My Jewish Coach
Hooray! Now What?
By all accounts, 2015 has been a satisfying year for me, personally and professionally. In addition to taking a wonderful family vacation to Israel, getting two kids off to high school, and cutting my work-related travel in half, I accomplished three goals that, as part of our family tradition, warranted a Carvel ice cream cake:
- I began teaching Management Communication at Wharton Business School.
- I was published in Harvard Business Review.
- I lost 25 lbs. (Trust me: I get the irony of celebrating this goal with cake).
What do all three have in common? Yes, they’re all impressive – but that’s not what I mean. And yes, they’re all the result of hard work – and that’s not what I mean either. What these three things have in common for me is that within 24 hours of reaching each of these goals, I thought to myself, “Now what?”
I gave myself a day (and probably only a few hours, if I’m being honest) to enjoy the achievement, and then had a sudden dip in interest, motivation and satisfaction as my mind began to scramble for what new goal I was supposed to be setting next. What could I do to get the next buzz? How could I top myself? What would make me happy next?
And all of a sudden, it hit me: The only thing that would “make me happy next” was slowing down my goal-driven behavior long enough to actually experience being happy. I knew what yearning felt like, and what accomplishing felt like, and what adrenaline felt like, but I had very little experience living with what just being satisfied felt like. For a professional coach who helps clients discover and lean into what’s already working well in their lives, and for a seasoned mom who teaches her kids to be grateful for what they have rather than always wanting more, I realized that I was out of alignment with my own integrity.
Eleanor Roosevelt said,
Happiness is not a goal. It’s a by-product of a life well lived.
My goal for 2016 (scratch goal, replace with plan) isn’t to want more, do more or have more.
It’s simply to be happy with what I already, blessedly have.
How to Give Feedback To Folks Who Don’t Want to Hear It
“I can’t wait to hear what I did wrong!”
“You’re frustrated with my performance? Do tell.”
“I’m failing to meet expectations plus I have a work habit that drives you crazy? Details, please!”
-Said nobody ever
Let’s face it: Getting feedback is hard. And so is giving it. But what’s even trickier is giving feedback to someone who is defensive, in denial or determined NOT to hear it.
So what do you do?
Drop it?
Force-feed them?
Send them a signing telegram?
None of the above — but you DO have to deal with it, and I’m thrilled to share my tactics and strategies for doing exactly that, published in Harvard Business Review “When Your Employee Doesn’t Take Feedback”.
A New Year of Positive Thinking
Having a positive workplace doesn’t mean waking up to your alarm clock playing Pharrell Williams’s “Happy” song every morning, nor does it mean greeting your colleagues with a “welcome to Disneyworld!” smile every day. This is not always perceived positive, and in fact, it can be downright annoying. However, when your work culture isn’t positive, it has a direct affect on your physical and emotional life. Cultivating a positive workplace requires first understanding that without it, work becomes meaningless, motivation drops and engagement disappears.
Positivity allows for creativity, big picture thinking and openness to new ideas, which leads to a successful organization.
I first learned about positive thinking as a child from my father who created a very special bedtime ritual (which I’ve adopted with my girls years later). Every night, my father would ask me “Noa, what kind of dream would you like to have tonight?” In most cases, my answer was to live in a candy store! At that point, my dad would pretend that there was an invisible zipper on my forehead which he would slowly unzip, and whisper my dream to my subconscious. Then he would hurry to zip up the invisible zipper so the dream wouldn’t escape and I would close my eyes and immediately immerse myself in thoughts of my candy store and everything that I get to do there and then I would fall into a sweet sleep.
So what do dreams of endless candy have to do with having a positive mindset at work? I learned that being able to “choose” my dreams as a child developed into having the ability to choose my thoughts as well as my moods as an adult. Positivity is, in fact, both a mindset and a skillset. We can all cultivate positivity through the choices we make, the perspectives we choose, the behaviors we engage in, the conversations we have, as well as those who choose not to engage in.
