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Our lives, our cultures, are composed of many overlapping stories. Novelist Chimamanda Adichie tells the story of how she found her authentic cultural voice -- and warns that if we hear only a single story about another person or country, we risk a critical misunderstanding.

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HBR Podcast: What it Take to Lead Across Generations

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HBR Podcast: What it Take to Lead Across Generations

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Generational differences may get laughs online. (Remember "OK boomer"?) But in the workplace, productivity can suffer when older and younger workers struggle to communicate and find common ground.

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What It Takes to Lead Across Generations

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Empathy can help you build common ground and tackle generational tensions on your team.

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FastCompany: Many Executive Lack the Most Important Leadership Trait. Here's How to Develop It Yourself

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FastCompany: Many Executive Lack the Most Important Leadership Trait. Here's How to Develop It Yourself

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Many executives lack the most important leadership trait. Here’s how to develop it yourself

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In this rapidly evolving landscape, know-it-alls will be left behind because humility is a prerequisite for knowing when to try something new.

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FastCompany: This Free Tool Helps you Make Step-by-Step Tutorials in Seconds

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FastCompany: This Free Tool Helps you Make Step-by-Step Tutorials in Seconds

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Scribe

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HBR Podcast: Creating Boundaries in Our Everyday Work

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HBR Podcast: Creating Boundaries in Our Everyday Work

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When you're struggling with mental health, the day-to-day routines of a work environment can be a lot - even for a famous author and academic, like Roxane Gay.

Gay speaks with host Morra Aarons-Mele about how recognizing and enforcing boundaries helps her navigate work and stress. Plus, later in the episode, we hear from Bob Pozen, a former financial executive and author of Remote, Inc.: How to Thrive at Work ... Wherever You Are, about productivity and mental health.
HBR Presents is a network of podcasts curated by HBR editors, bringing you the best business ideas from the leading minds in management. The views and opinions expressed are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of Harvard Business Review or its affiliates.

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Creating Boundaries in Our Everyday Work (with Roxane Gay)

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A conversation with author Roxane Gay about work and mental health. Plus, Bob Pozen discusses productivity and mental health.

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HBR: Stop Work Overload by Setting These Boundaries

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HBR: Stop Work Overload by Setting These Boundaries

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Why is it that when your friends, your significant other, and especially your mom tell you, You need to stop working so much! - you hesitate? On the one hand, you know they have a point. It's unsustainable to pull 12- to 14-hour days on a consistent basis, and you feel burnt-out and cranky. But when it comes to actually setting boundaries, you stall and tell yourself and others, "It's just a busy time. It will get better soon..."

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Stop Work Overload By Setting These Boundaries

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Reclaim your life with effective time investment.

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Ted Talk: Your 3-Step Guide to Setting Better Boundaries at Work

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Ted Talk: Your 3-Step Guide to Setting Better Boundaries at Work

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Nedra Glover Tawwab: Your 3-step guide to setting better boundaries at work

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Know you should establish clear limits at work but not sure how to do it? Here are a few strategies from relationship therapist and author Nedra Glover Tawwab that can help you feel more empowered and less overwhelmed, both on and off the job.

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Esther Perel: The Routines, Rituals, Boundaries we Need in Stressful Times

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Esther Perel: The Routines, Rituals, Boundaries we Need in Stressful Times

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Get a daily email featuring the latest talk, plus a quick mix of trending content.

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Esther Perel: The routines, rituals and boundaries we need in stressful times

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How do you effectively regulate stress? Therapist Esther Perel discusses the importance of creating routines, rituals and boundaries to deal with pandemic-related loss and uncertainty -- both at home and at work -- and offers some practical tools and techniques to help you regain your sense of self.

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HBR: How to Set Boundaries with a Chatty Colleague

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HBR: How to Set Boundaries with a Chatty Colleague

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You might think you're being generous or patient by listening to a chatty coworker talk endlessly, but you're simply letting resentment fester that's toxic to your emotional well-being and productivity. The author offers advice for setting boundaries with a talkative colleague in a compassionate, diplomatic way that still allows you to get your work done: 1) Preempt their request, 2) drive towards a close, 3) perfect the art of interruption, 4) come from your perspective, 5) direct dialogue to a certain time, and 6) have a big picture conversation.

Charlotte arrived at our coaching session frazzled and distraught. "I can't stand it anymore," she huffed, throwing her hands up. Charlotte explained that she had had another meeting with her chatty counterpart on the data science team. While she generally enjoyed working with this colleague, Charlotte felt frustrated that their planning sessions regularly ran 20 to 30 minutes over the scheduled time, causing her to be late for her other appointments. Charlotte's colleague tended to ramble and blather on and on, talking in circles about their analytics, not allowing anyone else to get a word in edgewise.

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How to Set Boundaries with a Chatty Colleague

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You might think you're being generous or patient by listening to a chatty coworker talk endlessly, but you're simply letting resentment fester that's toxic to your emotional well-being and productivity.

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How to Debate Ideas Productively at Work

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HBR: How to Debate Ideas Productively at Work

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HBR: How to Debate Ideas Productively at Work

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Not long ago, I gave a speech at a company that had been recently acquired and since gone from 300 employees to 1,400. Rapid changes are hard for any organization, but when I asked these leaders what their biggest challenge was they didn't say "scaling our tech infrastructure" or "hiring good people fast enough" or "integrating with our parent company."

They were worried about how many damn fights their people were having. The company had "a culture of arguing," they said - starting at the top - and, given the group's ballooning size and new ownership, they were worried those patterns of behavior weren't sustainable or productive.

I told them that arguing could be a very good thing - perhaps the key to their success - if they could train people to do it in a healthy way.

Research tells us that cognitive diversity makes a group smarter. Two heads are, indeed, better than one, and many heads are even better, especially when everyone is willing to share their expertise and opinions.

Studies also show that most mergers and acquisitions don't fail because of conflict. They fail from the " organizational silence" that stems from the fear of conflict. This is the same reason that, if you're looking for signs that a romantic couple is about to split, "not talking" is a better leading indicator than "fighting a lot."

While diverse thinking and disagreements can be uncomfortable, they are more likely to lead partners or a team to make progress, innovate, and come up with breakthrough solutions than consensus and "nice" conversations in which people hold back what they think.

In theory this means that a group such as, say, the U.S. Congress, ought to be pretty good at solving problems. The hundred members of the U.S. Senate come from 50 different states and several generations and should thus have a variety of viewpoints. (Perhaps they still don't have enough variety, but we'll leave that discussion for another day.) And boy do they argue. But the way they argue is rife with intellectual dishonesty. And the "rules" that govern their debates, especially on television, are ineffective at encouraging productive debate.

Unfortunately, most of the rest of us fall into similar pitfalls. We get sucked into trying to "win"- so we look good or don't make the group we represent look bad - which leads us to ignore logic and evidence that go against our original beliefs. And so we fight without making much progress.

We can change this dynamic, moving toward more effective discourse (exchanging diverse ideas) and debate (arguing honestly for and against the merits of those ideas), by training people to adopt the right habits. Here's how:

Remember we're all on the same team. Just about all debates fall into one of three categories: The kind where the goal is to persuade people you're right; the kind where the goal is to look better than your opponent; and the kind where the goal is to find better solutions together. The third is the one that helps us get the most out of a group's cognitive diversity. To steer people in that direction, set the stage by kicking off the discussion with a shared goal, a spirit of inquiry, and emphasis that everyone is on the same team. Offer these reminders:

We're here together in the spirit of inquiry, as comrades, not adversaries.

Our shared goal is to find the best way to do [x].

All viewpoints in service of this goal are welcome.

There is no "winner." The team wins if we make progress.

Everyone is an equal participant; there is no hierarchy or special weight given to one person's viewpoint over another's.

Keep it about facts, logic, and the topic at hand. One of the most difficult - and crucial - elements of a productive debate is keeping it on one track. Arguments tend to fracture, especially when people feel like their ideas or identities are coming under attack. Unfortunately, when people feel strongly about their opinions, they tend to, often subconsciously, resort to logical fallacies, question dodging, bad facts, and outright deception. Or they bring in outside issues to bolster their points and distract people from counterarguments. It's important for leaders (and participants) to be vigilant, so none of these bad behaviors sneak into debates. Tell people to follow these rules:

The debate is not about who cares more, who's loudest, who's most powerful, or who's most articulate.

No tricky rhetorical tactics.

Distinguish between facts and interpretations (stories people have about the facts).

Identify logical fallacies, and rewind.

Check the validity of assertions of fact, and analyze the quality of the evidence, not just the evidence.

If the debate veers into other topics, acknowledge it and reset.

Don't make it personal. Arguments tend to fracture when people feel like their ideas or identities are coming under attack. Emotion and ego begin to play a much bigger role and everyone becomes less likely to appreciate others' points of view, which greatly reduces the potential for innovation or problem-solving. To ensure that debates don't get sidetracked in this way, we need to explicitly depersonalize our arguments. In other words:

No name calling or personal attacks.

Stay away from questions that cast judgment on people, rather than their ideas. Instead of questions like "how could you believe that?" or "why can't you see?", pose "what" questions instead, such as "what makes you feel that way?" or "what has led you to that conclusion?"

Give people the benefit of the doubt. Assume that everyone's intentions are good.

Nobody loses face for changing their mind.

Reward people for carrying the group forward, rather than being "right."

Be intellectually humble. For a debate to truly be productive, participants need to be willing to respect every viewpoint and change their minds when necessary. This is what psychologists call intellectual humility, and it's one of the most important skills a good leader - and productive debater - can develop. This rule breaks down like so:

Don't take things personally.

Listen to and respect every person and their viewpoint, even if you disagree.

Admit when you realize you're wrong, and cheerfully concede when others have good points.

Be curious. Even bad ideas can be useful; they can help us find new and better ideas.

It's important for everyone involved in a discourse - whether it's a one-on-one over coffee or a public discussion in a board room - to exemplify these habits. But leaders (or whoever has the most power in the room) should be the first to hold themselves accountable to them.

The key to breakthrough problem solving isn't getting along well. It's not getting along - well.

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How to Debate Ideas Productively at Work

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Research tells us that cognitive diversity makes a group smarter. Two heads are, indeed, better than one, and many heads are even better, especially when everyone is willing to share their expertise and opinions.

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HBR: When You're Pushed Outside Your Comfort Zone

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HBR: When You're Pushed Outside Your Comfort Zone

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HANNAH BATES: Welcome to HBR on Leadership, case studies and conversations with the world's top business and management experts, hand-selected to help you unlock the best in those around you. Is your job pushing you outside your comfort zone? Probably in some ways; maybe not in others. Either way, it's important to understand how to make the most of stretch responsibilities. In this episode, executive coach and former venture capitalist Jerry Colonna discusses what to do when you don't feel qualified for your new role, or if you're covering an absentee boss's responsibilities, OR when you're leading a team but haven't been given formal power. This episode originally aired on Dear HBR in June 2019. Here it is.

DAN MCGINN: Welcome to Dear HBR from Harvard Business Review. I'm Dan McGinn.

ALISON BEARD: And I'm Alison Beard. Work can be frustrating, but it doesn't have to be. We don't need to let the conflicts get us down.

DAN MCGINN: That's where Dear HBR: comes in. We take your questions, look at the research, talk to the experts, and help you move forward.

ALISON BEARD: Today we're talking about stretch goals with Jerry Colonna. He's an executive coach and former venture capitalist, and the author of the book Reboot: Leadership and the Art of Growing Up. Jerry, thanks so much for coming on the show.

JERRY COLONNA: Oh, thanks for having me. It's a blast to be here.

ALISON BEARD: So, when you were a VC, you were often investing in unproven people, and now you're a coach. How can you tell when someone is ready to stretch?

JERRY COLONNA: Well, usually they break out in a sweat and start shaking. [LAUGHTER] Ugh, do I really have to grow, I don't really want to grow, oh my god, I'm growing!

ALISON BEARD: But how do you know that they're ready?

JERRY COLONNA: I watch and see the ways in which they are responding to new assignments, and this may sound odd, the mistakes that they're making. As a father of a friend of mine likes to say, if you're not standing on the edge, you're taking too much space.

ALISON BEARD: There is this inherent risk of failure though, have you seen people take stretch goals and not do them well?

