Coaching Blog

When you were a kid, you may have had many ways to identify yourself: activities related to grade school, family life, and extracurriculars like clubs, sports, and music. Perhaps you went to college and identified with university associations. When you began your career, you may have claimed a particular profession (or professions) or hobby as your identity.

Maybe you simply see yourself as one person in the big mosaic of humanity.

When you think of a patient person, what comes to mind? Mister Rogers? Mother Teresa? Mahatma Ghandi? They were definitely champions for patience in a world where instant gratification constantly causes plenty of problems.

Patient people have learned to not be reactive in the middle of frustration, and that is certainly a part of patience.

But patience doesn’t just mean poise or silence in the face of conflict; it means so much more.

So you’ve got a great team, and you’re excited about what the future holds. Everyone on the team seems to fit in the right spot, and you all work well together. Great!

But you’re a little concerned about all the statistics coming out these days about employee engagement—even before COVID-19 messed with all our rhythms. Employees are jumping from one company to another, the turnover rate is higher than you’d like it to be, and hiring costs are through the roof. You simply cannot afford for your employees to become disengaged. Not only for the company’s sake, but you also don’t want your employees to feel stuck or for working at your company to be dreadful.

When it comes to hiring the next person for your company or organization, the all-important question boils down to one word: Who? You know the candidates have what you’re looking for: the education, the experience, the chops. But how do you know if it will, you know, work out? How do you know if they are a fit for your company? Your culture? Your mission?

In our culture, the word judgment isn’t thrown around positively much anymore. People say, “don’t judge me!” for eating a whole sleeve of Oreos or an entire pizza (no judgment here!) or go to a gym that boasts a “no judgment zone.” This kind of judgment or shaming or condemnation is not the kind of judgment we’re talking about here.

We’re talking about value-based decision-making skills. Having good judgment means you have a certain set of values and that your values determine the kinds of decisions you make. You might think this is quantifiable in all those personality assessments you can find, and even take, for free online. And these assessments—like the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, DISC, 16 Personality Factor, and the Enneagram—are good tools. But personality assessments can only take you sof ar. They cannot tell you someone’s values or moral principles.

The Huntsville/Madison County Chamber of Commerce held a monthly CEO roundtable discussion, and this time, I found myself the one to bring the question.

The whole point of CEO roundtables like this one is to connect with other local business leaders to discuss issues that impact businesses in the community. They can be incredibly productive, kind of like a thinktank for CEOs and business leaders, especially for creatively solving issues leaders are facing.

And I had no idea how creative this discussion was about to get.

“It’s lonely at the top.”

But it doesn’t have to be. In fact, it shouldn’t be.

Leaders of all kinds have bought the lie that leadership is a solo sport, and they must be strong for whoever they’re leading. That kind of thinking may leave a leader feeling invincible in the short term, but in the long run, it will leave the leader depleted, distressed, and even depressed.

That’s a problem.

Leaders are readers.

A quick Google search on that sentence produces over 200 million results. It’s a widely-known idea, confirmed by the multi-million-dollar leadership publishing industry. Visit your local bookstore or library and see the scads of books dedicated to leadership, organizational development, and success.

Except — let’s be honest — some books feel like an information dump rather than an inspiration pump.

But what if I told you that you might not have to finish the book?

There’s this thing that sometimes happens inside our heads when we think thoughts.

Sometimes — maybe even a lot of the time — when we have thoughts, we assume they’re right and true, just because we thought them.

You don’t have to let your imagination run very far without figuring that this assumption might be a problem.

Life isn’t a solo sport.

If the COVID-19 pandemic and ensuing quarantine has taught us anything, it’s that life is better together. And that we need each other. Because we were created for relationships and community.

When it comes to personal development, there are a few key relationships you need to help you grow: Coaches, Mentors, and Peer Advisory Groups.

They’re all different, and they serve different purposes, but you need them all.