstrate these behaviors, but to look within and ensure YOU are demonstrating these behaviors. Whether you have responsibility for a team or are an individual contributor, the attributes Toback discusses are as critical for building an high performing team as being on a high performing team.
_______________________

10 Things Great Managers Do
By Steve Tobak
August 18, 2011

There’s all sorts of rhetoric about what good bosses should and shouldn’t do these days. I guess that’s a good thing. Unfortunately, most of it’s pretty basic, generic fluff that sort of blends together after a while.

Even worse, a lot of it’s, well, utopian. It panders to what employees want to hear instead of giving truly practical and insightful advice on what makes a manager effective in the real world where business is everything and everything’s on the line.

This list is different. It’s different because, to derive it, I went back in time to the best characteristics of the best CEOs (primarily) I’ve worked for and with over the past 30 years. It’s based entirely on my own experience with executives who made a real difference at extraordinary companies.

Some were big, some were small, but all were successful in their respective markets, primarily because of the attributes of these CEOs. Each anecdote taught me a critical lesson that advanced my career and helped me to be a better leader. Hope you get as much out of reading it as I did living it.


10 Things Great Managers Do
1. Maintain your cool and sense of humor, especially during a crisis. When our biggest customer - and I mean big - thought I leaked a front-page story to the press, I offered to resign to save the relationship. My boss, a great CEO, gave me this serious look, like he was thinking about it, and said, “You’re not getting off that easy.” Then he broke out into a big smile.

2. Tell subordinates when they’re shooting themselves in the foot. Sometimes I can be pretty intimidating and I’ve had CEOs who shied away from giving it to me straight when my emotions got the better of me. Not this one guy. We’d be in a heated meeting and he’d quietly take me aside and read me the riot act. He was so genuine about it that it always opened my eyes and helped me to achieve perspective.

3. Be the boss, but behave like a peer. I’ve worked with loads of CEOs who let their egos get the better of them. They act like they’re better than everyone else, are distant and emotionally detached, or flaunt their knowledge and power. That kind of behavior diminishes leaders, makes them seem small, and keeps them from really connecting with people. They’re not always the most successful, but the most admired CEOs I know are genuinely humble.

4. Let your guard down and really be yourself outside of work. You know, teambuilding is so overrated. All you really need to do outside of work to build a cohesive team is break some bread, have some drinks, relax, let your guard down, and be a regular human being. When you get to be really confident, you can be that way all the time. That’s the mark of a great leader.

5. Stand behind and make big bets on people you believe in. One CEO would constantly challenge you and your thinking to the point of being abusive. But once he trusted and believed in you, he put his full weight behind you 100 percent to help you succeed. He’d stand up for you even when he wasn’t sure what the heck you were up to. And he’d give you new functional responsibilities - something up-and-coming execs need to grow. Okay, he wasn’t perfect, but who is?

6. Complement your subordinate’s weaknesses. I often say it’s every employee’s job to complement her boss’s weaknesses. The only reason that’s even doable is because we’ve all only got one boss. But I actually had a CEO who did that with each and every one of his staff. For example, I’m more of a big picture strategy guy and he would really hold my feat to the fire by tracking my commitments. It felt like micromanaging at first, but I eventually realized it helped me to be a more effective and strengthened the entire management team.

7. Compliment your employee’s strengths. It takes a strong, confident leader to go out on a limb and tell an employee what they’re great at. Why? I don’t know, but I suspect it’s hard for alpha males that primarily inhabit executive offices. Anyway, it’s important because we can’t always see ourselves objectively. Twenty years ago a CEO identified how effectively I cut through a boatload of BS to reach unique solutions to tough problems. Today, that’s what I do for a living.

8. Teach the toughest, most painful lessons you’ve ever learned. As a young manager at Texas Instruments, I once asked my boss’s boss for advice about a promotion I didn’t get. He told me a candid story about the hardest lesson he’d ever learned, the reason he was stuck in his job. He made himself indispensible and didn’t groom his replacement. It was painful for him to share, but it opened my eyes and made a huge difference in my career.

9. Do the right thing. Just about everyone says it, but I’ve only known one CEO who both preached and practiced it to the point where it became a big part of the company culture. You’d walk the halls and hear people say it all the time. He meant two things by it. When he said it to you, it meant he trusted you to do just that. He also meant it regardless of status quo or consequences. He had extraordinary faith in that phrase. Now I do too.