JERRY COLONNA: Of course. And, but Alison, you say that like, as if failure's the problem. You know, not to get all Zen Buddhism on you, but there's something really, really powerful and liberating when we think about each step in that stretching towards doing something new as precisely that. And the expectation is we are going to get it wrong. That's growth, that's learning.

DAN MCGINN: Dear HBR: A year and a half ago I relocated with my family to a new part of the country. I took a job at a new industry, and in a role that was completely new to me. I was hired for some of the finance skills I had developed in previous jobs. Also, to put it bluntly, my new employers is a small firm in a small market, my manager was struggling to find qualified people. The roll was a bit of a step back, however, I worked hard and we made it through a novel company-wide project. It received a lot of attention from senior management, and from the board. Because of his visibility on this project, and his skills, my boss quickly moved up, creating a need for someone to take his position. He believed I could fill the role. I was very hesitant, but eventually, they offered me the job, and I didn't feel like I could turn it down. The bump in income will help at home. The increase in responsibility scares me. Here's what I'm worried about before I got here. I had never even seen or heard a lot of the types of work that I'm now involved in. I still have so much to learn and get up to speed on. My boss understands my concerns. He's assured me that at least for the first year or so, things won't change much from the way we handled the work last year and that he will help me out whenever I need it. Part of me worries that eventually, he's going to drop something in my lap and say good luck. The reality is he's busy. Most of the guidance I get from him is on the fly. I'm beginning to understand what people mean by Imposter Syndrome. I feel like a total fraud. It's a fairly small office, and everyone recognizes how new I am. They have to know that I don't have experience in this kind of technical role. I worry people will think I should not have been promoted. What can I do? Jerry, what's your initial reaction?

JERRY COLONNA: New job, new city, new circumstances, new, new, new. Well, there's that stretching. I'm, I'm doing things I have never done before. I'm being asked to do things I've never done before. The thing that occurs to me, one of the last episodes of Mad Men. Do you remember that TV show?

DAN MCGINN: Sure.

ALISON BEARD: Mm-hmm.

JERRY COLONNA: I loved that show. And what was the name of the executive assistant who worked for Don?

ALISON BEARD: Peggy.

JERRY COLONNA: Peggy, Peggy, Peggy.

DAN MCGINN: She got promoted up, sure.

JERRY COLONNA: Right, so she gets promoted up to the ranks, and, and one of my favorite scenes is Peggy's basically the boss, and she's coming to Don trying to figure out what to do. And she's just like breathless and filled with anxiety. And she's like Don, I don't, I don't know what, I don't know what to do, I don't know what to, and he looks at her in that sort of weird sage-like way, and he says welcome to the not knowing.

ALISON BEARD: Because he's the master of faking it till you make it. So, is that what you're supposed to do?

JERRY COLONNA: He is not only the master of faking it till you make it, but he's actually saying something that's genuine and true. Which is that leading and stepping into that leadership is welcome to the not knowing.

DAN MCGINN: Yeah, I think one of the things that's important about Imposter Syndrome is that everybody feels that way at some point.

JERRY COLONNA: Exactly.

DAN MCGINN: It's a universal feeling, everybody thinks oh, it's just me, I'm the only one that doesn't know what I'm doing. No, everybody feels that way.

JERRY COLONNA: That's right. Buried within the universality is the opportunity for your own self-growth, because wait a minute, wait a minute, so here I am in that Imposter Syndrome moment, I don't know what the hell I'm doing, I'm worried everybody's going to figure it out. Wait, everybody's walking around feeling that way?

ALISON BEARD: Yeah, so just to clarify Imposter Syndrome is a term originally coined by two psychologists. It basically means having self-doubt, insecurity, worry that you're inadequate, and it's going to be discovered.

JERRY COLONNA: That last bit, Alison, that you just shared, that it's going to be discovered, I think that's really important because it's not merely having self-doubt, but it's having self-doubt in the midst of a bunch of people who somehow have figured out that you don't know what you're doing.

DAN MCGINN: So, even if this is totally normal though, it's still not very pleasant. What constructive advice can we give him to try and reduce these unpleasant insecure feelings?

JERRY COLONNA: Well, first connect with the universality of it. Don't fake it. Don't walk around and pretend that you know when you, in fact, don't know. Cause I actually think that that feeds the Imposter Syndrome.

ALISON BEARD: Absolutely. We published a great piece by Andy Molinsky at Brandeis who talks about recognizing the benefits of being a novice. You know, don't act as if you are an expert, understand that you're not, and then ask really smart questions.

JERRY COLONNA: Yeah, I think the, I think the most under-utilized statement in these situations is, I don't know, I haven't done this before, what would you do.

DAN MCGINN: I think there's a happy medium in terms of, of advertising his lack of technical skill and his novice status. But, I think he probably wants to err on the side of acknowledging he's not a super technical person and he's going to need some learning curve and some help with this.

ALISON BEARD: And I think that will go a long way into his employees embracing him as a leader.

JERRY COLONNA: Can I add a corollary to this?

ALISON BEARD: Yeah.

JERRY COLONNA: When a leader, in a new situation, in a stretch goal, is able to sort of connect with the reality of what they know and they don't know and speak truthfully from that, there's this lovely, lovely corollary benefit that occurs called trust. Then all of a sudden you start to pull the team together and people start rooting for you.

DAN MCGINN: In terms of people rooting for him, the thing that I like most about our listener situation here is that it sounds like his boss is a really good guy, it sounds like the boss wants him to succeed, has the technical skills to help him succeed, how can our listener get the knowledge he needs from a supportive boss who's crazy busy?

JERRY COLONNA: Well, the first thing to also, I would add, is it sounds like the boss believes in the listener.

ALISON BEARD: And there are clearly other people in the organization who feel the same way because they offered him this promotion.

JERRY COLONNA: That's right, that's right. And that's a reality. I mean, we can see it because we're not in that listener's body feeling the panic. So, that's the first thing is like okay, if I believe in these people, and they believe in me, then maybe this Imposter Syndrome isn't 100% accurate. Then to walk in and say look, I know you're really busy, to send an email or something, I know you're really busy. Some point in the next two weeks, can I get an hour. And you just want to sort of develop that communication and that cadence, and that will go a long way to easing some of the anxiety.

DAN MCGINN: It sounds like our listener is reluctant to bother his busy boss with questions, which makes sense, you know, everybody wants to be respectful of their boss's time. But at the same time, it's in everybody's best interest here for this knowledge to get transferred and for him to succeed in this. Because if he fails, it's not just him that fails, it's going to be problematic for the organization. He's already said that this is an organization that really has a hard time finding qualified people. So, organizationally everybody here wants him to succeed and he needs to think about that when he's sort of reluctantly asking for time.

ALISON BEARD: And going back to the team rooting for him, you know, he talks about it being a small office, he doesn't talk about anyone being resentful, you know, or some rival being angry that they haven't been promoted to the position, so I do think that he's underestimating everyone's support for him.

JERRY COLONNA: I think you're right, I think you're spot on.

DAN MCGINN: Do you think that any of the people below him in the hierarchy, the team, might have some of these skills? Instead of just looking upward up the ladder to get the training and technical know-how he needs, I wonder if he could look downward and see if the people that are on his new team might be able to transfer some of those skills.

JERRY COLONNA: That's a great observation and insight. Those people quote below them, may, in fact, be dying to be able to share that technical knowledge. They may be looking for that opportunity to shine. And that's also something a good leader can do.

ALISON BEARD: I also wonder whether he could find a training program, or work with a consultant, just to build those skills as rapidly as they possibly can without taking too much time from his boss should he not be able to find it within the organization itself.

JERRY COLONNA: Yeah, I'd add to that too, peer groups, getting groups of people together cross-functionally within the same organization, or even outside your own organization, but people who have similar responsibilities. That can be an enormous resource for people. But you have to be willing to admit that you don't know something in order to get the value out of a peer relationship.

DAN MCGINN: Since part of his problem seems to be confidence here, maybe he can talk directly with the boss and say look, you know, you just, we just did this big project together that was successful when I was in my old role, is there anything we can do in the first three months in this new role I'm in that will be a success, give us a W, and maybe give me a little bit of a boost I need to feel like I'm actually qualified to do this.

JERRY COLONNA: I feel like those early wins are a great way to foster that sense of, of shared accomplishment of a goal as well.

ALISON BEARD: Is there any chance that our letter writer is right and that he has been promoted beyond his abilities?

JERRY COLONNA: Sure. And I think that that's sort of an interesting stretch-point, right, because people are promoted beyond their abilities or promoted, let's call it prematurely, all the time. That's what fast-growing companies need to do. There are many people within the organization who are probably being stretched by being promoted into positions that under traditional circumstances they may not have otherwise qualified for.

ALISON BEARD: Right. I guess you can be promoted beyond your abilities, but then as long as you are on a perpetual learning path, eventually you'll be able to handle the job no problem. I think that was another great bit of advice from Annie Molinsky that you should measure yourself not by everything that you're getting done or how much you know, but by how much you're learning each day, how much better are you getting.

DAN MCGINN: That's a great point. That can almost be part of our listener's messaging here, which is, look, I realize I'm not the perfect person for this job, but the company seems to think that I'm the best available under these circumstances, and I'm going to do my best to learn and get up to speed.

JERRY COLONNA: Yeah, I think that's great. And what I would add to that is, and I welcome your feedback when you see the things that I could be learning and growing further around. And that just opens up all the space for growth for everybody.

ALISON BEARD: So, Dan, what are we telling our letter writer who feels like an imposter?

DAN MCGINN: Well, first he's not an imposter. What he's feeling is totally normal and widespread, and we think he's really well situated here because he has a good boss, who's invested in him, who has the know-how to help him learn the skills he needs. So, I think they need to get into a very good structured check-in kind of schedule. Don't look upon this as a burden, this is the boss's job, and he needs to structure a way to make time for it. At the same time, the listener should recognize that there might be other sources of know-how that he can tap into. He can look towards peers or even subordinates in the organization, some of whom may have the technical skills that he lacks. He can look outside the organization, whether it's informally through peer organizations or whether it's through some sort of a more formal training program. And finally, we think it would be great if he and the boss came up with a plan to get him some early wins in the new role to help develop his confidence and to help to prove to everybody that he is making progress in getting up to speed and the requirements of the job.

ALISON BEARD: Dear HBR: I'm a junior communications manager at a small but very quickly growing software company. Our director of operations is this all-star player, who's practically running the company by herself for a few years. We're restructuring in order to spread out the work, but her schedule is still so full, that it's been a real problem. She frequently misses meetings and ignores emails. She comes in and out of the office so quickly that catching her in person is nearly impossible. We pride ourselves on our awesome company culture, I feel that she is detracting from it by not being present or even approachable. It seems like she doesn't respect my time, or anyone else's, and can't be bothered to change her ways. This is having a negative impact on my own work as a new manager. I've been tasked with taking over some of her responsibilities, but I can't meet with her to discuss expectations and transitional steps. I feel like I'm floundering. How can I succeed without knowing how, or even sometimes what she needs me to do? How can I navigate our relationship to make sure it doesn't sour? What can I do to stay out of her way, and still deliver on my job?

JERRY COLONNA: So, the main thing that occurs to me is like our last listener, there's an opportunity here to talk to some peers. I can almost guarantee that our listener, and this letter writer, is not the only one who's struggling with this and that there are other people within the organization. In this case I wouldn't even necessarily go outside yet to some of the other peers, but to really sort of gather together, and to ask people how are you handling situations, and to really talk about defining your own KPIs, to defining your own OKRs, defining your own stretch goals, and really sort of handing those back to the organization.

DAN MCGINN: Do you think it's important for the listener to recognize that there are great things that come from being at a quickly growing start-up, but that one of the downsides of it is that people are going to be stretched, people are going to be busy, that the culture is probably a little bit less structured than General Electric or the US Army.

JERRY COLONNA: Yeah, I'm glad you asked that, Dan, because the first thing I wrote down was quickly growing. And yes, there's definitely opportunity implicit in that, because in that constant shift and that constant challenge, oftentimes there is opportunity that gets created for people to sort of rise up and take on more responsibility, to stretch. I would go back to encouraging the listener to set up a dialogue within the organization to talk about the pros and cons of this quickly growing culture.

