Horizon Point Consulting

Author: Mary Ila Ward

Women in Business Need Male Mentors

My first professional mentor was a man. In college, I helped him with his research and he helped me grow as a human being in too many ways to count. It was no big deal for us to have one-on-one discussions in his office with the door closed. I never thought anything of it. I suspect he didn’t either. Nor were my parents concerned. They are as grateful to him for the positive influence he had on me as I am.

This mentor often spoke truth with directness to the situations I was dealing with that I found myself getting too emotional about. He also commended me when I acted in ways that showed I was capable and confident. Characteristics a woman is often chided for. This was invaluable.

My best boss was a man. He gave me the freedom to run with my ideas and got out of my way when I did so.   It was not uncommon for us to travel in the car to places for work related events, just the two of us. I never thought anything of it. I doubt he, his wife, or my husband did either.

This boss didn’t make me feel like an idiot when I cried in his office to him about something, that in hindsight, was stupid. Nor did he get condescending when we joked and left a positive pregnancy test on his desk as an April Fool’s joke. Pregnant I was not then, but a month later I was. Oops. He was also so proud when both my kids were born and gave me more flexibility than most after the first was born and I was also trying to finish my Masters thesis. He also spoke truth to my emotion and taught me to ask for forgiveness instead of permission. He praised me for behavior that is also often uncommon for a woman to demonstrate.

I’m often at lunch one-on-one with men.   They are typically clients or perspective clients. I think nothing of asking a man to lunch. I don’t think anything of asking anyone to lunch, male or female. Mealtime is natural way to build dialogue and relationships.

But the last time I was in a restaurant with a male client (in my hometown) an acquaintance-friend I know saw me sitting there with him. She looked away. When I saw her later on, she asked me who he was and why I was there with him.   It was obvious she thought it was weird. She seemed to disapprove. I was confused.

But in this #metoo world we are living in, if people find it strange for a female to be at lunch with a male that is anyone other than her spouse or possibly father, how can we expect it to be okay for both women and men to feel comfortable in one-on-one situations that often help to build strong business relationships, healthy dialogue and positive results?

At #SHRM18, Sheryl Sandberg spoke about, among other things, the need for women to have male mentors.   She related this to helping women model behaviors, more often demonstrated in males, that help women achieve business success. I know my male mentors and colleagues have helped me with this (not to mention my dad and my husband, both of whom have probably had more of an influence on this than my professional male relationships.)

Sheryl didn’t give a lot of advice on how to make men mentoring women totally acceptable despite the #metoo challenges.

The one direct thing she said to men fearful of establishing these relationships was, “If you don’t feel comfortable having dinner with a woman, don’t have dinner with a man. Group meals for everyone.”

I struggle with this though. The value I gained from the men in my life who have shaped me almost always came in the form of one-on-one, direct feedback. This just doesn’t take place in a group settings.

So, like Sheryl, while I don’t have a lot of direct advice to give on how to help this situation, maybe this quote I just came across by Bob Goff can speak the greatest truth:

I have two lunch meetings on my calendar for this week. Both are with men.   I won’t be afraid, and I pray that for all the great men out there, the world and the media won’t harden or scare you to the point that you are uncomfortable alone with a woman that you can help become the business person and woman she needs to be.

July 10, 2018
How can we best help? 5 Insights from Sheryl Sandberg at #SHRM18
2018 for me has been a year of providing support for both professional and personal friends and family that have been experiencing tremendous situations of stress, pain and loss. As I count today, there are half a dozen people that I’m actively engaged in providing support and encouragement for. If I think about it objectively, I could say that most people, every year, are actively providing support for at least this many people who dealing with some type of life struggle. Struggle is just a part of life.

I am humbled to have the opportunity to be a small part of helping people through their pain and problems. If you are doing the same thing, I’m sure you are too. But if you’re like me, I’m often not sure what helps and what may possibly hurt when it comes to the words and behavior I use when trying to provide the right support.

Sheryl Sandberg spoke about a variety of things at #SHRM18, most of which came from her personal experience of being a female business executive, a mother and widow. Her insights on the best way we can help each other in the workplace integrated with Adam Grant’s comments on creating an organization of givers. Like Adam, she was also diligent in stating facts and citing research to back up her points.

