Should You Lower Your Standards?

GEN Shelton notes in his book, Without Hesitation (p 112), that “an effective leader is not a hands on micro-manager; in fact the freer reign you give your people, the more they will excel-as long as you’ve communicated your objectives and expectations, and surround yourself with good, independent thinkers who are not afraid to speak up.”  He’s talking about how a values based leader has high standards. The values based leader always strives to do what is right.  Yet, he also discusses that a values based leader mixes in generous dose of compassion with the standards.

“You have to understand that for a certain reason,  individuals might have certain things they are wrestling with in life.  For example, you may be on a school bus riding to school and the person next to you is having a bad day.  For whatever the reason, they’re not their self.  But you’ve got a compassion for them because you recognize that something is going wrong. When you have someone who has had a tragedy in their family, you recognize that you know they’re a great employee, but they’re not having their best day or their best week because of this tragedy. ”

The lesson for me is that you don’t lower your standards. You expect everybody to do their best and achieve their personal and organizational goals.  You do recognize, however, that you have to get to know the members of your team, to know what is going on with them to the extent that you and the other person feel comfortable sharing. That knowledge helps you to understand how much they have on their plate and whether you need to adjust and give some additional time, if possible, to help them reach their 100% goal accomplishment for themselves and for the organization.  That’s compassion.

 Where have you seen a values based leader keep the standard high while simultaneously demonstrating compassion?

What is a Values Based Leader?

We are fascinated by learning from leaders. The basic formula seems to be:

  • look at a successful leader of one particular industry or profession,
  • interview that person,
  • look for lessons from that particular leader in that particular situation, then
  • try to generalize those themes to a broader audience.

Many fewer of us, however, look at universal or generalizable characteristics that can transcend a particular industry, profession, career, or where one is in the journey of life (K-12, college, early career professional, or executive).

GEN H. Hugh Shelton’s Values Based Leadership Model comes from his experience and success in the military, the corporate world, and his recognition by others for his leadership and contributions locally, statewide, nationally, and globally.  He’s outlined his key characteristics of great leadership as being a “Values-Based Leader”.  He talks about five cornerstones of values based leadership: Honesty, integrity, compassion, diversity, and selfless service. 

He believes that  “…any leader should strive to be known as a values based leader.  Values make up our character.  They’re things that we believe in.  They are things that we strive to make sure that we always include in our thought process when we think about making decisions.  A values based leader will leave a legacy each of us will leave behind if we strive to include these five cornerstones in our daily work.  We always try to do what was right and always support those who worked for them.  That’s the legacy of a values based leader.”

It makes sense then, for us to take a look at what he has talked about, his methodology and cornerstones for success, and how they might be applied to our personal and professional life. During the next series of five posts, we’ll briefly explore each of these five cornerstones and how we can apply them to our daily work.

Secrets of Success: Erskine Bowles

This next month signals the end of the Federal budget cycle. There’s been a great deal of passionate conversation about the budget and what can be done.  I re-read a snippet of GEN Shelton’s book, Secrets of Success (p. 65), and saw this snippet of a conversation with Erskine Bowles. I got the privilege to work indirectly with Mr. Bowles while he served as president of the University of North Carolina system.   I learned a lot from working with him on some projects to help our public schools and this snippet reinforces his values-based approach.  He is demanding, fair, and unwavering in his commitment to the needs of the state and nation. It was an honor.

“My understanding of leadership goes back to my father, Skipper Bowles.  When I was just a boy I remember going to a dinner over in Winston Salem, and when my dad was going to get some kind of prestigious award.  He looked at the audience and then at my two sisters and me and said, “Thank you, but I don’t want you to judge me based on what I’ve done.   I want you to judge me on what my children to for others.”  Later we asked him what he by that and he said, “Look, I believe that the success that I’ve had and the good decisions I’ve made in my life are a reflection on the values I got from my parents and the good education that they provided me.  I think the choices that you will make will be similar, a reflection on your mom and me.”  My dad used to always talk about how in the old south when you went out to chop firewood for your own family that you’d always throw a few logs on the community woodpile.  He’d say, “I want you all to feel that it’s always important to add to the community woodpile.”

So all of us – my sisters included – have, in our own distinct ways, tried to do just that, think about that night and what my father said in every leadership effort we’ve undertaken. I’ve had numerous opportunities to lead, and for that I’m very grateful. Working as President Clinton’s chief of staff, head of the small business association, and then later as the UN deputy special envoy to thirteen tsunami-affected countries in Southeast Asia all provided unique experiences. 

 Over the years people have asked me about the balanced budget when I was chief of staff during the Clinton Administration, wondering if that wasn’t the proudest moment of my time in leadership in Washington. My response is, “Yes, in some ways, but my proudest moment was putting together a team that had sharp minds and not sharp elbows.  We really focused on trying to move the country forward rather than to take some kind of partisanship off the table, establishing trust on both sides of the aisle.”  But the part of the balanced budget story that I like the best is this:  while we were balancing the budget we got twenty-seven billion dollars of new funding for health care insurance for five million poor kids. This was values-based leadership.  While being fiscally responsible we were still investing in something that could really make a difference in the lives of the kids.

Secrets of Success: Ed Gore

This is a short snippet (P. 51) of a reflection by Dr. Ed Gore, one of the Shelton Leadership Center  Board of Advisors.  You can find more reflections in the book, Secrets of Success.

My father had so many of the skills that make an excellent leader.  He was congenial, liked by people, but what I saw and carried over into my career was his work ethic and the willingness to seize the moment.  As a father and partner, he talked to me about sad family legacies and how there were so many of these wealthy upper-class people who had opportunities but never built on their parents’ and grandparents’ dreams.  But he’d look at it all in the light of the values-based leadership rules that he lived by and that Ive tried to live by, which is exemplified by the Four-Way Test of the Rotary:

  1. Is it the truth?
  2. Is it fair to all concerned?
  3. Will it build goodwill and better friendships?
  4. Will it be beneficial to all concerned?”

 

 

Avoiding the “One More Time” Syndrome

“The Army doesn’t give medals for missing your kid’s first step, or Little League games.” GEN Shelton relates this nugget that he heard as a young officer from one of his commanding officers, Lieutenant Colonel Old.  As GEN Shelton relates, LT COL Old helped him remember that one of the most critical decisions you make is one as part of a family and as a parent and spouse.  LT COL Old continued, “But the thing  you have to watch out for is the one more time syndrome.  I know you love those kids. But the night the CG (Commanding General) is due to drop by and you tell yourself, ‘Just this one time I’ve got to stay late because it’s so important’- or when you’re about to walk out that door and you get word the Coast Guard got deployed and you’ve got no boats for the next morning’s exercise-those are the ones that’ll sneak up on you.” (page 117 of Without Hesitation: The Odyssey of an American Warrior)

As I think about GEN Shelton’s illustration,  I think that integrity in decision making is made up of the hundreds of different decisions, large and small that occur in our daily lives.  It’s not just the big decisions that demand integrity and alignment with our priorities, it’s the multiple small decisions, like bringing work home late or missing family events that can degrade integrity in one’s personal life.