ALISON BEARD: I think that's hard to ask for in this very busy environment. We've published, you know, research that's showing even outside the start-up world absentee leadership is the most common form of incompetent leadership. Many managers are just too busy to be fair to their employees. You know, they're under lots of time pressure, and so they just can't treat employees as well as they might like to. So, this is the reality, the idea that she can change that culture or change her boss might be a stretch.

JERRY COLONNA: Oh, yeah, and a stretch in a way that's a set up for feeling terrible. I would say there may be more of an opportunity to change the culture than there is to change the boss. You know, one of the gifts of less competent management is we have a very clear model of what we don't want to do as a manager ourselves. And there is that opportunity in there, it's like learning by observing, we made that point before, and observing what works and what doesn't work.

ALISON BEARD: And how does she do that without creating sort of an us-versus-them dynamic?

JERRY COLONNA: Well, you know, it's funny. It brings me back to my early 20's when I was promoted early. And I remember giving one of my employees an extra week of vacation because he had a sick child and he needed some extra time at home. And I remember being chastised by the HR department, how could you do this, what do you think you're trying to create a better organization than the rest of the organization. It's unfortunate that that might get perceived as an us-versus-them culture, but I'd encourage our listener to be the kind of manager, to be the kind of leader that she herself would like to be led by.

DAN MCGINN: Is there an argument that what's going on here is that simply the communication's function at this company is not the priority and not the biggest problem that the director of operations has? Maybe, for instance, getting the software out the door, making sure customers are happy, making sure quality is there, could this director of operations actually be doing the right thing by making communications a lower priority at this moment in the start-up's life?

JERRY COLONNA: Possibly. That doesn't feel particularly sustainable though. I often say to a client that you're in the process of building a company, you're not just building a product. We're trying to build exquisite, beautiful products and services while simultaneously building a company that can sustain that and go for the long term. And I don't hear that latter part going on in this quote awesome culture.

ALISON BEARD: It's clear to me that our letter writer should be more proactive. Absolutely, like you said, Jerry, in talking to her peers, but I think also in just sort of figuring out what her own priorities should be what her role is.

DAN MCGINN: I'll go even further. On paper it doesn't make a lot of sense to have the communications person reporting to the director of operations, those are two kinds of really disparate functions. How about our listener identifies somebody else in the organization that she would like to be her boss, that there's some logical connection with, and say, hey, I noticed you're so busy you've skipped our last five meetings together, maybe I should be reporting over to this person who has a little bit more time and makes a little bit more sense to oversee communications, what do you think?

ALISON BEARD: Tricky conversation, but a great idea.

JERRY COLONNA: Yeah, I agree. It's a tricky conversation depending on the culture, but I do like the direction that you're headed with that, Dan.

ALISON BEARD: One of our author Amy Jen Su says that you know, there are two questions to ask when your boss is not prioritizing your work for you, and that is what is my highest contribution, and what am I passionate about. So, where can I make the most impact in this organization? And then, I think, she can, once she sets out those goals for herself, share them with the boss, solicit feedback, but in a way that's not as needy as she seems to be approaching it now.

JERRY COLONNA: Can I add a question to Amy's questions?

ALISON BEARD: Yeah.

JERRY COLONNA: What kind of leader am I? And I think that there's a self-reflective component in that. Or what kind of adult do I want to be? What kind of company do I want to work for? I think that those kinds of self-orientation questions can be super helpful in these kinds of situations, especially when your, your supposed manager is absent, right? Cause it puts it back into your very capable hands and says, okay, I lack a model, so I'm going to be my model, I'm going to be that person that I need to be. And I think that's super empowering, even in the midst of the whole chaos here.

DAN MCGINN: Are there some people who are just not cut out for the chaos that you're going to experience at some point in the growth of the start-up? Could this just be a personality kind of issue for her?

JERRY COLONNA: Sure. Almost implicit in every start-up is a varying degree of dysfunctionality. And then there's, you know, and I've unfortunately had to be in these situations, there are companies where, you know, there are fist fights breaking out on the floor. And what individuals have to do is have to look, they have to look inward and say is this really for me, is this the company I want to work for. And if it's not, then I really have two kinds of choices. Can I alter that company, can I alter the trajectory of that culture or not, by my growth or my agency, or is it time for me to actually find a different place.

DAN MCGINN: Alison, what's our message to this listener?

ALISON BEARD: So, first we completely understand her frustration. Her boss is supposed to be helping her make this transition and is actually an impediment. At the same time, she's working in a really fast-moving environment, her boss is probably always going to be extremely busy, and this is why she's getting more responsibility. So, we think that she should talk to her peers about how they're handling it, how the work is happening, and how they can help each other. We also think that she should think about her own goals and priorities and be proactive. She should ask what value she adds, and what kind of leader she wants to be. And then she should communicate what she's going to do to her boss, and maybe not even expect a reply. And last, we'd just like her to consider the broader context. How important is communications to the company right now? Maybe she could even look at the org chart and figure out whether there's another team where she more logically fits.

DAN MCGINN: Dear HBR: I work in the tech field. I've recently changed jobs going from a huge organization to a much smaller one. I'm not the most senior engineer in my immediate team of five. My manager wants me to provide technical leadership to the team. Before I joined, the other four members had been working on the project for about four months. They're a very smart bunch, even though some of them are barely out of college. I've never been in a similar situation before. I've either joined an established team with more senior engineers who helped me out, or I started from scratch and had other engineers join in later. This is the first time I'm expected to come in and lead from behind. My manager has not given me useful guidance on this. What should I do?

JERRY COLONNA: Well, I love this question because there's, there's an implicit understanding about leadership that I think is somewhat false, that I think that leadership is only coming from one position, the front. And I applaud the organization first of all for being able to ask people at various levels to lead in a particular conversation. This is really good training. You know, earlier we made reference to the notion of the battlefield promotion, that military notion of someone all the sudden being thrust into a leadership position. One of the great things a culture to do is to give people small bits of leadership opportunity throughout the organizational structure. So, hats off to the manager who asked our listener to step in.

ALISON BEARD: So, one tension I see here is that it's unclear whether the manager has told the rest of the team that he wants our letter writer to be their leader. It's unclear whether he has any formal leadership role. So, how does he navigate that?

JERRY COLONNA: That's a great point. I think one of the first things to do would be to clarify that that has been communicated, because otherwise, the listener is kind of in danger of being perceived as a little bit arrogant, a little bit assuming too much. So, that would be the first thing I would ask for.

DAN MCGINN: This kind of leadership seems a little bit tricky cause it doesn't sound like these people are going to report to him, it doesn't sound like he's going to have a lot of authority, it sounds more like sort of a coaching, sort of wisdom passing on, this technical leadership, but not being the manager. Is that a particularly tricky role?

JERRY COLONNA: I think it is, but I think it's a particularly rewarding role as well.

DAN MCGINN: Why?

JERRY COLONNA: Because it's leadership without power.

ALISON BEARD: That sounds, does not sound rewarding to me. [LAUGHTER]

JERRY COLONNA: Don't be so terrified. It's leadership that stems from the internal capacity of the individual. It stems from kind of the way in which the individual holds themselves. The manager who is asking for this is seeing something in our listener that that listener may not see, and that's really fascinating to me. They're kind of calling forth leadership with a lower case L, and they're being asked to take that position, without, you know, having the dint of some sort of organization chart that says I'm the boss.

ALISON BEARD: There does seem to be a generational element here too. You know, he's an older person coming into an existing team of younger people, and A, trying to break his way onto the team, but now being tasked with leading them, how does he get over the perception that he's just the old guy coming in and telling everyone what to do?

JERRY COLONNA: I would embrace the gravitas that comes from wisdom and life experience. And gravitas is a great word, it's I'm here. I would not pretend and fake that I have authority, that I might not have authority.

DAN MCGINN: In this situation, it seems like figuring out whether he wants to have a push system or a pull system would be important. Is his role going to be to proactively teach and correct and instruct, or is it more to wait for questions to come up and be kind of like the local help desk that the younger people can come to? Sort of figuring that dynamic out seems like it would be important to be effective and to fit in.

ALISON BEARD: I vote for pull.

DAN MCGINN: You vote for pull?

ALISON BEARD: Yeah, I think he should get to know people, and then explain that his door or cubicle is always open.

JERRY COLONNA: Can, can I vote for the middle way?

DAN MCGINN: Sure, how does that work? Tell us.

JERRY COLONNA: I'm a Buddhist and I can't help but vote for the middle way. I would advise them to sort of listen a heck of a lot, so I'm like you, Alison, right, to sort of lean in on that, but then I would use the word coax, and to create conditions for people to sort of come forward. I wouldn't necessarily take the posture of imposing wisdom, let me tell you how to do it. Cause I think that that can create all sorts of negative dynamic. But ask some really, really powerful questions that come from that place. And the questions should be open and honest to sort of coax and invite more participation.

ALISON BEARD: Yeah, I think that's great advice. You know, when I'm thinking about people starting a new job and particularly taking new leadership roles, I always go to Michael Watkins, author of The First 90 Days, and he talks about questions that you can ask right out of the starting gate just to get people aligned. They are what will we accomplish, why are we doing it, how are we going to do it, and who's going to do what. And just to set the team up for that sort of group discussion, to allow people to have input, but then it just opens a conversation for all of these technical issues that they need to figure out together. With our letter writer's leadership.

JERRY COLONNA: Yeah, I mean, I'd add questions like, specifically for this listener, how would we know that the project's succeeded? What would the benefit to the organization be if the project succeeded? What resources would we need in order to accomplish this, right? And the whole idea is early on in that process to kind of coax an imagination, and to pull the team together to jointly come up with that image.

ALISON BEARD: Yeah, Dan you talked earlier about early wins, and I think that is critical here, you know, demonstrating that he's adding value by pulling the team together and getting them to execute on something sort of more quickly or more efficiently, or at higher quality than they would have otherwise.

JERRY COLONNA: It does not feel like leading from behind, what we're describing, it feels like it's leading from shoulder to shoulder standing together, right, leaning into the work that's in front of us. And to me, yeah, that's harder. To your point earlier Alison, that's harder, cause you're leading by dint of your gravitas, not necessarily by dint of some sort of De Juro organizational structure. You're the boss, therefore you make the decision. I think leadership that's like that just inculcates a much healthier culture and allows everybody to step up and grow up.

ALISON BEARD: On a more personal level though, how does he step in and make all of these people feel like a team, feel like peers, especially when there's an age gap.

JERRY COLONNA: My default answer in all those questions is actually to model it themselves.

DAN MCGINN: I wonder if there are structural things they can do as a team to try and create more of a culture of teaching. For instance, I've heard of organizations, whether you are programmers or sales people where you create a structure where people come in and talk about, you know, a sale that we just made, and what the keys to it were, and what the lessons that could be learned from this particular closing this deal were, or if you're a software programmer, how you sort of cracked this stuff problem. Basically giving people a forum to talk about a recent success, try to draw some lessons from it, and put everybody into this role of teacher, at least for a few minutes.

JERRY COLONNA: Yeah, I mean one of my favorite tactics is the notion of a blameless post-mortem. And it's especially helpful for a failure where you are analyzing what happened, what were the processes by which decisions got made, what were the questions we were seeking answers to, and how did things unfold. And the most important piece of that is the notion of not seeking blame, but really creating a learning retrospective. You know, Dan, you were speaking about the successes, but I think that here is where you can create a culture where okay, let's examine what went wrong, understand what happened, and then go back in and re-engineer processes and organizational structure to be able to respond to that.

ALISON BEARD: And I don't actually think that it has to be as formal as you all are describing. I think that our letter writer can start to create a learning culture just by demonstrating that he wants to learn from his colleagues too, even though he has more experience, and maybe more skills, surely there are elements of their work that they are expert at, that he can take away lessons from them.

JERRY COLONNA: Really well said. I agree.

ALISON BEARD: So, Dan, what are we telling our listener?

DAN MCGINN: So, leadership as our listener recognizes, doesn't only come from the front. And he's being asked to provide leadership in a different kind of structure than he's used to, so this is a good thing, this is a growth opportunity for him, and hats off to the organization for setting up this kind of structure. It does take a little bit of getting used to, you're leading without a lot of formal power, without a lot of formal authority. The leadership mechanism here will probably feel a little bit more like coaching. We think you should utilize his experience, his age, his gravitas. He should listen and ask a lot of questions and coax, and try and create an environment and a mechanism where people will bring him questions and problems, rather than sort of intrusively getting into their business all the time. We think that it would also be great if he created a format for a learning retrospective so that the whole team feels like they're sharing and teaching other rather than having a very sort of top-down environment. Lastly, it's important in this kind of soft leadership environment that he not fake authority that he doesn't have, and that he work appropriately to be more of an advisor than a boss.