While it is much easier to have a positive outlook when times are good, it’s even more important to focus on positive thinking when things go wrong. Many of us have serious and urgent problems. We experience disappointments, heartaches, rejections, and stress on a daily basis. While we don’t want to pretend that our problems aren’t real , “sugar coat” them or withdraw into denial, we can still approach solutions in a positive manner.
Shawn Achor, author of The Happiness Advantage and Before Happiness explains that stress is an inevitable part of work. It can be obstacle to growth but it can also be the fuel for it.
His suggestion to working stress in a positive manner is to make a list of all the stresses you’re under and place them in two groups – the ones you can control (unfinished tasks, inbox) and those you can’t control (the stock market, politics in Iran). You then are being asked to choose one stress that you can control and come up with a small, concrete step you can take to reduce it. This is what signals your brain to shift to a positive, productive mind-set.
Most people believe that success preceded happiness. “Once we reach our campaign target, then I’ll be happy”, or “Once I lose 10 pounds, then I’ll be happy”. However success is a moving target – as soon as we hit our target, we raise it again and the happiness that results from success is gone.
Similarly to training our muscles at the gym, recent research on neuroplasticity, shows that it is not so different than training our brain to be more positive.
Here are a few things that we all can do each day to help our brain cultivate more positivity in our work and life:
- Writing down three things we are grateful for.
- Acknowledging someone else for doing/being good.
- Exercise for 10-30 minutes.
- Meditate anywhere for two minutes.
- Describe in a journal the most meaningful experience of the past 24 hours in a journal.
Even by choosing one of the above as a new habit and repeat it for three weeks, will show improvement in your levels of positive and engagement.
Growing up in the 1970s, neither my dad or I knew anything about “positive psychology” and the “happiness factor”, but somehow, we knew how to apply these principles.
As you are gearing up for a new day at work, remember that you can’t have a positive work environment with a negative mind. Training your brain to look for the positive outcomes in each situation and your positive contribution to taking one step towards solution will help you enormously in cultivating a positive day.
Good Grief! Do you Delegate like Lucy or Charlie Brown?
I must admit that, while most of my work is cool, last week provided me with an opportunity that was cooler than cool: I was invited to facilitate a delegation workshop at 20th Century Fox’s animation studios, with the teams that are making the new Peanuts movie (in theatres November 6th, by the way). Between the production teams, and the story teams, and the animation teams, and the talent teams – they’ve got a lot to do and not a lot of time left to do it.
Good grief!
So how will they get it all done? By delegating. Which is, of course, easier said than done.
Most of us are well aware of the benefits of delegating, which include lightening your workload, developing your staff, providing opportunities for collaboration, offering your team members a sense of ownership and empowerment, giving you an emergency back-up, retaining talent, as well as growing and challenging yourself (both to take on new tasks and to learn how to “let it go”). And yet, despite the myriad benefits, many managers don’t delegate well – but when they do, their style is either too Lucy” or “too Charlie Brown. (tweet this)
What’s your delegation style?
You may be a Lucy if:
- You joke about being a “control freak” (but you know it’s not a joke).
- Everything feels urgent to you.
- You are addicted to adrenaline.
- You need to be in charge.
- You tell people not just what to do but how to do it, and don’t welcome others’ input and approaches.
- You’re deeply concerned about credit and blame.
- Your style is command and control.
You may be a Charlie Brown if:
- You find yourself mired in minutiae.
- Most of your tasks feel comfortable to you.
- You hoard work.
- You realize someone else could do it but so could you.
- You worry about being seen as dispensable.
- You don’t want to overload your team.
- You want to protect your staff from stress or failure.
- You’re worried about messing things up.
- Your style is just to do it yourself.
You may be either a Lucy OR a Charlie Brown if thinking about delegating gives you hives, sweats or stomach pains (or makes you want to cling to Linus’ blanket.) Either way, delegation is a critical competency for anyone who has too much to do and not enough time to do it (tweet this), for anyone who is charged with developing and empowering others (tweet this), and for anyone who realizes that in order to move up in the organization, they need to make sure that their current work can be done by others so that they’re not stuck doing this (whatever your “this” is) for the rest of your career (tweet this).
