Have you upgraded to the new iPhone yet? I did last weekend. It’s been a trying experience. Two simultaneous issues made the troubleshooting quite complex. After five hours of phone time on Saturday, two hours of Genius time at the Apple store on Sunday, and another three hour phone call on Monday night, the phone was still not fully functional. I was at wit’s end – and ready to return to Blackberry-world.

On a whim, I stopped in to the Verizon store in Pittsford, NY as I was passing by on Tuesday. “Have you seen any similar issues over the past week?” , I ask the Verizon specialist, Stefan. “In fact, we’ve been seeing something similar in specific cases with a certain ISP (which happened to be mine).” He proceeded to troubleshoot along this path, phoning the server host company at one point. After an hour’s effort, my phone was working!

“Why didn’t I hear this from Apple or Verizon before?” I ask.
“Not sure. We’re just beginning to see this trend as people come in for service.”

Aha. This is where the current, timely information is. At the street level, where real-time customer interactions occur.Not in corporate offices or customer service training centers.

Want to know the latest, most up-to-date information and trends about your business? Talk to your front-line people. They’re on the customer front every day, dealing with issues, troubleshooting with their own experience and ingenuity, and maybe even working around your company’s policies and practices that don’t work in the real world. These are your customer experts, living the customer experience daily.

Find a way to systematically collect their findings, their input, and their ideas and solutions, and incorporate them as quickly as possible into ongoing operations, planning cycles and processes, to be on the top of your game. And find a way to value and acknowledge them for their contribution.

And if you’re a Verizon customer contemplating a new iPhone, stop by the Pittsford store and ask for Stefan.

My favorite photographer, DeWitt Jones, teaches us to see the world in new ways. In his DVD, Celebrate What’s Right With the World, he says:

   “Live with uncertainty, act with confidence.”

   “We have to know ourselves as well as our craft.”

   “The times of most change contain the most potential.”

How do we live and lead, and celebrate what’s right with the world? How do we tap into the potential within the changes we all face?

We have to see what’s right with the world. Too often we focus on what’s wrong, what’s broken, what needs fixing. Try, for today, to shift to appreciation and gratitude. We have so many blessings in our lives, so much to be grateful for. And the more we can celebrate what’s right, the more energy we have to make a difference and fix what’s wrong.

There’s a process, Appreciative Inquiry, where we look at what is working and what we can learn from what is going well, so that we can include those elements in future efforts.

Picture yourself having a new conversation with colleagues – perhaps asking these appreciative inquiries:

   “What is working?”

   “Think about a great situation you’ve encountered – what made it great? What elements were present? How could we do
    more of that?”

   “What makes our customers keep coming back? What do they love about us? How can we provide more of it?”

Take time today to Celebrate What’s Right With the World.

In his latest book, The Great Rest: How New Ways of Living and Working Drive Post-Crash Prosperity, Richard Florida defines ‘creative destruction’: economic crises sweep away old firms and outmoded economic systems and practices, clearing the way for entrepreneurs to introduce new technologies and entirely new industries and set into motion a new era of growth.”

Luxottica’s CEO Andrea Guerra says, “Crises are not only about negative things. Where the world is changing and changing fast, your thoughts have to be bold.”

It’s hard to overcome the gravitational pull of traditional wisdom – established ways of doing things, usual ways of viewing your markets. That’s why it’s hard for leaders to do something truly new – to champion brave new ideas in a me-too world. Yet that’s the job description for leadership today. After all, if you do things the way everyone else does things, why would you expect to do any better?

How are you using this Great Reset to update your own leadership approach and your company culture, in order to be among the companies rising higher as a result of this experience?

Have you noticed that our learning goes up when we actually have to apply it in a real-life situation? Beyond conceptual understanding lies experiential wisdom.

Remember when you had to actually make something happen? No more academic exercises, it was time for the real world. The stakes went up, your attention focused, and you really cared about getting a great outcome. Whether it was a household problem to solve, an internship to prepare us for the world, or being up to bat in a tied game, bottom of the ninth, two outs.

In the hotseat of responsibility, we can come alive, and put to use all the knowledge we’ve accumulated from books and lectures. Until then, it’s all conceptual. Through experience, we learn what really works, what real-time adjustments need to be made and the power of great timing.