ALISON BEARD: Great. Jerry, thanks so much for talking with us today.

JERRY COLONNA: Can I just say this was a blast, guys?

HANNAH BATES: That was executive coach Jerry Colonna - in conversation with Alison Beard and Dan McGinn on Dear HBR. If you liked this episode, check out Dear HBR wherever you get your podcasts. We'll be back next Wednesday with another hand-picked conversation about leadership from the Harvard Business Review. If you found this episode helpful, share it with your friends and colleagues, and follow our show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. While you're there, be sure to leave us a review. We're a production of the Harvard Business Review - if you want more articles, case studies, books, and videos like this, be sure to subscribe to HBR at HBR.org. This episode was produced by Curt Nickisch, Anne Saini, Ian Fox, and me, Hannah Bates. Music by Coma-Media. Special thanks to Rob Eckhardt, Maureen Hoch, Adi Ignatius, Karen Player, Ramsey Khabbaz, Nicole Smith, Anne Bartholomew, and you - our listener. See you next week.

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When You're Pushed Outside Your Comfort Zone

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Executive coach and former venture capitalist Jerry Colonna takes questions from listeners struggling with stretch responsibilities.

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Spotify: Re:Thinking Jon Batisite on the Art of Pushing Your Limits

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Spotify: Re:Thinking Jon Batisite on the Art of Pushing Your Limits

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Jon Batiste on the art of pushing your limits

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Listen to this episode from ReThinking on Spotify. Jon Batiste has had a record year-he was the most nominated artist at the Grammys, winning five of his ELEVEN nominations across multiple categories, including Album of the Year. When he's not making musical history, he's a touring artist, late-night band leader, and Oscar-winning composer.

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High Performance Podcast: Building a Culture That Motivates Talent

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High Performance Podcast: Building a Culture That Motivates Talent

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E154 - Kevin Ellis: Building a culture that motivates talent

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Listen to this episode from The High Performance Podcast on Spotify. This is the last episode in our CEO Series, in which we will be deep diving into what it takes to be a CEO.Kevin Ellis is Chair and Senior Partner of PwC UK.

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NYTimes: Learning to Take Responsibility When Things Go Wrong

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NYTimes: Learning to Take Responsibility When Things Go Wrong

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Forbes:  Leading for Success - How to Build & Run a High-Performing Team

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Forbes:  Leading for Success - How to Build & Run a High-Performing Team

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Betsy Dougert is VP of External Relations at SCORE, resource partner to SBA and mentors to America's small businesses. Connect with Betsy.
Everybody wants to be a good boss, manager or team leader-but it doesn't always work out that way. Effective leadership is challenging and incredibly nuanced, and transmitting that leadership into a high-performing team, even more so.

Recent survey data shows that hiring, retaining and motivating employees are among the top three reported business challenges. Disengaged employees aren't just bad for team morale-they're also bad for business, with leaders reporting less engaged employees negatively affect productivity, increase the workload for their colleagues and decrease business growth.
1. Foster a growth mindset.
Contrast that suboptimal scenario with a high-performing team, where everyone's talents are utilized to enable as much time in flow state as possible. They are given uninterrupted time to do what they are good at, to expend the bulk of their energy and effort in the " zone of genius." On those teams, the work not only benefits the company itself, but also results in a product or service that in some way adds value to the world at large.

Every manager strives to lead a high-performing team. And for those willing to reflect seriously on their managerial styles and consistently work to fine-tune them, there are several strategies that can yield a hyper-productive, efficient and positive group dynamic.
2. Build a team with diverse, complementary skills.
The number-one component of a high-performing team is a collective growth mindset, a concept developed by psychologist Carol Dweck. People with a growth mindset want to learn, grow and level up what they're doing every day. A growth mindset enables teams to bat around ideas, seek and give feedback and disagree with each other, all without taking any of it personally.
3. Lead with vulnerability.
You can teach technical skills. You can even teach soft skills or social skills. But you can't teach people who don't want to learn. That's why if you hire people who have only one thing in common, it should be a growth mindset-and fostering that mindset as a mainstay of work culture is critically important to creating a team that delivers novel ideas and strong products.

Hiring a diverse team is not just the right thing to do; it's actually good for business. Hiring people who communicate or think exactly like you doesn't move the needle. True diversity encompasses both personal backgrounds and thoughts. Teams made of colleagues with different experiences, capabilities and thinking-including neurodiverse people -produce groundbreaking ideas and products and bring fresh ways of thinking to the table.
4. Normalize check-ins.
The great researcher and professor Brené Brown has famously championed the importance of showing up with vulnerability and authenticity. Vulnerable leadership means being honest and transparent about your strengths and weaknesses, what you know and what you don't know, what's going well and isn't going well.

I periodically ask my team, "How am I accidentally getting in your way? What am I doing or asking you to do that's causing more work than I realize, with too little payoff?" As a manager and as a human being, it can sometimes feel hard to hear the answers to these questions. But discussing them openly fosters trust and respect, and improves our team's efficiency and productivity.
5. Appreciate your team the way they want to be appreciated.
Being part of a high-performing team involves caring about each other as people, not just colleagues. In this era of remote work, with many teams scattered across time zones and locations, it's easy to fall into the trap of staying heads-down in the work. Schedule regular check-ins with your team, both 1:1 and in group settings, to connect as human beings.

I start team meetings with two-word check-ins. Everyone describes how they're currently feeling and can choose to explain more or just leave it at those two words. This helps the entire team to understand where their colleagues are coming from and to adjust their own behavior and expectations accordingly. This also helps the team lead to identify trends and offer support.
6. Strategically plan for accountability.
Some people love public praise. It's music to their ears when you announce their accomplishments during a company-wide meeting. For others, this situation might feel unbearably embarrassing. Truly appreciating your team members requires taking the time to learn each team member's preferred method of appreciation. The famous "five love languages" have been adapted for appreciation in the workplace -these can provide a useful starting point for conversations.

Once you know how people want to be appreciated, you want to give a lot of positive feedback so they feel seen and valued. This provides a strong foundation of respect so that when you do have to give constructive criticism, it's better received.

My organization loves planning. We have a five-year strategic plan, which we work towards every year with our annual tactical plans. There's one annual tactical plan for the entire organization, another for each department and, finally, individual personal plans. These plans clearly define what everyone will be doing, as well as their timeline and KPIs (how success will be measured). Because the plans fit together, everyone can see how their work plugs into broader initiatives on the team and across the organization. They understand how their portion of the process contributes to achieving our most important goals.

It sounds like a lot of planning, but clarity and transparency prevent micromanaging and increase creativity. Accountability is built directly into the KPIs, so you can see what people are working towards and what progress they're making along the way.

Ultimately, high-performing teams and their leaders succeed on multiple fronts: Individual employees feel empowered and fulfilled; the company turns out a great product or service; and in the best cases, that product or service is truly transformative for users at large. These dream teams can shake up industries and change the world.

Forbes Communications Council is an invitation-only community for executives in successful public relations, media strategy, creative and advertising agencies. Do I qualify?

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Council Post: Leading For Success: How To Build And Run A High-Performing Team

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A high-performing team is every manager's dream. Fortunately, there are some proven strategies to help make your team happy and hyper-productive.

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LA Times: How Not to Say the Wrong Thing (Ring Theory)

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LA Times: How Not to Say the Wrong Thing (Ring Theory)

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When Susan had breast cancer, we heard a lot of lame remarks, but our favorite came from one of Susan's colleagues. She wanted, she needed, to visit Susan after the surgery, but Susan didn't feel like having visitors, and she said so. Her colleague's response? "This isn't just about you."

"It's not?" Susan wondered. "My breast cancer is not about me? It's about you?"

The same theme came up again when our friend Katie had a brain aneurysm. She was in intensive care for a long time and finally got out and into a step-down unit. She was no longer covered with tubes and lines and monitors, but she was still in rough shape. A friend came and saw her and then stepped into the hall with Katie's husband, Pat. "I wasn't prepared for this," she told him. "I don't know if I can handle it."

This woman loves Katie, and she said what she did because the sight of Katie in this condition moved her so deeply. But it was the wrong thing to say. And it was wrong in the same way Susan's colleague's remark was wrong.

Susan has since developed a simple technique to help people avoid this mistake. It works for all kinds of crises: medical, legal, financial, romantic, even existential. She calls it the Ring Theory.

Draw a circle. This is the center ring. In it, put the name of the person at the center of the current trauma. For Katie's aneurysm, that's Katie. Now draw a larger circle around the first one. In that ring put the name of the person next closest to the trauma. In the case of Katie's aneurysm, that was Katie's husband, Pat. Repeat the process as many times as you need to. In each larger ring put the next closest people. Parents and children before more distant relatives. Intimate friends in smaller rings, less intimate friends in larger ones. When you are done you have a Kvetching Order. One of Susan's patients found it useful to tape it to her refrigerator.

Here are the rules. The person in the center ring can say anything she wants to anyone, anywhere. She can kvetch and complain and whine and moan and curse the heavens and say, "Life is unfair" and "Why me?" That's the one payoff for being in the center ring.

Everyone else can say those things too, but only to people in larger rings.

When you are talking to a person in a ring smaller than yours, someone closer to the center of the crisis, the goal is to help. Listening is often more helpful than talking. But if you're going to open your mouth, ask yourself if what you are about to say is likely to provide comfort and support. If it isn't, don't say it. Don't, for example, give advice. People who are suffering from trauma don't need advice. They need comfort and support. So say, "I'm sorry" or "This must really be hard for you" or "Can I bring you a pot roast?" Don't say, "You should hear what happened to me" or "Here's what I would do if I were you." And don't say, "This is really bringing me down."

If you want to scream or cry or complain, if you want to tell someone how shocked you are or how icky you feel, or whine about how it reminds you of all the terrible things that have happened to you lately, that's fine. It's a perfectly normal response. Just do it to someone in a bigger ring.

Comfort IN, dump OUT.

There was nothing wrong with Katie's friend saying she was not prepared for how horrible Katie looked, or even that she didn't think she could handle it. The mistake was that she said those things to Pat. She dumped IN.

Complaining to someone in a smaller ring than yours doesn't do either of you any good. On the other hand, being supportive to her principal caregiver may be the best thing you can do for the patient.

Most of us know this. Almost nobody would complain to the patient about how rotten she looks. Almost no one would say that looking at her makes them think of the fragility of life and their own closeness to death. In other words, we know enough not to dump into the center ring. Ring Theory merely expands that intuition and makes it more concrete: Don't just avoid dumping into the center ring, avoid dumping into any ring smaller than your own.

Remember, you can say whatever you want if you just wait until you're talking to someone in a larger ring than yours.

And don't worry. You'll get your turn in the center ring. You can count on that.
Susan Silk is a clinical psychologist. Barry Goldman is an arbitrator and mediator and the author of "The Science of Settlement: Ideas for Negotiators."

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When Susan had breast cancer, we heard a lot of lame remarks, but our favorite came from one of Susan's colleagues. She wanted, she needed, to visit Susan after the surgery, but Susan didn't feel like having visitors, and she said so. Her colleague's response? "This isn't just about you."

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Forbes: 3 Ways to Grow Your Professional Visibility & Amplify Your Value

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Forbes: 3 Ways to Grow Your Professional Visibility & Amplify Your Value

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By gaining professional visibility, you will have access to more career opportunities.
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When it comes to getting the career opportunities and promotions you deserve, having a strong work ethic is not enough.

The people who have the biggest impact on your career advancement - company decision makers, hiring managers or your bosses, for example - are often overwhelmed with many responsibilities. As a result, they may not notice all of your hard work unless you amplify your contributions strategically.

Professional visibility matters. After all, if no one knows about your value or accomplishments, you cannot get rewarded for them.

By using the three strategies below to grow your visibility, you'll make it easier for others to recognize the value you bring to your workplace.

1. Take credit for your work

Many of us tend to be generous in our praise for others but are uncomfortable acknowledging our own work. The next time you attend a team meeting where there will be opportunities to give shoutouts, don't stop at giving kudos to your co-workers. Speak about your own contributions, too.