If you’re a Lucy, it’s time to show your team that you believe in their talents, that you can be flexible, and that you’re as committed to their development and growth as you are to getting it right. If you’re a Charlie Brown, it’s time to show your team that you value and trust them, that you’re resilient in the face of setbacks, and that you’re ready for all of you to play a bigger game – even if you need to hold on to your security blanket for a while longer.
If you or anyone on your team is wrestling with delegation, you can instantly download our online 60 minute course “Delegate without Drama” and learn the eight steps to help you start giving up a little bit of control and gaining a few more hours each week without giving up your commitment to quality
When Someone’s Behavior Leaves You In the Dark
My daughter Sophie reported that climbing Masada (she ran up the Snake Path in 25 minutes!) was one of her favorite experiences of our recent family trip to Israel.
For my son Jacob, it was the Ayalon Institute, a secret bullet factory built underneath a kibbutz.
My husband Michael and I told the kids that we adored visiting Yad Lakashish, a non-profit organization that empowers nearly 300 elderly Jerusalem residents on a daily basis by putting them to work as artisans. (Our real favorite part of the trip was how well the kids got along with one another, but we’re keeping that to ourselves.)
But one experience made it to the top of everyone’s list: our dinner at Nalagaat Blackout Restaurant. So awe-inspiring, in fact, that the lessons we learned there keep growing – and yes, this is my second article about it.
If you recall, our family had the opportunity to experience a totally dark dinner served by blind and visually-impaired waitstaff. What surprised all of us the most was that our eyes never adjusted. Not even a little bit. It was pitch black, all the time, with no relief.
When I finally came to terms with the fact that I was going to be completely in the dark until I left, I realized how many of us work with or know people whose behavior leaves us in the dark – and that far too often, we sit there waiting for something to shed light on their behavior. And that light never comes.
What do you do when you work with someone you don’t trust? Whose intentions you can’t see or whose behaviors blindside you?
Working with someone you don’t trust is like sitting in total darkness. You are desperate to see something – anything – that can help you figure out what to do next, say now, or even believe about yourself and your situation. You realize that you need to trade vulnerability for vigilance. You realize that you need to shrink your expectations from thriving to surviving. And all of that can impair the quality of your work as well as your confidence.
There’s no easy fix for working with someone you don’t trust, where you can’t see how to proceed next. But here’s what I did at Nalagaat to adjust my expectations and behaviors in the dark, once I realized that my situation wasn’t going to adjust.
I stopped blaming myself (and my eyes) for not being able to see in this situation.
I acknowledged that I had two options: 1) stay and figure out how to make this work to the best of my abilities or 2) get up and leave.
I adjusted my expectations of what I would be able to accomplish in the dark (from “enjoying a lovely meal” to “emerging without cutting myself or wearing my meal.”)
I asked for help from my team (family) for things with which, under normal circumstances, I wouldn’t need to ask for help.
I offered help, unsolicited.
I recognized that each of us was struggling – both together and individually – with the circumstances.
I made small movements and sought frequent feedback from my team and from the environment as to how I was doing.
I offered positive, reinforcing feedback to the team.
I gave myself positive self-talk throughout the meal.
I took all advice from the waitstaff, who were experts in how to manage this situation.
And probably most importantly, I reminded myself that the darkness wasn’t being dark to make me angry, endangered or frustrated. It wasn’t personal. The darkness was just being what it was, and I just happened to be there for it.
Could you use a little more light shed on how to create a culture that instills a sense of trust? Join us for our webinar on Creating a Culture of Trust.
A Life Lesson Learned Over Dessert in Israel
Shalom from Israel!
True confession: the last time I was in Israel, I was with my old boyfriend. Considering that I’ve been with my husband Michael for 18 years, it’s been a long time since I’ve been back “home”.
