CHAPTER 11
Do you think of yourself as a high-performing leader? If not, do you want to become one?
Leadership isn’t confined to a specific role or position, although that fits. We define leadership as the level of influence you have from any role in the organization. Leadership has much more to do with embodiment than it does with titles or positions bestowed by someone from the outside. True leadership comes from the inside out.
Leadership surfaces when you are solid inside yourself—you know what you think, feel, and want. You express it through willingness and ability to influence, and to be influenced by, the people around you and the circumstances you’re in.
A good leader masters the movement along two key axes:
- The ME—the space within yourself
- The WE—the space between you and others
We focus in this section on the ME; we’ll get to the WE in the next section.
Most leaders we work with want to increase their influence and effectiveness. When we ask them what they’re doing to reach their goal, they tell us about the conferences they attend, the business books they read, and the podcasts they listen to. They ask for input from their peers and bosses, and they attempt to follow the latest success formulas.
Sound reasonable? Something critical is missing.
Leaders tend to focus on external input and applying tips, tools, and formulas to drive great results. That makes for a fantastic résumé with terrific achievements. These endeavors may even impress all the right people.
While this achievement mentality works for a while, an outside-in leadership development approach is ultimately not sustainable. Eventually, you’ll need to turn inward to understand how you operate, know when you tend to react defensively versus respond productively, and learn to ride the waves of the fluctuating human emotions. Turning inward develops self-mastery, and it may be the number one biggest lever for increasing your leadership influence, as well as your team’s and organization’s creativity and effectiveness.
INSIDE-OUT FOCUS
Self-mastery requires an inside-out leadership focus, beginning with self-discovery: what is going on inside of you? Self-mastery entails learning how to operate this human called you. From there you can learn to work with and master the fluctuations that occur in your own internal environment.
Most of us are wired to look outside ourselves to determine if we are doing okay. But this view is warped, because our compare and contrast equation has very little to do with what is happening inside other people. There is a common saying, Don’t compare your inside to someone else’s outside. When you do, you only see one side of the story.
Like other leaders, you may judge yourself from the outside first, meaning you’re okay if everyone around you is happy, or if you win, get the promotion, or complete all your work. Now, don’t get us wrong. Of course, you want those things to happen. The problem comes when you make those outside things more important than what is going on inside. That moves you to try to change, construct, or manage yourself to please others and meet their expectations rather than make yourself happy.
This outside-first approach develops what we call a siloed person. A siloed person’s life is compartmentalized. She manages her behavior for effect and treats herself and others like objects to be manipulated instead of as complex, emotional beings to be heard and considered. When things don’t work out well, she doubles down and works even harder to look good, be in control, and shape herself into trendy styles and forms that are the latest, greatest examples of high performance.
When you try to meet those outside expectations, you repress your natural human tendencies and compress your own energy, which is why this behavior doesn’t work for long. Eventually, you need to release this natural energy inside of you. If you’ve repressed it for some time, it likely emerges as an explosion, a failure, or an emotional or physical breakdown.
Rather than focus outside, your task as a leader is to be aware of what is going on inside yourself. Inside-out focus enables you to identify what you are thinking, feeling, and wanting in any given moment.
It sounds simple. But do you easily recognize what’s going on inside you? When something new is happening for you, do you recognize:
- Your thoughts: How does the new information bump against your own belief system?
- Your feelings: What is happening in your body physiologically? When you connect to your physical body and simplify what is going on inside, you’ll notice that you are either opening or closing, leaning forward or leaning away, feeling close to or distant from another person, idea, or situation. Explore and identify what you feel inside.
- Your intentions: Do you know what you really want in this situation? For example, do you want to convince the other person and get your way? Do you want to understand the other person’s point of view? Or, are you interested in repairing the connection between you? Check in with yourself and notice.
Too often, inner awareness does not come until our insides are screaming, at which point management is required to avoid eruption or implosion!
SURF THE WAVES
Self-mastery is like surfing. On a surfboard, it’s critical to notice the water’s rhythm, see the wave rising, anticipate the wave’s size, and time your decision based upon a solid ability to work with the water’s movement so you can ride the wave. Surfing requires self-mastery. It’s not about having the perfect high-end surfboard. And it’s certainly not about the impossible feat of controlling the water—good luck with that! Surfing is about mastering the relationship between you, the board, and the water.
In the same way, leadership is not about having a stellar résumé or multiple accolades. We can’t control our humanness; that’s even trickier to tame than a wave. But we can master the relationship between our inner self and the world in which we live and work.
Leaders often make the mistake of focusing on a better surfboard, or hell, upgrading to a boat! They construct themselves from the outside in to stay afloat through a storm or ride through rough water. The better the boat looks, the more they assume it is water-ready and safe.
Sadly, when leaders look outward, they miss the real opportunity to create a relationship with their inner emotional world. They don’t learn to ride the ebb and flow of strong emotional waves.
Self-mastery entails integrating new information and understanding what fits for you and what doesn’t. You ride the wave with the surfboard you have, and that tool becomes an extension of your body. When you have self-mastery, you can pause and turn inward to be aware of the waves inside of you. Instead of reacting to the waves, you embrace them, you lean into them like a horse leans in to an attacker. When you lean in, you more easily digest what you learn, keep what fits, and throw out what doesn’t.
THE FIRST STEP TO SELF-MASTERY
Self-mastery begins with gathering information about yourself. Be aware of what is happening inside of you. What thought patterns come up for you repeatedly? What physical sensations do you notice? What emotional tones occur? Finally, do you notice your intuitive hunches?