Come prepared to discuss the scope of your work and the impacts of these contributions. Most importantly, tie these contributions to the business priorities or goals of your organization. Especially if you work remotely, mention the most impactful work you have done behind the scenes that your boss may not be aware of.

Alternatively, if you're not yet comfortable putting yourself in the spotlight or speaking up during meetings, start with baby steps. For example, instead of speaking about your own contributions, ask a trusted co-worker to give you a shoutout during the next team meeting and provide specific talking points for them to use.

If the idea of self-promotion scares you, remember this: when something goes wrong on a project, you might have to take the blame or take ownership of your mistakes, so you might as well take credit for your work when projects are going well.

2. Apply for awards - both internal and external

Another way to gain visibility is to apply for awards. Take some time to learn about the ways your company recognizes high-performing employees, and ask your manager if they would be willing to nominate you for internal recognition opportunities.

As you prepare to apply for awards, make a habit of tracking your progress and reflecting on your work throughout the year. It's easy to forget the details of the contributions you have made, so block at least 30 minutes in your calendar every other week to track your work wins and to take notes on what you have accomplished. When award application deadlines and performance reviews come around, you will thank yourself for tracking your progress on a regular basis.

In addition to applying for awards offered by your company, consider applying for awards or recognition lists managed by professional associations, media publications (such as Forbes 30 Under 30 local lists), alumni associations or university departments at your alma mater. These external recognitions can grow your credibility and feature your work in front of a larger audience, including hiring managers at other companies.

If you d0 win an award or a spot on a recognition list, don't forget to share the news with your managers, so they can amplify and celebrate your accomplishments as well.

3. Spotlight your expertise by teaching others

Some employers offer opportunities for employees to lead lunchtime seminars, also known as "lunch and learns." If this applies to you, volunteer to spend 30 to 60 minutes teaching your peers about a skill or topic that you are well versed in.

Teaching short seminars will direct more attention to your expertise and also demonstrate your willingness to contribute to the learning of others. This is one more item you can discuss during your performance review or when you make your case for a raise.

If your company does not have a lunchtime seminar program in place, pitch the idea to your managers. These types of informal gatherings can be great ways for companies to engage employees without having to spend money on external speakers or trainers. Plus, if you initiate a lunchtime seminar program, you will create opportunities for your co-workers to grow their visibility as well.

You can also share your expertise with a wider audience by speaking on panels at industry events, leading workshops at conferences, posting about your work on LinkedIn, guest speaking at university classes or teaching students part-time as an adjunct instructor.

The benefits of teaching are not limited to growing your visibility. Teaching external audiences will grow your credibility by positioning you as an expert or thought leader in your field. It is also an opportunity to deepen your craft. The questions posed by students and peers will challenge you to think more critically about the work you do and how it can be applied in different contexts.

What are some other strategies that have helped you successfully grow your professional visibility? Share your stories by commenting below or sending me a message on . Y our response may be featured in a future Forbes article.
Subscribe to my to get my latest Forbes articles delivered straight to your inbox.

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how to increase your value as an employee

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3 Ways To Grow Your Professional Visibility And Amplify Your Value

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Professional visibility matters. If no one knows about your value or contributions, you cannot get rewarded for them.

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TED Playlist: The Pursuit of Curiosity & Understanding

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TED Playlist: The Pursuit of Curiosity & Understanding

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Curious about the world? These fascinating talks will encourage you to seek and experience the endless delight and intrigue it offers. (Curated in partnership with the Qatar Foundation.)

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The pursuit of curiosity and understanding

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You have JavaScript disabled For the best experience, please turn JavaScript on. Here's how Curious about the world? These fascinating talks will encourage you to seek and experience the endless delight and intrigue it offers. (Curated in partnership with the Qatar Foundation.)

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In every workplace, there are three basic kinds of people: givers, takers and matchers. Organizational psychologist Adam Grant breaks down these personalities and offers simple strategies to promote a culture of generosity and keep self-serving employees from taking more than their share.

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TED: A 3-Step Guide to Believing in Yourself

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TED: A 3-Step Guide to Believing in Yourself

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Sheryl Lee Ralph: A 3-step guide to believing in yourself

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Sheryl Lee Ralph is a force, delivering iconic performances both on stage and screen. But she didn't always know if she'd make it big. In a lively talk sparkling with actionable advice, she shares how her struggles taught her what it takes to believe in herself -- and how we can all find the self-confidence to keep moving forward.

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TED Playlist: Talks for When You Want to Laugh & Think

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TED Playlist: Talks for When You Want to Laugh & Think

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Talks for when you want to laugh and think | TED Talks

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These hilarious talks won't just make you laugh out loud -- they'll make you think twice.

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TedTalk: The Science of Productive Conflict

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TedTalk: The Science of Productive Conflict

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WorkLife with Adam Grant: The Science of Productive Conflict | TED Talk

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Whether it’s over a project, politics, or pizza toppings, conflict with colleagues is inevitable. The goal is not to eliminate it; it’s to handle it better. There’s a whole science of managing individual and team conflicts, and it suggests that we don’t have to agree to disagree. We need to start by…

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HBR: How Do I Set the Right Pace to Meet Our Strategic Goals

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HBR: How Do I Set the Right Pace to Meet Our Strategic Goals

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MURIEL WILKINS: I'm Muriel Wilkins, and this is Coaching Real Leaders, part of the HBR Podcast Network. I'm a longtime executive coach who works with highly successful leaders who've hit a bump in the road. My job is to help them get over that bump by clarifying their goals and figuring out a way to reach them so that hopefully they can lead with a little more ease. I typically work with clients over the course of several months, but on this show, we have a one-time coaching meeting focusing on a specific leadership challenge they're facing. Today's guest is someone will call Mo to protect her confidentiality. She's worked in the higher education sector for decades, and she continues to be driven by the work and the relationships she gets to build.

MO: To be able to see students, to get to know them, to get to see how they grow and change during these four years, and then to see them have success as they launch into the world, and then to see that they reach back so quickly to give back and to see the way that our community supports our students as they are navigating, exploring their values and their purpose and what they're feeling called to do. All of that is just really rewarding.

MURIEL WILKINS: For a long time, Mo was at the director level and managed a small team, but recently there was a shakeup.

MO: We had a new leader of our organization who brought in a new structure, and my role was a part of this structure of this new organization that had never been aligned in this way. So in the new role, there was an expansion of my duties. The team grew. It's the first time in my career that I have been a manager of managers as opposed to managing a small team.

MURIEL WILKINS: Mo has taken on more responsibility. She's energized by the challenge and has ambitious goals, but she reached out to make sure she was approaching these goals in the right way, and to think about ways she can succeed as a first time manager of managers. I wanted to get a baseline of where she was at. So I began by asking her how she felt about this new increase in responsibilities.

MO: It's been exciting. It's been great to still be in an institution where I still feel called to do this work, while also having the opportunity to grow and to learn. Love to learn. It's nice to have that expansion of learning. And there were all the areas that now report to me I had a little bit of insight into. I had been an advisor at one point, so that was not something that I had no idea about. Success coaching, completely new. So to have that report to a person who reports to me has been a new area to learn about. So I'm now learning about things that were just beyond what my original scope of work was.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay, so what brought you here? Why are we meeting? What's going on?

MO: We are meeting because there are some goals we have as a team that cannot be accomplished in a single year or a single semester. They're going to take years of effort and work. They're also going to take multiple collaborators. Our team cannot do it alone. So we're relying on so many partnerships and collaborations. And so that is a lot to keep track of and also, to know what is the right pace? What is the right amount to get done in one year toward a goal that I can set a timeframe on it and say, we want to have this done in three years, but some of it is outside of our control because of all these multiple collaborators. And so it's hard to know what is the right pace to do this work, what is the right timeline to even project and guess might be the right time to allow us to start to achieve some of these goals. And what is the right allotment of my time? So, this is the first time that I have been in this more strategic role as opposed to just doing and managing. And so I am just still trying to figure out what is the right allotment of my time? What is the right timeframe to put on these goals? And how do we know if we're measuring progress in the right way? These are the questions that I struggle with almost daily.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay. All right. And what does that struggle look like?

MO: It looks like just a constant wonder of, am I getting this right? Am I spending my days in the right way? Should I be doing more? Should I be doing things differently? The inability to feel confident that the way that I am arranging my days and weeks and months is the correct and accurate way to get us where we are trying to go as an institution and as a team.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay. So lots of unknowns for you around how to map out the future, not only for your team and the strategy and as you said, the pacing and the timing to be able to reach your goals, but also, for you personally, in terms of being the leader of this team, how you should be allocating your time. And as you put it, am I spending my time, the "right way". Okay. So how would you know it's the right way?

MO: Great question. That is what's so hard to know. Will I only know it in reverse? Will I only know it at the end of a year when I look back and say, "Oh, we accomplished X or Y?" Am I supposed to know it at the end of every month? Because we were able to set a goal and we achieved it that month. That's what I'm struggling with.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay.

MO: Because the things that we're trying to do cannot be accomplished in a single year. It's so far out. It will take so long to know that we have moved the needle towards success. That it's hard to know working backwards, okay, was this a good week? Did we get things done the right way? There are some goals, right? I could say have one conversation a week with a potential collaborator or partner.

MURIEL WILKINS: To what end?

MO: But what if it took three conversations to actually-

MURIEL WILKINS: What if it took three?

MO: Right? What if it took five?

MURIEL WILKINS: Got you.

MO: I don't know.

MURIEL WILKINS: All right. I hear you. You're looking for the formula.

MO: I am.

MURIEL WILKINS: I don't know if there is a formula, Mo. Okay?

MO: Okay.

MURIEL WILKINS: I think you've got to create your own formula, and it's a hypothesis, right?

MO: Right.

MURIEL WILKINS: So, let me ask you this, right? Sounds like you've worked directly with students-

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: -as well. And you articulated that what you love about the work that you've done and the community that you're in, is that it's in support of these students being able to launch. Now, I presume when these students come in, they're four years out from that launch?

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay.

MO: Call it one to four.

MURIEL WILKINS: So, for those that are four years out, how did you in the past, determine what was the right way to spend your time? So that the ultimate goal would be that they launched successfully in four years.

MO: So, if it was an individual conversation with an individual student, giving them some of the tools and resources and giving them some ideas of experiences that they should be having along the way, was the way to help them think about reverse engineering a successful launch following their degree.

MURIEL WILKINS: So, you gave them the information so that they could reverse engineer and say, "Oh, so what do I need to do along these four years to be able to get to this ultimate point?"

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay. So what would it look like to reverse engineer the goals that you've set for your team?

MO: Yeah. I think painting a picture of what success... What we hope the outcomes are and the impacts are, and what our hopes are for just pick a time. Whether that's three years or four years or two years, and then follow my own advice and reverse engineer it. And so if we say, okay, if we want to have this specific number of courses that embed career readiness, just to pick a number and buy a specific date and then figure out, okay, if that's the number of courses, then how many potential collaborators would we need to speak with? Knowing that not everyone's going to say yes, not everybody's going to buy in. Then figuring out, okay, do we think that half the people will, or do we think that a third of the people will? And just like you're saying, a hypothesis, make that guess and start working toward that.

MURIEL WILKINS: Yeah. I do think there's a bit of a reverse engineering. So I think there's two parts to it. There's the, how do you get your team tracked and pacing? And then there's the, how do you spend your time within that? So let's tackle the team piece. And it sounds like you already have goals that are established. The question is, when are those goals supposed to be met by?

MO: Right. Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay. So while you can create a hypothesis, it needs to be informed, and then you want to test it. And so my question is, where did these goals come from? What's the context of these goals? Are they in support of bigger goals for your institution? What is the container that they're in that might give you a better sense of what the time range is?

MO: And we're in a bit of a transition period. So the leader who created this new division that I'm a part of, departed, and we've had an interim leader, an acting leader, and now, the new leader is going to arrive and begin work. So, there will be a little bit of a discernment period and a goal setting period and a strategic planning process that our work needs to support.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay. All right.

MO: So that's why it's hard to say, okay, should we just say we want to accomplish some of these goals within two years, but what if our new leaders' strategic priorities are a little bit different and we need to step back and figure out a way to sort out those priorities? So we're in a little bit of a holding pattern.

MURIEL WILKINS: Yeah. So what if that happens?

MO: Then we adjust. We adjust.