Of course, when I came to Israel with an old beau, I never anticipated that the next time I’d be here would be with a (different) husband and my teenage twins. And considering the inspiring and moving sites and experiences we’re having on this trip – from camel rides and rafting in the Jordan River to Havdalah at the Western Wall and a walk through Yad Vashem’s Garden of the Righteous — I never could have anticipated I’d learn the biggest life lesson at the bottom of a dessert dish.
Now, it wasn’t just any dessert dish. It was a dish of crème brulee that my son Jacob was eating at Tel Aviv’s Nalaga’at BlackOut, where diners eat their meals, served by blind waitstaff, in total darkness. The experience was startling, humbling and like nothing any of us had ever experienced. Some of us (ok, me) resorted to eating with our hands when utensils proved too tricky without a stitch of light. And by the time dessert came, we had been so taxed by the lack of visual context that we had stopped talking in order to concentrate so that we wouldn’t be wearing our dinners.
And then, Jacob broke the silence: “I’m so sad about this dessert!” he said. “Don’t you like it?” I asked him, to which he replied, “I love it. It’s the best dessert I’ve ever had. But since I can’t see it, I don’t know when it will be over!”
“Jacob,” I said, “you have just summed up one of life’s great lessons and challenges: how to truly enjoy what you have because you have no idea when it will end.”
As we thanked our blind waitress for her excellent service, we thanked God for the gift of our sight, and felt truly thankful for this incredible family trip to Israel. And while it’s the first for the four of us, I hope it isn’t our last – but no matter what, we are truly enjoying what we have because we have no idea what the future will bring to any of us.
Shalom from Israel.
Is Your Halo Hollow?
For the past two years, if you were looking for me on weekday mornings between 8 and 9 am, you would have found me at my local CrossFit – that workout regimen that combines Olympic gymnastic and weightlifting moves and high-intensity aerobic training with weeping, grunting and collapsing. This was going to be the habit that upgraded my physique! This was going to be the new activity that changed my life for the better!
Guess what? It didn’t work – and not for the reasons you might think. It didn’t work because I misplaced my halo.
For two years, I believed that if I exercised the way that professional athletes do, I could also eat the way professional athletes do. 50 pull-ups? 100 squats? 200 sit-ups? Surely that’s a recipe for carte blanche dining, right? As it turned out, it wasn’t. I had fallen prey to a behavioral halo effect bias that was hurting me both physically (100 squats!) and emotionally (feeling stuck at the same weight).
The “halo effect” is defined as the tendency for a person’s positive or negative traits to “spill over” from one personality area to another in others’ perceptions of them. My halo effect was behavioral – I was expecting the benefits of one overwhelming positive action (intensive exercise) to spill over into another area of my life (my eating habits). I thought that if I behaved beautifully in the gym, I could misbehave at the table. So maybe I could have gotten away with it a little bit, but I couldn’t get away with it nearly as much as I told myself. And as much as I tried to right-size my portions, I couldn’t shake that “halo” feeling that I shouldn’t have to work out so hard to still eat so little.
I am not alone. Have you ever worked for a manager who believed that her intelligence and talent gave her the right to explode at her direct reports? Behavioral halo effect. Do you know a major donor who thinks that the size of his gift permits him to boss other volunteers (as well as professionals) around? Behavioral halo effect.
And how about you? Do you:
- Treat your members and customers with incredible patience at work…and then come home and blow up at your kid for leaving his shoes in the hall?
- Give your undivided personal attention to your boss but keep one eye on your cell phone when a direct report wants to talk with you?
- Attend every board meeting but cancel your supervision meetings?
- Make sure your babysitter or nanny never wants for anything, while brushing aside your spouse’s needs?
- Take care of everyone else while ignoring your own health and happiness?
If you answered yes to any of these, your halo is hollow. You’re allowing one set of positive behaviors to cast an artificial glow on others that clearly don’t deserve a spotlight. How do you fix it? Stop granting yourself permission and excuses to behave carelessly, and start giving yourself credit for the fact that you clearly have what it takes to act responsibly, considerately, and like a mensch. If you can do it somewhere, sometimes, and with some people, you can do it (almost) everywhere, every time, and with most people. Especially with and for yourself.