10. Do what has to be done, no matter what. It’s a rare executive who jumps on a plane at a moment’s notice to close a deal or gives an impromptu presentation when a potential investor shows up unexpectedly. It’s even more rare when he does it without asking questions or hemming and hawing about it. He just does what has to be done. That kind of drive and focus on the business is relatively common with entrepreneurs in high-tech startups - but it shouldn’t be. It’s the mark of a great manager who will find success, that’s for sure.

I confess, I am a Bibliophile!

I, admittedly, am a bibliophile. 

 

My New Year’s resolution was to read 19 books in 2019 and post reflections to Instagram (#19in2019).  When I hit 21, I stopped posting… I think this weekend I hit 37. 

 

Some favorites from the #19in2019 challenge in the order I read them:

 

#1   The Alchemist by Coelho

#3   Girl Wash your Face by Hollis

#6   The Awakening by Chopin

#7   To a God Unknown by Steinbeck

#11  The Screwtape Letters by Lewis

#15  Wolfpack by Wambach

#17  The Vegetarian by Kang

#20  The Coddling of the American Mind by Lukianoff / Haidt

#21   Start with Why by Sinek

#24   Where the Crawdads Sing by Owens

#32   Thomas Jefferson The Art of Power by Meacham

 

To see the others, follow me on Instagram at @stacyrea.

What does Insanity, Einstein, Rats and a Squirrel Have in Common?

I have a bad case of rats.

Which isn’t surprising considering we are on the Roseville annex line and back up to miles and miles of open fields.

And, 2019, has become the year of the rat.

Three years ago, it was the year of the locust.
Two years ago, it was the year of the spider (the size of small children)
Last year, it was the year of the raccoon and opossum.

The rats are a problem because they get in the chicken food, rabbit food and scare the bejesus out of you when you walk up to put the animals up each night.

So, I asked my husband to solve the rat problem and gave him some specific guidelines:
1)      No poison (because of the hawks and owls)
2)      No sticky traps (because of the blue belly lizards and king snakes)
3)      No death traps (because of the birds and squirrels)

This left us with live traps.  Eight live traps to be exact distributed in the back yard.

Monday morning (as in 7/29), I went up to let the chickens out and I noticed something rather large in the live trap in their pen.  Didn’t look like a rat, so decided to investigate.

An adorable young ground squirrel.

Fearing what my husband would do if he found it, I quickly got the trap, moved it to the top of the chicken food table and opened the trap.  The squirrel bolted.  I reset the trap and put it back in its place.

After a very hard lunch hour call, I decided to finish my lunch up on “the hill” (i.e. the farthest part of the backyard where the chickens, tortoise, rabbits and lizards live).

Approaching the hill, I notice the trap was sprung again.  Yep, the adorable young ground squirrel had been caught again.

Like last time, I got the trap, moved it to the top of the chicken food table and hit release.  Again, the squirrel bolted.  I didn’t think twice, but reset the trap and put it back in its place.

I think you all know what happens next, right?

Working away, it dawned on me that maybe – just maybe – I shouldn’t have reset the trap.  It was a hot day, nearing the hottest part of the day and God forbid the squirrel get trapped again.

Luckily that call ended early and I was able to run up the hill and found the trap sprung again with the ground squirrel.

Apologizing to the squirrel for not thinking, I grab the trap, moved it to the chicken food table and hit release.

This time, the squirrel does not bolt.  Instead, he walks out of the trap and sits down (literally, like a foot from me) on the table and just stares at me.

Not sure if he is angry with me or attempting to negotiate or saying thank you, I reach in my pocket and grab a rabbit snack and put it in front of him (or her).

I take the trap, close it, and put it at the end of the table.   All the while, holding a lively conversation with the squirrel (Did I mention I talk to animals?).

With my next conference call looming, I said goodbye to the squirrel and went back to work.

I kept reflecting on the squirrel for the rest of the day.  It probably would make you laugh to think of some of the thoughts, but where I landed was what matters.

Why do I keep doing the same things over and over expecting different results?   Seriously, after two times, why didn’t my brain click?