MURIEL WILKINS: Exactly.

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: I think you're leading in a state of ambiguity. That's what's exacerbating this, right?

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: You're trying to make things known in a situation that is unknown. So in fact, your feeling of I'm not sure what the future is going to look like is on point because it is unsure what the future is going to look like because the future leadership isn't here yet. The strategic planning process hasn't happened. And so you're trying to make these decisions around goals for your team in a vacuum.

MO: Right.

MURIEL WILKINS: Right.

MO: Right. Exactly. And yet, I want to do a little bit of strategic planning ourselves in a very draft form so that when the new leader arrives, we have some things for that leader to react and respond to. The leader may say, "Nope, none of this." Or the leader may say, "This seems good." And so that we are not just waiting, but that we are ready to respond and to show, okay, this is the value based on the strategic ideas that you will bring. Here's the value that our team can bring in support of this new leader's vision.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay. All right. So you've articulated two options and you've got to choose one.

MO: Right. Right.

MURIEL WILKINS: You're either in a holding pattern, which is, you know what? We're not doing any planning. We're not doing any goal setting, we're not doing any of that. We're just going to wait until new leader provides clarity. Or you decide that you're going to head towards some destination, right? Not quite sure which one yet, but you're going to figure it out, which means you're going to do your own interim planning process and start working towards those goals. What you can't do is be in a holding pattern and head towards your destination at the same time. It's physically impossible. So I think what I'm hearing around what you're struggling with is not necessarily the timing of marching towards the goals, but you need to take it to step one, do I even want to claim these goals and own these goals and make a plan against them and do the work? Or do I want to wait?

MO: Right.

MURIEL WILKINS: And so which one are you leaning towards?

MO: I'm leaning towards still planning because the leader who is coming, is known to me. This is a leader who actually hired me to move into the role that I was in prior to this new expanded role. And so I know a little bit about what matters to this new leader, and I think that the work that we are doing will be in alignment with his goals.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay.

MO: So, I would love to have some things ready for response, even if we have to set us aside and say, "that's not it." No... no. Wrong goals.

MURIEL WILKINS: Wrong goals.

MO: Remake them, right? Recreate them. That would be okay.

MURIEL WILKINS: You're okay with that?

MO: Completely okay with that.

MURIEL WILKINS: Great. So that's where your confidence is going to come from.

MO: Okay.

MURIEL WILKINS: Your confidence is going to come from or is coming from, no matter what happens, I'm okay with it. If these are the goals that this new leader agrees to, yay. If these are not it, that's okay. We keep it moving.

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: What it sounds like you're not okay with is just being in this holding pattern and not doing anything.

MO: Right. That's hard, right?

MURIEL WILKINS: Yeah.

MO: Most of us want to-

MURIEL WILKINS: Yeah. I see your face all scrunched up.

MO: Right. Most of us want to feel like we are moving toward goals. So yeah.

MURIEL WILKINS: Most of us. Although this morning I was sitting there, I'm like, I don't want to move. I just want to be still. Can I just be still for a while? For a while. But I hear you. Mo started off this conversation by sharing how excited she still is by her job, how much it energizes her, and that she had some concerns about knowing some of the things she wants to accomplish, but not sure if she's pacing out goals correctly. As a first time manager of managers, she seemed a bit overwhelmed by the set of challenges she was facing, which she first articulated as her goals being dependent on other stakeholders. As we spoke though, we teased out a few related issues that we'll dive deeper into. First, we learned in terms of the specifics that it isn't just that she's leading a newer, bigger team, but also, that there have been shakeups in the leadership ranks above her, meaning setting a strategic vision is even trickier. That feeds into the problem she articulated around not knowing if she was pacing work and goal setting correctly. She's leading through some ambiguity here. And when that happens, I like to coach people through possible approaches or options to see how the different scenarios might play out, which got us to the question around whether she should take initiative to set a strategic plan, knowing it might change or wait until a new leader is in place and she's able to make that decision based on something she's confident in, that if she does move forward and the direction later changes, she'll be able to pivot. The first step is deciding on the destination, and then we can work through her planning process on how to get there and how to time it correctly. She can reverse engineer it. Let's dive back in as we start to think about that process and how much of her work depends on other stakeholders as I ask her, how big of an impact could her collaborators have on her timing?

MO: That's challenging. And I'm thinking a lot. They completely control the impact on timing because some of the collaborators that we most need to buy in have a lot of independence and control over their work. And so, it is completely, they hold all the impact of this timing because there could be people who say, "Absolutely not. I don't want to be a part of that." And so the search that continues for the people who might say yes, and then once the people say yes, it might be, okay, but that's not going to work for this upcoming semester, but I can see doing that a year from now. And so, the timing is completely out of our control.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay. So it's out of your control. I didn't ask you though whether the timing was in your control or out of your control. I asked you, how can you gauge how much of an impact these collaborators can have on the timing? Meaning, how are you going to know how to time things given the collaborators?

MO: I think that's where I'm stuck.

MURIEL WILKINS: So, let's imagine you're the collaborator and somebody else is working on something and it's using resources or needs the resources that are under your control. How would you want them to relate towards you as they're planning something out, which clearly you have skin in the game?

MO: I think I would like them to relate to me by recognizing that maybe that it aligns with my goals too. So being in alignment on what we both hope to achieve, but then also, just having enough notice to be able to start working on it and to do it well.

MURIEL WILKINS: Yeah. You used the word getting buy-in from your collaborators, which is part of what you're saying in terms of aligning and goals, and then how is it executed? So how much gaining buy-in is going to be part of your process in planning towards your team's goals? Or how much have you already done? I'm not sure.

MO: Yeah. So some relationships have already been built that I think will lead to buy-in. Just last week, a member of the team and I started talking about where do we think our strongest allies are and who might be in a quick yes so that we could start working together. So some of that is already done. I think it's just a matter of sharing this vision with some key allies and potential partners to see if we can get a yes from them. And then once we get a yes, what is the timing that works for them? I think that's where I have been stuck is, all of this takes typically one-on-one conversation, and it may not take just one conversation. There may be follow-up conversations. And so that is what has been a challenge, is to not know if I have four conversations in a week, is that enough? If I have four conversations in a month, will that be enough? So I guess the best way to figure it out is just to start. So maybe you set a goal, which would be maybe set a goal to have two conversations a week and see what is the yield? Does that yield one person who says, "Yes, let's keep talking." Or does that yield one, "Yes, let's do this." Or does it, for the people who I talk with that week, where they're zero takers on potential collaboration and that could therefore inform the hypothesis of how many conversations it might take.

MURIEL WILKINS: Yeah. Look, I think you're looking for this magic number and you don't have a track record yet, which is really where the source of discomfort is. You don't have something to say, this is what you right should do and it will guarantee that you get to these results.

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: There's never a guarantee. All you can guarantee is the effort that you're putting in, and you want to make sure that that effort is aligned with the overarching goals that you've set for yourself or for your team. What's interesting to me is that you're focusing on the number of conversations, the quantity of the conversations, rather than the quality of the conversations. And I would say that alignment, gaining alignment is a function of both.

MO: Right.

MURIEL WILKINS: Quality and quantity, with probably a higher index on quality, because that's where the meat is. That's where you can align on objectives. You can find out what's going on with them, what are they willing to do, et cetera. So when I say that, the focus on quantity versus quality, how does that land with you? What does that make you think of?

MO: I completely agree. And yet, when I look at my schedule in the week and trying to figure out where do I put these conversations, how many do I even try to squeeze in, given the way that my schedule currently exists? I think the reason I'm looking for the magic number is I'm trying to figure out, okay, am I trying to find space for one conversation per week, or am I trying to find space for a larger number than one per week? And so even though the quality matters once I'm there, just even finding-

MURIEL WILKINS: The space.

MO: Building in the space for the quantity that need to be there is the unknown. It's just unknown. How many should I be trying to find space and time to make?

MURIEL WILKINS: And in the order of priorities, I'm assuming you have priorities. In the order of priorities, where do these conversations or this gaining alignment with the collaborators doing the strategy work, where is it from a priority standpoint?

MO: It's a really high priority for me. Because what we are trying to do is create a campus-wide culture, meaning that students don't necessarily have to come to a member of our team to gain the preparation and the readiness that they need to launch. But it's just infused. It's everywhere. And so in looking at trying to create this campus-wide culture, which is just so hard to get your hands around, right?

MURIEL WILKINS: Yes.

MO: It's hard to know when is enough. Is it if every academic department has this as a part of their major declaration process? Is that too late? And so does it therefore need to be during a first or second year experience that every student has?

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay. So I can't tell you that because I'm not in the institution, right?

MO: Yes. Right.

MURIEL WILKINS: And nobody else is going to be able to tell you that because you're leading this. And that's part of leadership. Part of leading it is being able to put a stake in the ground to say, "This is how we're defining success, and this is the evidence we would be looking for that would help indicate that we've achieved the culture that we want to achieve." But it starts with, well, what is that culture? And then what evidence? What would we need to see to believe that this culture is now in place? And I'm saying you need to put a stake in the ground as the leader, but because it's an institutional or organizational-wide culture that you're trying to implement, you can't come up with what that looks like in isolation, which is where the process of getting alignment and getting folks to provide input and weigh in on what they think the culture should be on, what they would see as evidence as to what they define as success is going to be important for you.

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: So, I'm hearing a couple of things. One is, this is one of your high priorities in terms of defining the culture and then defining the plan that's going to get you there and aligning with the collaborators that are going to get you there. And the other thing I'm hearing is, but it's unclear what we're aiming for. So I think you need to start with getting clarity on what you're aiming for. There's no way you can answer, how much time should I be spending in my calendar, if there's not some clarity around what the destination is. If we go back to this airplane, you've decided you're not staying in a holding pattern, you're going to move towards a destination. Well, you've got to figure out like, well, what's the destination that I'm going to? And then you need to check, how much gas do I have? Do we have enough? Are they able to let us land there? And so that's the equivalent, right? You have to articulate destination. Then you need to go check with the collaborators and say, "Is this doable? Are you aligned with this? Does this fit with your vision?" So there's a strategic level muscle that needs to start from an umbrella standpoint to see the whole process and own it and drive it before you can get down to the nitty-gritty of, how are we timing this thing? Right?

MO: Right.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay.

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: And then in terms of your question of, well, then how do I spend my time? Look, I think if you truly feel like this is one of your priorities, one of your top two or top three priorities, then I think you need to use a bit of a different approach than what you have used. The approach you told me you've been using is you look at your calendar and you look at where can you squeeze in this strategic planning and these strategic conversations. I think if the strategic planning and the strategic conversations are your priority, it should be the reverse. That should be in your calendar, and then you're looking to squeeze in the other stuff.

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: So, if you did that, what would that look like? How much space would you be giving it? And what would it look like in your calendar?

MO: I think I would have something that's helping move toward this priority four out of five days of the week.

MURIEL WILKINS: You've got your answer.

MO: Yeah.

MURIEL WILKINS: And what makes you land on that? Four to five days a week?

MO: Just because I think the recognition that it's going to take. This will not be achieved without investing significant time, and it is going to take multiple conversations. And those take time. And it probably won't take a single conversation with any one person. It might take multiple conversations because something that you said about, I've got to paint the picture of where we're going and what I'm hoping to achieve, but then there's just got to be a lot of listening and a lot of hearing from others, where, what are the challenges that they're trying to solve for? What are their pain points? And then what are ways that this strategic vision and direction could actually help address some of the things that they are concerned about and that they're trying to do?

But that's just going to be a lot of listening, and it can't be me going in and just talking. It's got to be having some conversation points, some prompts, and some questions that guide the conversation so that I'm hearing information that people need to share with me. But that's just going to take time. And so, I think that's the answer. Is to block this time to try to be available, to try to initiate these conversations just so that I can hear what others are thinking and hoping, and see how we could then get in alignment to still achieve this strategic goal.

MURIEL WILKINS: Yeah. And I think using this word initiate is important. It's not just making yourself available.

MO: Right. No, no.

MURIEL WILKINS: It's initiating it. It's driving it. It's matching up your schedule and your time to your priorities, and only you can decide what those priorities are. Particularly because you're in a state right now of not getting direction. Nobody's telling you what your priorities should be. Nobody's telling you where to spend your time. Ironically, it's like the students you deal with when they get to college, nobody's telling them anymore.