So how did I drop the halo and its blinding effects? I quit exercising and eating like a linebacker and started working out like someone who needed to 1) have better balance and 2) be careful about what she ate. I no longer allowed one overwhelmingly positive action to grant me permission for excess or carelessness. By dropping the halo, I raised the bar for my behavior and dropped the excuses — along with almost 25 pounds — along the way!
The Best Way to Get the Worst Results
Last weekend, in an uncharacteristic burst of energy, I decided to tackle the piles of clutter that threatened to overtake our front entrance hall and my bedroom bookcase. Despite the fact that I knew this would thrill my (orderly and neat) husband, Michael, I decided not to announce that I was going to do it. I just did it. I managed to get the many non-book stacks of stuff off of my bookshelf and into my office/bathroom/garbage without anyone noticing what I was up to. I then went to tackle the front hall, where I had dumped everything from makeup and office supplies to spare keys and headphones (so that’s where they were!) and had promptly forgotten where they were.
This was where I got careless. I stopped being so quiet. And I got caught.
“Wow,” said Michael to me, eying surfaces he hadn’t seen in weeks. “You look like you’re on a roll!”
“Yup,” I said, “I’m getting my act together.”
And that’s when Michael committed the fundamental sin that partners, parents, bosses and co-workers make every single day:
Since you’re in an organizing mood, I have a great project in the basement for you when you’re done with this.
As Julia Roberts said in Pretty Woman, “Big mistake. Big. HUGE!”
What was Michael’s egregious error?
When Getting Along Is Easier Said than Done
by Noa Peri-Jensch
This past Saturday, I was listening to a Bar Mitzvah boy at our synagogue. He spoke about the most important mitzvah of ‘Love your neighbor as you love yourself.’ He explained that we should love and accept others’ shortfalls just as we accept our own.
“Easier said than done,” whispered the man sitting behind me. “Easier said than done.”
As a coach, I often hear from clients that life would be so much easier if only difficult colleagues, employees, customers and bosses didn’t surround them. And while it’s fair to assume that every workplace has a few challenging people, working with difficult people in your own Jewish community can be especially hard. When every aspect of our lives is deeply intertwined, from work to our personal relationships, we realize that the person we fought with at last week’s board meeting is now sitting next to us at Shabbat dinner.
A “difficult” personality is better described as a “very different” personality from us. Even a great friend can be a challenging co-worker if your work styles don’t align. But before you deal with a difficult person, you need to deal with yourself first by asking:
- Why does this person bother me?
- What do I need in order to feel more comfortable dealing with this person? Do I need them to listen to me? Do I need to better understand their intentions? Do I need our work relationship to be more flexible? More stable? More task-focused or more people focused?
- What can I do to communicate this need?
- What about me could be bothering my co-worker?
- Is our issue resolvable? Is it worth resolving?
Early in my career, I was introduced to the Myers Briggs personality assessment. After taking it, I gained a great amount of insight into not only myself, but also my group of “difficult people.” Here are a few common examples of how our personality profiles can lead to a difficult relationship:
Introvert/Extrovert: Some people are more centered and productive when they work alone in a quiet environment. Others cannot function on a task without bouncing ideas off other people. If a very social extroverted personality tries to “think out loud” with a very introverted focused on internal processing, they will feel rejected if the introvert does not show enthusiasm and make minimal comment. An introvert trying to focus their mind on organizing their thoughts will feel frustrated, resentful, and drained by a more sociable co-workers constant “interruptions”.
Which one are you? Which one is your difficult person?
Sensor/Intuitive: Some prefer to look at the facts and details, and others are more interested in the big picture and its general impact. When a sensor watches a co-worker’s eyes glaze over as he relays all the vital data he collected, he may assume that the other person finds his report boring or unimportant. However, it can be just the opposite. An intuitive personality is often so busy trying to turn these tiny facts into a big, meaningful picture that she can become overwhelmed, lost, and shut down in frustration. On the other hand, if an intuitive person goes directly to the end result, a sensor may become anxious without seeing the data that led to that result.