Was I just going through the motion?
Was I on autopilot?
Was I in a hurry?
Or, was I simply not thinking?

Whether or not Einstein actually said it, there is truth in “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.”

To get a different result, I just need to pause, think, adjust and alter the course.  If it doesn’t render what I want, I can just do it again.

That squirrel reminded me that we all have the ability to alter our future, just by altering our course.  So simple!

And, that is what insanity, Einstein, rats and a squirrel have in common.

Happy Thursday!

Conference Calls Should Be Simple, Right?

Create an agenda, invite the appropriate individuals and for the duration have a thoughtful conversation, make all the right decisions and walk away with a plan of action. But, nowhere in that plan, does it mention the technological glitches, individuals not fully paying attention or barking dogs.

The past two weeks, I have been on many conference calls that felt disorganized and to be frank, were not capitalizing on the invitee’s time.  One meeting took 10 minutes to begin as we waited for participants to join and then the facilitator spent another 10 getting the late arrivals up to date.  Another, the facilitator was late leaving us in musical purgatory.  The final straw was a meeting where everything that could go wrong, went wrong.  Children, dogs, cats, Darth Vader, and someone typing (using a hammer?).  No one was surprised when I cried out BLACKOUT and reported I had filled up my conference call BINGO card.   Not really, but you can picture it can’t you?

Over the weekend, I started to write down conference call behaviors that I want to hold myself accountable to and model in an attempt to change my engagement in conference calls.

My first draft was a tad verbose (see bottom of thread), but through the editing process I was able to create one liners:

How do I integrate these behaviors?
 · If I aspire to live these behaviors, I need to make them a habit.
 · In making them a habit, I need to model them in every meeting I attend.
 · In modeling them, I need your help to tell when I am NOT modeling them.

And, as a team challenge, what if we agreed to these conference call commitments for meetings we schedule and meetings we are invited to attend? Fast forward two years out, would these changes today raise our street credibility? I believe they would. Anyone up to the Conference Call Commitment challenge?

Happy Thursday!


 Conference Call Commitments
 I will be present and actively engaged in the meetings I accept.
 I will invite individuals who have a role to play. 
 I will make sure everyone invited is really necessary to the conversation and stop inviting folks as “optional”. 
 I will remember, the more people on the line, the more it costs the bank. Not to mention, the more people on the line means the less everyone pays attention.
I will start on time. And, if someone joins late, I will not catch him or her up. It wastes everyone else's time. I will encourage him or her to catch up with someone at the end of call to see what was missed or follow back up with the organizer after minutes have been distributed.
I will give the meeting agenda / goal within the first 120 seconds of the call. 
I will put intentions in my meeting invites as the other people on the call should know why I called a meeting and want I need from them right away.
As the call organizer, I will ensure everyone is engaged. This means calling on participants if they are not speaking.
When using a screen sharing, I will make sure it works before the call starts. And, I will make sure I am sharing only the presentation, not your whole computer.
I will keep my sentences “shortish” and remember to pause regularly. If I do, I believe this will allow people to jump in or ask questions. 
I will remember that unless I am giving a lecture, I should not speak for more than 75% of the call.
Five minutes before the end of the call, I will warn everyone that it's wrapping up, and ask if there are any questions. I will not let it run over if at all possible because I know it's disrespectful of other people's time.
I will have someone act as scribe and pass to them at the five minute marker to share next steps and action items. I will ask the scribe to send the minutes directly after the call so they remain top of mind to participants.
If I am joining a conference call, I will – at the first pause - introduce yourself.
I will plan my calls so that I am in a location where I can listen and engage. In the rare case that I am caught in a noisy location, I will let people know right away that I’ll be on mute unless I am speaking.
I will use the mute button strategically. And, if I am muted for 90% of the call, I will ask myself if I need to be on the call.
I will not be “that” person. You know the one that is not engaged, is checking emails, is responding to IMs and needs to ask for questions to be repeated. Instead, if I am not engaged – I will ask myself I need to be on the call. If I need to be on the call and am being distracted by a fire drill, I will consider one of the following: (1) Can a team member fill in for me? (2) Can the meeting be rescheduled? (3) Can I tell the fire drill originator that I need xx minutes before I can assist (4) Can I tell meeting coordinator, I need 5 – 10 minutes to address fire drill and return promptly.