MO: Right. Right.

MURIEL WILKINS: Right? So think about it that way. Okay?

MO: Right. Right.

MURIEL WILKINS: It's freshman year. And so if you think about it from that standpoint, literally, all jokes aside, it's freshman year. What advice would you give the freshman in this sense of ambiguity that can also be a sense of freedom and what can you apply to yourself?

MO: Yeah. I think the question that you ask much earlier in the conversation just made me realize, I teach people how to do this every day, and yet...

MURIEL WILKINS: And yet.

MO: And yet.

MURIEL WILKINS: Right? If we would only listen to our inner teacher.

MO: And yet... Oh, it's a challenge that I've been struggling with.

MURIEL WILKINS: But I asked you at some point, what's the struggle? And so now, looking back on the conversation we had, what would you define the struggle as being?

MO: I think there are two struggles. I think one is, I have had this strategic vision for many years, and yet, we are in this waiting period. And so I think part of the struggle is press forward or wait? And both choices are possible. So I think that's one struggle. I think the second struggle is, just time is finite. And unfortunately, I wish it weren't so, but it is. And so there just are a lot of demands on my time, and some of them are things I have to say yes to. And then others are things that I choose to say yes to because they're things that also matter to me, even though they're maybe not my top strategic priorities. And so I think the struggle has been how to figure out how to fit it all in, in any given week because it all seems important.

MURIEL WILKINS: Because it all seems important. Right? These are choices, and choices are trade-offs.

MO: Right.

MURIEL WILKINS: Because how can I fit it all in when I don't have all the time in the world? You don't. As you said, time is finite, right? It's bounded. Well, not really, but in our physical realm, it's bounded.

MO: Right. Right. It is.

MURIEL WILKINS: Right?

MO: It is.

MURIEL WILKINS: So, what you're struggling with is making a choice, but why is making a choice hard for you?

MO: I think because there is so much that we could be doing. There is so much that we already do, and I don't want to stop doing those things, but yet, I have the appetite for us to do more. And a member of my team who I work with, I learned a phrase from her that I'm a time optimist. She's a time realist. And so being a time realist versus a time optimist, I'm a time optimist. And so I think that there should be more time to do more and there should be more opportunity to do more as we try to serve our students in the best possible way. And a time realist would say, "You got to make a choice. We can't do all these things because there isn't enough time." So the time optimist that I am doesn't like that answer and doesn't want to hear that answer, wants to continue to just push ahead and to try to keep adding more and more, which is unrealistic.

MURIEL WILKINS: Yeah. But you know, there is such a thing that is known as a realistic optimist.

MO: Okay.

MURIEL WILKINS: I think this is going to be what we're going to aim for. Realistic optimism. And the optimism part, it is having a vision that you're pushing forward towards. You see what's possible. That's the optimism part.

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: The realistic part is what can be done within the context? The framing of where we are towards that vision? And I think you're seeing them as mutually exclusive. If I can't be doing everything right now as it relates to that vision, then I'm not marching towards that vision. That's not true. There's a difference between what can I do within the timeframe that I have or the time limitations that I have, which is for you on a weekly basis, 24 times seven, but hopefully you're not using up all that time. What can I do? There's a difference between that question and the question, what can be done during that time? And so what's the difference to you when I say that?

MO: The difference is, finding other people who want to help do the work. It's spreading it out. To me, that's the difference.

MURIEL WILKINS: Yeah. Because this is where you have to ask yourself, particularly for you as a leader who's now, what we call scaling up, you went from managing a team to now managing multiple teams. You went to becoming a manager of managers. What is more important to you? That you're doing the work or that the work is getting done?

MO: Oh, it's very much important to me that the work is getting done.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay.

MO: Right.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay.

MO: Yeah.

MURIEL WILKINS: So, this is where the realistic part is, what can I do within my time parameters? How do I prioritize? How do I make choices? Of which one of the parts that you're responsible for is making sure that the other work that you aren't responsible for personally is getting done. So I think I want you to hold this being a realist and an optimist because the reality part is in the present and the optimist part is in the future. And so it's your capability, your capacity to hold both. Your calendar is what holds you to the reality, present.

MO: Right, exactly.

MURIEL WILKINS: The vision is what holds you to the future of the optimist part. They're not mutually exclusive. In talking through how she might tactically move forward to her goals, we've worked through a few important points here with Mo. It was interesting that she zeroed in on the number of calls, on the specifics of how to divide her time as she works towards her goals, which is an important concrete thing to do. To set goals around what she can achieve, what she has control over, what she can measure the results of. But in some ways, she was focusing on the trees and we lost a bit of the forest. I love that we reached this point of being a realistic optimist and how to hold both of those things at once because that allows her to think realistically about her time, how she spends her weeks, and how much time she needs to reach the goals she has for the team, but also allows her to hold onto the excitement and hope she has around those goals and realize that there are things within her control, she just has to make some decisions. I wanted to dive back in because I was picking up on something for Mo, that she's having a bit of a hard time prioritizing because she has this feeling that time is limited, but that her goals will also take years to accomplish. I asked her about how that tension made her feel.

MO: I feel okay about it. There is part of me who wishes that we were already there. Many of the... There are lots of things that I already wish we had accomplished, but I know that it takes time and I know that it's okay to invest the time. That's okay. That's a good use of time, is to try to work toward accomplishing these strategic directions. But I am just a little impatient, and I wish in many cases, that we were already there. But I just have to keep reminding myself of the work that we have accomplished.

It's been good to go back and reflect and look through prior strategic plans and realize, okay, these are things that we got done. These are new initiatives that we started, and we are doing them and they are working and they're good. What's hard is to look at all of the tactics that we had hoped to implement by this time and that we just haven't even begun yet. And so that is a call to realism just of, was that too optimistic to try to think that all of those things could have been accomplished in a three or four year time period? I think it's good to have aimed for it, but it just shows that there's still so much to be done.

MURIEL WILKINS: Yeah. So, I'm sensing that you are looking back and saying, "We've been down this road before and we didn't accomplish it, but man, not on my watch."

MO: I know.

MURIEL WILKINS: If I'm flying this plane, we are getting to this destination.

MO: We are trying to get there. Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: We are trying to get there.

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: And there's no magic ball as to whether you're going to get there or not. Obviously, you wouldn't be heading in that direction if you didn't think you could, but that's what you have to try to figure out is, what is within our capabilities.

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay.

MO: Exactly.

MURIEL WILKINS: And because it's multi-year, and because it's culture, look, the culture, this is the thing with culture change. People are like, "Oh, I want to change the culture and it needs to happen in a year." I'm like, "Well, the current culture you're in didn't get created in one year. So why the expectation that it's going to change to something else overnight?" Creating a new culture is changing organizational habits. And when we think about how much time it takes just for habits at an individual level to change, think about what it takes collectively. And so with that in mind, I'm just curious around what your expectations are. Do you have a sense of what you can expect to even happen within the next year and then the next two years and the next three years? Have you mapped it out in that way?

MO: We're in a process of doing that right now. There was a larger strategic planning process that then needed to be put on hold just with the change in top leadership. With a new leader starting just in a few months, that strategic planning process will begin again, and then at that point, we'll know which of the things that matter to us and that we have thought were important will be adopted and which of the things will not be adopted. So I think it's hard to know where will we be in 12 months, 24 months until we know what the strategic priorities of the institution are and where ours help push forward those strategic priorities.

MURIEL WILKINS: So again, you're back to, you got to figure out what you can figure out within that context that you're in, and you've already decided you're going to do that. Why the impatience? How does that help you in any way?

MO: Yeah, I guess it doesn't.

MURIEL WILKINS: I'm not making judgment. I'm curiously and you're like, "I guess." You either...

MO: Yeah.

MURIEL WILKINS: Don't guess.

MO: Yeah.

MURIEL WILKINS: Is it helping you? Is it not helping you? Why be impatience?

MO: I think the impatience is at the point that I am in my career, I view this as the final chapter. So within 10 years max, I will decide to retire. It could be eight years, and eight years is going to fly by. And so knowing that there is, just as the weeks have finite bounds on them, the years now I'm starting, it's not this infinite stretch of my career, but I'm starting to see that there is a pretty finite length of time that will move pretty rapidly just because the years do. The years move pretty rapidly. And I would like this to be a legacy of my career.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay.

MO: The strategic vision.

MURIEL WILKINS: Now we're seeing.

MO: That's why the impatience, that's why the impatience.

MURIEL WILKINS: That's the impatience. Okay. So there's a level of urgency for you because you're seeing your timeline with this organization as finite.

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: And you want to make sure that the work gets done within the next couple of years that you're going to be there?

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: Because this is your, as you see it, final hurrah. Right? But is it?

MO: In this role? I think it is. Yes. I think is.

MURIEL WILKINS: So, there's definitely a completion or an ending in terms of time that you're there. There's a difference between time being finite and then what happens with impact. Impact is not finite or it doesn't have to be. So I think the formula that you're actually solving for, I'm going to go back on what I said earlier. I actually think now that you've shared this, the formula you're solving for is, what should I be spending my energy on in the next couple of years to ensure that it has impact beyond those years?

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: So, when we frame it that way, how does that inform where you should be spending your time? Does it inform it any differently?

MO: I don't feel like it does. I feel like it still calls me to focus on my top priorities of which this strategic vision of this culture is the top, because of the impact that it can have. Because if we get it right, then every student going forward is impacted. Every student. 100% of them.

MURIEL WILKINS: Yeah. So perhaps where you need to feel rest assured, have some confidence, is that if you put in the effort now, there will be a residual beyond the years, right? It's no different than, again, I keep coming back to this because you're in the field of educating young people, and you've dealt with alums, alumni. It's no different than you put in those four years while they're there. Is that really the end all? When do you start seeing the results?

MO: Right? The results, you can see the results during the four years. You can see the results within the first years. You can see the results in some cases, because I've worked with them for a long time, like a decade and two decades later, you still see the results.

MURIEL WILKINS: Exactly. And so the confidence has to come in, can you trust that what you're doing now is going to have the long-term results, the long-term impact that's aligned with the vision that you have for the culture? And you may not see it.

MO: Right.

MURIEL WILKINS: I hope you do.

MO: Right.

MURIEL WILKINS: But rather than thinking, I need to do everything that's possible, the exhaustive list of what's possible to see this culture come to life within the timeframe that I've put on this because it's tied to my retirement age, right?

MO: Right.

MURIEL WILKINS: Not arbitrary.

MO: Right. It's tied to my life.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay. If we put a bit of a different lens on it, which is, what can I do? Where can I put my efforts and my team efforts in the time that we do have, so that it sets the foundation, maybe even the next step. It sets the scaffolding, maybe even more than that for the culture that we hope to have. And as you said, it sounds like that doesn't really change what you came to around hey, I need to be prioritizing these strategic conversations. I need to be prioritizing the aligning and start off probably a little slower so that I build a strong foundation. And for you, we started off this conversation where you asked, is what I'm doing enough? And so when we frame it that way, in terms of the doing, being in service of the longer term impact of the culture, what does enough look like for you?

MO: Yeah. I think enough looks like defining success maybe in smaller chunks so that it's easier to know, yes, this was enough. We were able to define what success would look like in year one, and either, we achieved it or we came close. I think in a way, by making the timeframe smaller, instead of realizing that the timeframe is eight to 10 years, figuring out what would success look like in 12 to 24 months? What could we call that? If we could consider it a win, if we were able to do X within 12 to 24 months? I think that that would be more helpful than trying to have this very large goal that has a very long timeframe because it's hard to know within a shorter timeframe, was it enough? Did we get anything done if you're constantly looking out so far ahead.

MURIEL WILKINS: Right. And just because you have the shorter timeframe of what success looks like in the next year, two year, three years, week, doesn't mean that you're letting go of the longer term vision and the longer term goal. It's actually the contrary. Those shorter term milestones are what keeps you moving towards that goal. And maybe instead of asking yourself, am I doing enough? The question could be, am I doing what's aligned with the longer vision? Because are we ever doing, who knows? Enough is such a relative term.

MO: I know.

MURIEL WILKINS: The question is, are you doing and is it aligned? That's it. Is what we're doing aligned with that longer term vision?

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: Okay?

MO: Yes.

