Four Must Dos of Every Leader at an Organization Right Now

Leaders can make work smooth surfing for their staff right now by doing these four things.

We almost went out of business and everyone was looking for jobs.

It’s ancient history now but 2007 was a tough year. It was the Great Recession and we were preparing for a new event and new awareness campaign the following year. If that wasn’t enough, all of us could expect our boss to literally look over everyone’s shoulder everyday to see what they were working on. 

Looking back on it now, I can honestly say the worst part was not the challenges of starting something new or doing it during a bad economy. The whole “looking over the shoulder” part was terrible. 

Half of nonprofits don’t make it out of their first year and about half of small businesses don’t make it past year five. The risks may be even higher in the times ahead with another recession and a workplace revolution marked by labor shortages. People are just finding better places to work at.

The biggest underlying cause is the same as my experience - feeling distrusted and devalued.

The good thing that came out of feeling like working in a foxhole for two years was the bond made with my colleagues that led to a commitment to build a healthy organizational culture. It was a revolutionary resolution back then but today, it’s absolutely essential. According to Glassdoor, four in five workers consider an organization’s culture before saying yes to a position. That means if we don’t have a healthy organization then we’ll be spending most of our time managing constant turnover rather than results.

It worked out for us. Over the last decade, we’ve been named one of the best places to work eight times by the NonProfit Times while expanding our budget 500 percent. The fact is: If we’re to have successful results, we need to be leaders of a healthy organization with stunning colleagues. Here are four things we need to do to get there:  

1. Manage ourselves. No one. Absolutely no one can do a better job at doing this than ourselves. We can’t effectively lead or manage others without being keenly self-aware. French writer and aviator Antoine de Saint Exupery said, “If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up people to collect the wood and don’t assign them tasks, but rather teach them to long for the vast and endless sea.” As a leader, and we’re all leaders depending on the situation, others will look to us to inspire and show them the way so mastering how our words and actions impact others is everything. We can only do this by knowing our personality (by the way, it’s much more than knowing if we’re introverted or extraverted), build on our strengths, embrace our weaknesses, invest time in the types of activities from which we draw energy, and know our habits on how we’re most likely to handle conflict and difficult situations we may find ourselves in. 
   
   For example, I’ve developed the ability to galvanize teammates by enabling them to see how their role and responsibilities are essential in working toward our shared goal and by showing them the results of their efforts. Some of this strength comes from being a teenage radio DJ (I know it sounds like a sitcom). I turn on that energy and try to shine it on others. On the flip side, one of my weaknesses is being detail oriented; especially if spreadsheets are involved - forget it. I spend my time getting better at my strengths, because it gives me energy, and I use the vulnerability of my weaknesses to build trust with my teammates because I’m seen as relatable. These weaknesses also empower those who are exceptional at the details to come forward to shine. 
   
   It doesn’t end there. If we’re to have successful organizations, it’s not enough to be self aware. We must know what makes our teammates tick too. What are their strengths and what objectives give them energy? Failure to see the genius others can bring to a team burns them out and leaves us in a constant state of onboarding the next person. 
   
   For example, a colleague of mine is great at strategizing and they are someone one I go to for help on brainstorming and discussing our future, another is exceptionally strong at woo’ing others so they’re utilized to bring in new partners, and a third colleague is a console personality type (attentive and people-focused), to lead our events. Further, we take what we know about each other and share information easily for everyone on the team to see. It’s sort of a user manual for each colleague so we can have the best chance to be a cohesive team and to leverage each other for success. 
   
   Most places don’t take this step but for those that do, they find a competitive advantage. However, this is just the first step because there’s far more to all of us than just four letters on a personality test.
   

2. Create a Circle of Safety. Again. No one. Absolutely no one can create this but the leader. The good news is anyone who inspires others is a leader. It’s a concept as old as time. From the African proverb of “a bundle of sticks is unbreakable” to the U.S. revolution rally cry of “united we stand, divided we fall”, and made popular in recent years by Simon Sinek. A leader who can create a culture in which colleagues cooperate toward protecting and growing an organization by forging a team - not for the organization itself - but for themselves and their colleagues, will inspire the building of an organization that will stand the test of time and the dangers around it. 

