Teamwork – Page 3 – Grandpa Bob Encouraging Leadership

We Are All Mountain Climbers

Until you face a climb yourself, you can never fully understand what it takes.

There it is…Mount Everest from the air. Each year, about 150-200 climbers attempt to reach its summit, 29,029 feet above sea level. There are thousands of other mountain peaks in the world, but Everest is the highest, and most challenging. Of course, from this angle it looks pretty tame.

That’s the thing about mountains. Perspective is everything. Until you face a climb yourself, you can never fully understand what it takes. Watching others make the climb, or hearing their stories about what it was like, are no substitute for taking on the climb for yourself.

Look around you. If you look closely, you’ll see that each of us are climbing a mountain. Some mountains are short and easy, while others are as high or higher than our friend, Mr. Everest.

This is the point where I could wax on poetically about striving for the highest peaks in life, chasing ever higher summits, new vistas, and new challenges. Yes, do all of that. Don’t let anyone stop you…especially yourself.

No, I’m not going to talk about the standard, inspirational mountain stuff. Instead, I’m going to talk about weight.

When embarking on a climb, is it better to carry twenty pounds, fifty pounds, or one-hundred pounds of gear on your back? Obviously, all things being equal, less weight is better. Gravity is not your friend.

How much weight are you carrying on your climb? Only the essentials? Anything extra? Are you carrying baggage that won’t be used? Why? Carrying all that extra baggage isn’t helping you reach your summit.

What about your fellow climbers, especially those closest to you? How much extra baggage are they carrying? How much of it is yours?

The best strategy for extra baggage (and its unnecessary weight) is to avoid packing it in the first place.

Photo Credit: Alan Arora, who owes me some details on how he was able to be in the cockpit jump seat of an Airbus A319 at the perfect time to capture such a beautiful shot of Mount Everest.

Moving Boulders

The boulder was huge. By all estimates, it weighed at least a ton.

The boulder was huge. By all estimates, it weighed at least a ton. It had rolled down the mountain and was blocking the main road into town. Various city departments sent their top managers out to assess the situation. All came back with the same assessment: the boulder was huge, and there was no way their department could move it off the road.

The road department recommended that they build a new road to go around the boulder. Given the urgency of the situation, that was seen as the best option. They worked around the clock to build the new road. Within four weeks, they had successfully rerouted the road around the boulder. The road department was hailed for their work and sacrifice in helping the city avert the crisis brought about by the boulder.

Success? Not really.

Sure, the city attacked the problem with its best minds. They came up with a novel approach to solving the problem. The road department employees put in a heroic effort to re-open the vital artery into the city.

But, something was missing (other than jackhammers and tractors). In this case, the most vital ingredients to problem solving were missing from the story. Those ingredients are trust and teamwork.

Each manager sought a solution from within the artificial boundaries of their own department, their own experience. Their assessments were correct, from their limited perspectives. None had the resources to move the boulder. Each fell victim to, and tacitly supported, a culture that ignores (or avoids) cross-departmental teamwork.

Imagine what would have happened if even two of the departments had trusted each other. Imagine if they found a way to pool their resources and ideas. The power of teamwork lies not in having more hands to do the work, but in broadening the array of available solutions.

How does your organization deal with boulders blocking the road? What are you doing to change it?

Unacceptable!

Last week, I had an employee come in and tell me how something is unacceptable. The details of the thing that was unacceptable aren’t important. As I sat there, considering how to best respond to this “unacceptable” situation, I wondered if the employee knew what she had done by using that word to start the discussion.

Merely stating that something is unacceptable, without offering up potential solutions, isn’t helpful. The recipient of the news (in this case, the manager) is placed in a position of having to extract additional information, and then determine if there are any acceptable alternatives. Of course, since one situation has already been deemed unacceptable, it’s quite possible that one or more of the alternatives may be similarly unacceptable.

It goes even deeper than that. By starting the conversation in a deep hole of unacceptability, the potential for finding an alternative that is not just acceptable, but ideal, is very low. In other words, finding an ideal solution is probably not going to be the goal. Rather, it will be to find something that is at best “not unacceptable.”

There’s a mindset at play in the person who chooses to use words like “unacceptable” on a regular basis. That mindset is focused on off-loading responsibility for finding solutions to someone else. It is focused on creating short-term impact at the expense of a longer-term environment for success and collaboration.

It’s true that some things in life are unacceptable to us. When these situations arise, we have an opportunity to express this from the perspective of trying to find a more ideal solution. If your manager or co-worker holds the keys to an “unacceptable” situation, describe it with words like “challenging,” “difficult,” or possibly use the situation as a pivot point to what you see as more ideal alternatives. Bring an understanding of the pro’s and con’s of your alternatives to the discussion.

Building collaboration is much easier when we seek ideal solutions together, rather than merely working independently to avoid the unacceptable.