Self-mastery requires turning up the volume of what is happening inside of you and gathering this information over time. We offer a tool to help you do that the Three-Point Check, which is to be used in conjunction with Interested Curiosity.
Tool: Three-Point Check
The Three-Point Check involves pausing at least three times a day to notice:
- What am I thinking?
- What am I feeling?
- What do I want right now?
Capture your findings on a notepad. Do this for a week and review your notes. What patterns do you find? As you review your findings, engage the next important quality, interested curiosity.
Rather than label what you notice as right or wrong, consider that the thought, feeling, or intention is there for good reason. It might be an outdated reason. Something you learned growing up was probably helpful when you learned it, but maybe it no longer serves you.
Approach whatever you notice with interested curiosity. Ask yourself, “I wonder what’s driving my thought, feeling, and intention in this situation?”
This exercise helps you uncover more about yourself instead of getting rid of something you deem unattractive. Despite our best efforts, we don’t change by making ourselves wrong. We change when we are curious about, learn what’s underneath, and understand the problem that the thought, feeling, or intention is trying to solve. This exercise of curiosity is often enough for our so-called negative patterns to dissipate. If you want to apply these tools for yourself, download The Oh Sh*t! Kit at www.Thriveinc.com/beautyofconflict/bonus.
See how our past client Charlie got great value from the Three-Point Check using interested curiosity.
CHARLIE EMBRACES HIS ANGER
Charlie was an up-and-coming executive in a fast-growing technology company struggling with a series of angry explosions at work. His superiors told him his advancement would be limited, as would his career at the company, if he didn’t stop reacting so unproductively.
Charlie attended an anger management class on company recommendation. He learned the importance of shutting down his anger and communicating in a more respectful style when he was upset. It helped for a while. That is, until about two months after the class, when Charlie blew up again. Repressing his angry feelings wasn’t going so well.
When we try to get rid of or suppress our emotions, they go underground in our bodies only to pop out unproductively somewhere else, like with other people. They may even show up as physical symptoms. We have emotional energy for good reason. Knowing what drives it is the key to unraveling the pattern.
A few months later, we met Charlie in person at one of our six-month leadership-development programs. We conducted an in-person module shortly after the start of the program. Charlie traveled from China to Montana to attend. His goal: to get rid of his anger.
We emphasized the importance of understanding, owning, and acknowledging unpopular feelings such as anger, rage, and frustration. We also explored why it’s unhealthy to shut down these feelings or to get rid of them. Charlie was surprised by the discussion. He assumed the different approaches to anger reflected a cultural difference between China and the US. We quickly explained that American executives are also trained and encouraged to control, manage, and get rid of negative feelings. We just don’t agree that the approach is effective.
We encouraged Charlie to be curious about his anger, rage, and righteousness by asking himself, “What is driving my anger in this situation?” We suggested that he get to know, understand, and fully acknowledge that part of himself with curiosity. This would give him a choice when those strong negative emotions began to surface.
Charlie was intrigued. Even better, he was willing to give it a try.
Throughout our work together, both in-person and virtually in the months following, Charlie got over the belief that he had to get rid of his anger. Once he accepted that his anger was natural, he started to make progress. In fact, it gave him vital information about what wasn’t working for him.
First, he did the Three-Point Check three times a day. He became aware of triggers and patterns both inside and outside that escalated his anger. He noticed two triggers and came up with ways to work with them.
Charlie’s first trigger was poor performance. When someone gave Charlie a project that clearly missed the mark, he got riled up. Because he was working on self-mastery, rather than resort to exploding, he now paused to do a full Three-Point Check:
- Thinking: This person is incompetent!
- Feeling: That’s easy—rage!
- Wanting: People to do what I tell them to do!
This Three-Point Check gave him some space to consider with interested curiosity: What’s driving my reaction? He realized that he didn’t think people were hearing him. As a result, he shifted his approach. Instead of yelling, he would ask his team member, “What did you understand the assignment was about?”
More than once, the person related something that was clearly not what Charlie had wanted. Each time, Charlie was surprised. He became even more curious, asking, “Wow! How did we get so far apart?”
Again, more than one person said, “I don’t always understand what you want me to do. I don’t ask questions because I don’t want you to get angry.”
This information helped Charlie improve the way he gave assignments. He spent more time getting people on the same page, and he was much happier with the results.
Charlie’s second trigger was hunger. He realized that he was more apt to get upset around 4 p.m. His Three-Point Check revealed the relationship between his hunger and his anger. He incorporated a 3:30 p.m. protein bar to his routine, and everyone was happier.
Even if you do not have an anger issue like Charlie, you can still increase your leadership influence and effectiveness through self-mastery, the inside-out leadership development approach. Self-mastery is about knowing and owning one’s inner landscape as much, or even more than, focusing on meeting others’ expectations. Trainings, conferences, and business gurus are all helpful, but don’t stop there.
Use the Three-Point Check to understand what you think, feel, and want at any given moment. Want support practicing, download The Oh Sh*t! Kit at www.Thriveinc.com/beautyofconflict/bonus.
The information you gather will give you valuable insight. Then, approach what you notice with interested curiosity. Ask yourself what’s driving this thought, feeling, and intention so you can get underneath the pattern and unravel it. This is where the surfboard meets the water!
Let’s move from the surfboard to the pasture. Because, as we’ve already discussed, horses have a lot to teach us, especially when it comes to the ME.