As a leader assisting people in these situations, think of your role as Just-in-Time Coaching. What words of wisdom would be most helpful to them? What can you share from your own experiences? How can you enhance this learning experience, without removing them from the hot seat of responsibility, where real learning happens?

Catalyst, the trusted name in research on women at work, released a new report last week updating the progress of women in Board rooms and executive suites. Bottom line, there is little progress. The findings: women still lag men in compensation, career advancement and places at the executive and Board tables.

Women represent 3% of Fortune 500 CEO’s, 15% of directors at those companies, and less than 14% of corporate executives at top publicly-traded companies. The Catalyst study, titled ‘Pipelines Broken Promise’, finds that, while for years executives have looked to the pipeline of up-and-coming women in organizations to provide future women leaders, in fact, that pipeline is failing. Anticipated advancement of women is not happening. (For complete research go to www.catalyst.org/publication/372/pipelines-broken-promise)

What the research does not address is the impact of so few women at the top of organizations. Newsweek,on its April 12, 2010 cover, asks ‘What Would Mary Do? How Women Can Save the Catholic Church from Its Sins’ , i.e., what would the feminine perspective of humanity bring to tough decisions made by mostly-male groups? Like the Catholic Church in its latest crisis. Like world leaders. Like Wall Street financiers. (See www.newsweek.com/id/235890)

What do you see in your organization and industry? What impact would more women in strategic decision-making seats have? What are your ideas to address this trend?

 

Heart power.  Capture the heart, you’ve captured the person. Get people to fall in love with your company”                                                                
                                                              Vince Lombardi
                                                                          

Vince knew what he was talking about. People – employees, customers, partners – know when we really care. And when we don’t.

Take a minute today to reflect on where you’re using your heart power effectively. Establish absolute trust as the cornerstone of your relationships. Trust is based on
       honesty – telling the truth, and
       integrity – doing what you say you will.
Add a healthy dose of respect for others and their opinions, and genuine caring about the people in your life. Now heart power really kicks in.

‘Throw your heart over the fence and the rest will follow’
    (that’s Norman Vincent Peale)

I attended a community conversation on the issue of mayoral control of the city school district this AM, consisting of a panel of three school reform experts, a local school Board member and the school union president. What emerged for me was leadership in action. Facing a knotty, long-term, seemingly insoluble problem, what will leaders do?

The core  issue is improving the performance of students, by improving performance of the school district system and its teachers. While some saw the issue of who should control the district (Board or mayor), that is just one option to make change.

Not all agreed that change is necessary; while their initial statements supported it, their subsequent defense of the status quo sent another message.  Others were focused on the below-standard results currently being produced as proof that change was urgently needed.

What caused the differing perspectives among these leaders? Here’s what I saw:
  – Those operating within the current system tended to overlook missing components of performance such as accountability, measures and monitoring, and clear role standards and expectations. Those with some distance from the situation tended to call out these missing elements.
  – Internal leaders focused on actions being taken to address necessary changes; external leaders looked for results, not effort.
  – Internal leaders were more focused on what could not change; external leaders focused on what can be changed

Overall, what is needed in any successful change effort is a consistent and cohesive vision, an urgent mandate for change, and drive to get there. Add a good strategy to achieve the vision, a systemic approach that includes all constituencies, and a culture that includes accountability, collaboration and a focus on performance.  

There are many ways to achieve such a vision. Mayoral control is just one possible path.

Where does this scenario mirror change issues within your organization? What can be learned from the conversation? If you shift from the perspective of an internal leader to an external one, what might you see differently?

I first heard the word ‘liminal’ at a Circlework retreat,  timeouts that I take regularly to maintain purpose, clarity and self-awareness. Liminal. It has a mysterious ring to it. And it means ‘standing at the threshold of transformation’.

Each day we stand in this doorway. Yet it is not easy to recognize. It takes being present and intentional to see the liminal.

What in your leadership is transforming now?  What transformations have already occurred to make you the leader you are today? What needs transforming?

I invite you this week to notice where you are standing in a doorway to a new future. And to consider what actions you can take to follow this invitation to transformation.