MURIEL WILKINS: I can't remember the name of the book now, but it's by one of my favorite writers, Ta-Nehisi Coates. In the book, he talks about the march towards justice and anti-racism and how we need to really think about what we're doing in that area as this multi-generational effort rather than thinking what we're going to do is going to make us see that vision come to life in our lifetime. It might. It would be great if it did. Of course nobody's going to say, "No, no, no, no, no, we don't want to end racism in my lifetime. Let it wait." Right? Nobody wants to say that.

MO: Right.

MURIEL WILKINS: And so, there's the optimism that it will end, that there's a hope that it ends, and then there's a realism that it might not end in my lifetime, but that doesn't mean I'm going to stop the work. So I think in any change effort, that's the case. What you're doing with these kids in school, you're planting the seed in them, you're creating a foundation so that they can go out in the world, but you might not see as you said, the impact till 20 years down the line. You might never see it, but you have to trust that it's going to be there, that you've done what you needed to do in alignment with them being able to be successful in the world as alums.

MO: Yes. That's right.

MURIEL WILKINS: So, let me ask you a question. How much are you struggling now versus how you were struggling when we first started our conversation?

MO: So, it's been really helpful to realize that I need to define success, but then I need to define it in shorter timeframes as opposed to having this very long, far off goal. So I think, that's going to help me, that's going to help a lot, and it's going to help me struggle less, and it's going to help me realize that enough is a really weird word to try to define as far as a week goes. And so I think that I hope to struggle less. I think there's a lot to think about, and I don't do this work alone. They're great partners in the immediate team. And so this is just really helpful as we anticipate bigger strategic conversations as an institution and as we try to figure out how our work supports those strategic initiatives. Defining success in shorter term groups, that's just going to be really, really helpful because it will help me feel like... It'll help me measure what enough is, right? Because if you can figure out what does success look like in the coming academic year, then you can reverse engineer and figure out okay, by May or June of next year, if we want to be at a specific place, then okay, what do we need to do to get to that specific place?

MURIEL WILKINS: Exactly.

MO: And so, trying to make smaller goals and name what those milestones are is just going to be so helpful. So helpful. Because the phrase boiling the ocean comes up. Like that is... Of course, I want to boil the ocean. Wouldn't that be great? No. So I struggle with the wanting to do it all. And so just remembering that you can't and figuring out okay, what could be done in 12 months and within 24 months? And then measure the path, measure success in those smaller timeframes.

MURIEL WILKINS: In those smaller timeframes with the confidence that it will have a residual impact over and beyond the finite time limit that you've set.

MO: Right.

MURIEL WILKINS: Very nice.

MO: Thank you.

MURIEL WILKINS: Thank you. Hopefully, that was helpful.

MO: It was so helpful. I've got [inaudible 00:55:34]. So it was very helpful. Thank you so much.

MURIEL WILKINS: Sometimes, it takes a while during a coaching session to really understand my client's underlying motivation, and we cracked this code further into the conversation as we started talking more about the years left in her career and the legacy Mo wanted to leave. She came into the conversation focused on how to be a manager of managers and how to set strategic priorities, but like with so many leaders, there was also something else at play for Mo - the desire to leave a lasting legacy.

Having a better understanding of this, why she felt the need to move quickly and why she felt frustrated when it felt like things were moving too slowly was the key to her breakthrough. Once Mo came to this realization, it helped her reframe her goals and the milestones she wanted to hit. In some ways, this reframing might help Mo reset her parameters to shift from the idea that she's doing enough and moving fast enough to ensuring that what she's doing is aligned with her longer term vision. This shift will help her better reach her goal of doing what needs to be done and making a lasting impact at her organization. That's it for this episode of Coaching Real Leaders. Next time...

NEXT EPISODE'S GUEST: I felt unsuccessful, both in asking for and receiving the support that I needed, but also building trust with the new leadership that I had. Slowly, my team began to be reduced.

MURIEL WILKINS: Want more of this episode? Join the Coaching Real Leaders community, where I host live discussions to unpack the coaching sessions you hear on this show, become a member at coachingrealleaderscommunity.com. You can also find more from me on LinkedIn at Muriel Wilkins. Thanks to my producer, Mary Dooe; sound editor, Nick Crnko; music composer, Brian Campbell; my assistant Emily Sofa, and the entire team at HBR. Much gratitude to the leaders who join me in these coaching conversations. And to you, our listeners who share in their journeys. If you are dealing with a leadership challenge, I'd love to hear from you and possibly have you on the show apply @coachingrealleaders.com. And of course, if you love the show and learn from it, pay it forward, share it with your friends, subscribe and leave a review on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. From the HBR Podcast Network, I'm Muriel Wilkins, and until next time, be well.

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How Do I Set the Right Pace To Meet Our Strategic Goals?

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A leader must learn how to set long-term goals and timelines for her team.

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TED: Why Great Leaders Take Humor Seriously

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TED: Why Great Leaders Take Humor Seriously

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Jennifer Aaker and Naomi Bagdonas: Why great leaders take humor seriously

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There's a mistaken belief in today's working world that leaders need to be serious all the time to be taken seriously. The research tells a different story.

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TEDTalk: The Surprising Habits of Original Thinkers

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TEDTalk: The Surprising Habits of Original Thinkers

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The surprising habits of original thinkers

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How do creative people come up with great ideas? Organizational psychologist Adam Grant studies “originals”: thinkers who dream up new ideas and take action to put them into the world. In this talk, learn three unexpected habits of originals -- including embracing failure. “The greatest originals are the ones who fail the most, because they’re the ones who try the most,” Grant says. “You need a lot of bad ideas in order to get a few good ones.”

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HBR: What to Do When Your Ideas Aren't Landing

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HBR: What to Do When Your Ideas Aren't Landing

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Think small. Whether you're talking a manager, a peer, or a senior leader - these people have a lot on their plates. It will be easier for them to process what you're saying if it's clear, to the point, and focused on a single solution or concept.

Share in 10 minutes or less. It's safe to assume that your audience's bandwidth is limited. Cut down your presentation into one big headline and two or three supporting points.

Do more than point out the problem. It's important to deliver difficult news or alert your manager to a big concern - but don't just point out the issue. Suggest a solution as well.

Remember that it's not about you. Ask yourself: How can I package my thoughts in a way that will resonate with my audience? How do they like things presented? Good communication is about considering the other person.

You just started your first job at a new company and are eager to share all your brilliant ideas with the team. You go into your first meeting feeling energized, expecting your manager and peers to listen attentively to your suggestions - and then implement them, pronto. But to your dismay, nothing you share ends up landing. This continues to happen week after week.

When you ask your manager for feedback, they tell you something vague like: "We love all ideas - keeping them coming!" Still, you feel you could be doing more to communicate your thoughts in a meaningful way.

Ever been in this situation? You're not alone. The majority of the workers I coach face this issue at some point in their careers, and typically, the issue is not their ideas - it's their delivery. Here are four strategies that have consistently worked for my clients. Use them to present your ideas in a way that will resonate with any audience.

Think small.

One client I worked with had great ideas that she believed could solve some major issues at her company. She didn't get too much one-on-one time with her manager, so when she did, she ended up sharing all of her recommendations at once. A few minutes into their meetings, my client could see her manager's eyes glaze over. She knew her ideas weren't being heard.

It can be easy to get carried away and think you need to share all your ideas at once - especially if, like my client, you get little face time with the decision-makers at your organization. But presenting someone with too many thoughts or proposals at once can overwhelm them. Whether you're talking a manager, a peer, or a senior leader - these people have a lot on their plates. It will be easier for them to process what you're saying if it's clear, to the point, and focused on a single solution or concept. In other words: Have patience and think small.

My client and I discussed how her laundry-list of recommendations was not helpful to her boss, who likely lacked the headspace and time to walk through every problem-solving hypothesis she offered. Moving forward, she began to do that work herself - deciding on her strongest pitch and presenting that singular idea when the opportunity presented itself. As a result, she had more fruitful conversations with her boss and was able to successfully sell her ideas.

In your own situation, ask yourself: "What is one idea that I can sell to my team/boss/peer in our next meeting?" You may feel eager to elaborate or present several options-but selling your best idea and gaining that win is the first step. It will carry you forth until you're ready to share next idea ... and then the next.

Share in 10 minutes or less.

These days, everyone seems to be stressed and burnt out. Hybrid and remote workplaces that lend themselves to being "always on" can exacerbate these feelings. Consider this when you're selling your ideas. Assume that everyone's bandwidth is limited and aim to share your thoughts in 10 minutes or less.

Consider this example of what often doesn't work versus what does: One of my clients created a 50-page deck highlighting the budget needs of his department and shared it with the executive committee of his company. He created an extensive rationale for every dollar. After my client got through the first three pages, the committee told him he had the funding. However, my client continued to proceed through the entire 50 pages and wound up losing his audience. Even though my client secured the budget, he received feedback that his packaging and delivery were not well-received by the powerful group of stakeholders he had presented to - potentially damaging his reputation and future asks.

You can avoid this by honoring your audience's busy schedule. One method I recommend is breaking your idea down into a few elements:

Start with a headline that describes your pitch, solution, or idea (Example: $200K Budget Recommendation for FY24)

Support point one (Example: This budget will give our department the opportunity to expand our resources and offer clients more efficient solutions.)

Supporting point two: (Example: Our earning from last year can be allocated in X way to support this budget,)

This will help you present your idea clearly and concisely. Just make sure that your headline highlights what you're proposing and include hard evidence or data in your supporting points to help you make a persuasive case.

Do more than point out the problem.

I once had a client who was very adept at spotting problems before his team members and pointing them out. This type of thinking is needed in every organization, but constantly highlighting what isn't working or what won't work is ultimately exhausting and makes other people feel shut down. No one wants to hear all the pitfalls of their plans - over and over again.

To help my client with his idea-packaging, we decided that while his concerns were valid and should be shared, he also needed to shift the conversation toward solutions. From then on, after pointing out a problem, he followed it up with a simple question: "How can I help?"

In your own situation, it's similarly important to deliver difficult news or alert your manager to a big concern. Yet it's also important to ask yourself: How often am I doing this? Am I as perceived as someone who always looks for problems? If so, your ideas won't resonate. People may start to tune you out because they don't want to deal with the messy situations you bring up or they may start to believe you're not interested in solving the problems you bring up.

Instead, aim to ease the tension when discussing difficult issues. Be prepared to discuss possible solutions as well, and if none come to mind, show your good intent by saying something like: "I'm not sure what the solution is yet, but I know there is one. What does the group think?"

It's not about you.

Finally, remember that sharing the best idea is not a contest you need to win. It's not about you and your ego. It's about your audience, their communication preferences, and how you can meet them where they are at.

Ask yourself: How can I package my thoughts in a way that will resonate with my audience? How do they like things presented? For example, if your manager only wants to hear the headline but you're someone who likes details, refrain yourself. In your presentation, only focus on what's absolutely necessary to make your case. On the other hand, if your manager likes details but you dislike the nitty gritty, step up and include the specifics. Remember, good communication is about considering the other person.

To figure out the preferred communication style of your audience, just ask. If you're presenting to your manager or a senior colleague, ask your peers first. Particularly if you're new, they'll be more familiar with the leaders at your organization and how they like to communicate. If that leads to a dead end, ask you audience directly. You can say: "How do you typically like new ideas or data delivered to you?"

A third option is to experiment and see what lands. For instance, try using visuals to make a point in one presentation and bullet points in the next. Pay attention to what lands best with different groups. Be open, curious, and nonjudgmental. Then, evolve and shift your style based on the feedback you receive.

. . .

If you're frustrated because you can't sell your ideas, focus on packaging them more effectively. Unfortunately, no idea - no matter how good - can be greenlit without being presented in a way that works for the audience.

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What to Do When Your Ideas Aren't Landing

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What should you do when your ideas just aren't landing with your team? Here are four strategies you can use to present your ideas in a way that will resonate with any audience. Think small. Whether you're talking a manager, a peer, or a senior leader - these people have a lot on their plates.

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WSJ: Don't Be a Jerk at Work. (But Don't Be Too Nice, Either)

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WSJ: Don't Be a Jerk at Work. (But Don't Be Too Nice, Either)

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Rachel Feintzeig | Photo illustrations and video by Aaron DuRall for The Wall Street Journal 

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Don't Be a Jerk at Work. (But Don't Be Too Nice, Either.)

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How devolving into people-pleasing can hold back your career.