   
   There are always threats and dangers. For me, working in the nonprofit arena, sometimes it’s competitors but most often, the dangers are weather events like hurricanes and political cycles that draw people’s attention away from our mission. A circle of safety works to eliminate internal challenges; enabling the team to focus its energies on meeting the external ones together. 
   
   Said another way, if we’re worried about getting fired because we step out of line with needless company policies or arbitrary metric benchmarks then we’re not spending our efforts on meaningful things like innovation, retention, and constituent or customer loyalty.
   
   Putting it into practice: At ZERO, we care far more about living the values of the organization - humble, hungry, and empathetic - than we do about metrics. Someone can execute a plan flawlessly and still have outside factors like a pandemic or a rain storm cause poor performance. If we help our colleagues live the values then they are in the circle of safety which gives them an incredible sense of trust to innovate and make strong relationships with our constituents.
   

3. Adapt high responsibility and high freedom. Responsibility and freedom go together like peanut butter and chocolate; just with less calories. When we have clear goals where our teams can give input, colleagues accept personal responsibility when we say, “you can do it your way” rather than by saying something like “you’ll get the credit or get blamed for your performance”. If we say, “We have a policy for that, so you have little freedom to manage the project the way you like” then it dramatically reduces responsibility especially in times when a project doesn’t work out the way we want it to turn out. 
   
   The problem is that the vast majority of workplaces operate this way. It’s micromanaging and it creates discouragement and resignation to a “quit and stay” attitude. We’ve all been part of these companies and it’s exhausting for everyone involved. By knowing ourselves and trusting that our colleagues can bring their talents to the team, we can innovate and efficiently generate results we may never have thought possible. 
   
   We’ve tested it out over the last decade. At ZERO, we stripped down most policies. Unless it has to do with promoting diversity or giving legal protections, we shy away from them. One we let go of was how much you should spend while traveling and all of these years later no one has stayed at a Four Seasons. Instead, high freedom inspires colleagues to act like entrepreneurs. They do what’s best for the organization, save money, and they feel like the success of the cause is dependent on the successes they have in their role. When it comes to vacations -  we “take the time we need” to recharge, take care of our families, and prepare to give our best. No one has run off to Fiji.
   

4. Build a Cohesive team with shared values that communicates clarity. You guessed it - No one else can do this either. A leader is responsible for building a cohesive team that behaves and functions well with one another. Not having it threatens the long-term health of an organization. It’s the most important job any leader can have - getting the team to rally around the shared-values of an organization as well as eliminating any fundamental differences that exist among team members. 
   
   This is where the concept of circle of safety and knowing yourself and others really well comes is really important as members of terrific teams trust each other on an emotional level and they are comfortable being vulnerable with each other about their fears, mistakes, and weaknesses and are not afraid to say things like “you’re better at this than I am” and I’m sorry”. Practicing vulnerability-based trust especially during difficult situations will make tighter bonds. The aim is to get completely open with each other like we see on sports teams or rescue squads - speaking out to make each other better and keeping the focus on what’s most important. 
   
   Teammates who trust one another aren’t afraid to engage in conflict around ideas that are key to the organization’s success. This is where knowing your teammates goes a long way because then we can make acts of challenging each other about the pursuit of the best solutions and decisions. 
   
   When everyone on the team can engage in healthy conflict around ideas, all are able to gain commitment to decisions as members can disagree and commitment to the direction because all have been given the opportunity to weigh in so they buy in. Commitment to decisions and standards of behavior allow for all teammates to hold each other accountable for living up to the decisions that have been made. 
   
   Teams that can rally around shared values and establish a great level of trust among one-another, engage in healthy conflict, gain commitment to decisions, and hold each other accountable are far more likely to be productive and achieve results. 
   

   As we wrestle with high turnover and a struggling economy, we can use difficult situations to our advantage by leading our teams in coming closer together around these principles to create a healthy culture that will make our organizations more resilient to challenge and change and more productive for years to come. What are you doing to be a great leader and make your organization a healthy one?