Which one are you? Which one is your difficult person?
Rational/Values: As if things were not complex enough, people differ even further in how they process decisions they make. Some people make decisions and base their opinions on rational, analytical thought. They are very comfortable in the realm of cause and effect. Other people base the same choices on their personal values and how the topic at hand will affect others.
Which one are you? Which one is your difficult person?
Organized/Spontaneous: Some people can change at a moment’s notice. They are constantly adapting and changing their work to reflect the needs of that exact moment. Other people, however, prefer stability and predictability. They want to make a detailed plan of action for the next six months. That spontaneous co-worker may wrestle with the needs and demands of their hyper-organized partner. They may even feel the organized person is too rigid.
Which one are you? Which one is your difficult person?
Clearly, neither side is right or wrong. However, these differences can create challenges in working with those who are different! This essential difference in perspective can lead to a difficult relationship.
Working with difficult personalities does not need to be so challenging. Next time you encounter a difficult personality, remember that you might also be difficult for them! Look at your own personality profile and how it might be the reason for the clash.
If working with difficult people still feels “easier said than done,” register for our webinar on Dealing with Difficult People on Thursday, May 21.
The High Cost of a Single Missing Leadership Trait
“The task of the leader is to get his people from where they are to where they have not been.” – Henry A. Kissinger
When you think about leaders you admire – whether it’s Moses or Miriam, the CEO of your organization or the president of your Board – you likely see in them several well-known and well-regarded leadership skills and attributes: vision, passion, confidence, strategic thinking, conflict management, results-orientation, integrity, decision-making and more.
These leadership traits make up a critical combination of competence, commitment and character – and hopefully, you demonstrate many of these yourself whether you hold a leadership title or not.
But there’s one more crucial leadership trait that, according to Harvard University business professor and social psychologist Ann Cuddy, can make all the difference between you and your organization being loved or loathed. And more importantly, it’s a trait that everyone in your organization who interfaces with customers, members, donors, or prospects needs to cultivate if they don’t have it already.
What’s in the secret leadership sauce?
The added ingredient associated with the most effective leaders of our organizations is Warmth. Warmth is the very first trait that people perceive about us, and based on that initial reading – whether we like it or not – people decide whether our intentions are positive or negative.
Warmth is considered more important and more influential than competence (our ability to do the job). And while the people with whom we work may forgive us for a breach in competence, studies show that “a single instance of negative-warmth behavior is likely to irredeemably categorize the perpetrator as a cold person.”
So what does that mean? It means that your front office staff member who gets things done but has a brusque tone is costing your organization credibility. It means that a supervisor who is brilliant at the technical aspects of her job but who is described as having an “edge” is costing you staff morale. It means that the fundraiser on your team whose numbers are good but who also rubs some donors and prospects the wrong way is costing you money.
It means that every single member of your organization needs to know that making people feel included, engaged, respected – and cared about – is a part of his or her job description.
Here are 10 ways to increase feelings of warmth among your team, in the organization, and with customers, members, donors, and prospects:
- Increase the number of agenda-free “casual conversations” you have.
- Give others your complete attention (no cell phones, emails, looking over their shoulders for someone more interesting, etc.).
- Be curious about other people’s work and non-work activities.
- Share your own personal and professional challenges with your colleagues.
- Demonstrate empathy for others’ challenges.
- Let rumors, gossip and bad news die at your desk.
- Be willing to apologize when you make a mistake or hurt someone’s feelings.
- Trust others and be trustworthy yourself.
- Use inviting body language, such as eye contact, smiling and nodding.
- Explain your intentions to others when making decisions or taking actions that affect them.
If you, your team and your leaders could use some help getting even warmer this summer, email us at headcoach@myjewishcoach.com.