When people are dealing with difficult situations, Sheryl noted:
1. Realize people feel like they are a burden when they are hurting. Often, they will apologize or say they are sorry when they share their thoughts or feelings. Make sure you assure people that they are not a burden. Validate for them that their thoughts and feelings are okay and that vocalizing them is a good thing.
2. Don’t assume people have enough help or support from family and close friends. They often don’t and need you. Oftentimes people that aren’t as close to the situation are the best people for providing support.
3. You are never reminding people of their pain. It is always there. When you realize this, it is always best to ask about and acknowledge the elephant in the room.
4. When you don’t ask, you aren’t protecting people you are making them feel isolated.
5. Our natural tendency is to ask, “How can I help.” This is not bad, but people often don’t know what to tell you. Sheryl suggested just showing up. Show up in the waiting room at the hospital and just let them know you are there if and when needed. Show up with a meal or a gift or with their dry cleaning you’ve already picked up and paid for them. Don’t ask, just do.
What are the best ways you know to help people who are hurting?
July 3, 2018
Culture Eats Strategy for Lunch: 9 Takeaways from Adam Grant at #SHRM18

“The work of culture building is never done. It’s always a work in progress.” – Adam Grant

People were excited about the concert Tuesday night at #SHRM18, but I was giddy about hearing Adam Grant speak that morning. The organizational psychology nerd in me was so excited to hear Adam Grant speak, and his comments did not disappoint.

Top takeaways from his presentation all centered around company culture:

1. What got you here won’t get you there. Hire for cultural contribution (if you are a big company). Cultural fit is still important for startups.

I think most people miss Adam’s overall point in this. Many simply hear him say don’t hire for cultural fit. But he cited a study showing start-ups that focused on hiring for cultural fit above other characteristics had a 0% failure rate, surviving for at least 15 years. Interestingly though, what happens post IPO is that cultural fit is the worst way to hire. As a company grows, you need more change and adaptation. Cultural fit doesn’t sit as well. Instead, look at what is missing from your culture and hire people that can help you fill gaps and adapt.

2. Not hiring toxic people is more important than hiring good people. Regardless of company size, hire givers, not takers.

Adam stated that the cost savings of not hiring a selfish employee are more than twice as valuable as hiring a superstar, or the top 1% of people in terms of performance. In addition, the negative impact of a taker is more than double to triple the positive impact of hiring a giver.

This is because givers make cultural contribution. They 1) share their knowledge 2) make connections and 3) create an environment of sharing. All of which lead to innovation. Takers sabotage all of this.

3. Worried about how to screen out toxic people? Ask one simple question.

Adam suggested taking anything you are worried about hurting the culture of your organization and asking candidates how common they think it is. For example, “What percentage of the population do you think is fundamentally selfish?” Then it is your job to ask them how they came up with that estimate. If their answer gets back to the fact that they think people are fundamentally selfish, then they are most likely fundamentally selfish. Steer clear.

4. Hire disagreeable givers.

People who are takers are not the same thing as people who are disagreeable. You can be agreeable and be a giver or a taker and be disagreeable and be a giver or a taker. Think four-box grid. Disagreeable givers aren’t afraid to speak up, saying what no one wants to say, which leads to better results. They are more committed advocates for original thinking and are often disagreeing because they are intensely loyal and passionate about the company and the mission. You need to hear them; they give through challenging.

For more on this idea, take a look at Adam’s Ted Talk on the subject.

5. In order for people and companies to thrive, build a culture that welcomes upward challenge.

When was the last time you questioned or disagreed with your boss? Do you feel comfortable doing so? If not, and if you aren’t alone in your organization, most likely your company isn’t capable of remarkable results. Adam cited Bridgewater, a company where, “no one has the right to hold a critical opinion without speaking up about it.” Their website says the culture is one in which, “meaningful relationships are pursued through radical truth and radical transparency.” One dimension of performance evaluations at Bridegewater is challenging upward. People are actually rated on whether or not they challenge their boss and their boss’ boss, all the way up the ladder. The company has consistently outperformed its competition in the market.

6. Create a negative feedback video.

Most people hate to be challenged and hate to receive negative feedback. But Adam’s talk emphasized that both are necessary for a great culture to thrive. Great leaders seek out both challenge and negative feedback. He showed a hilarious video of his colleagues all reading negative feedback they received from students. When employees saw the negative feedback videos there was an 11% increase in a growth mindset. Creating such a video shows you can take it and opens people up to realize that there is nothing that can’t be voiced. It is the beginning of a culture where people can speak truth to ideas.

7. To communicate original ideas, give people a reference with a tune they know.

If you have a truly original idea, most likely people lack the schema or reference point to understand it. If you can relate your idea to another in a different context (for example, the match.com for companies and job seekers) people are more likely to understand and be open to your idea. “You have to take your unfamiliar idea and make it familiar,” says Adam. The more you know outside of your organization and your industry, the better you are at making connections to get your ideas adopted.

8. People who really believe in a mission and are able to contribute in the most meaningful ways are ruthless prioritizers.

People in this category are able to not pursue a good idea because it isn’t as good as another idea. What you aren’t working on is often more important than what you are working on.

9. Crowdsource questions, problems and requests making it easier for people to be givers. It’s imperative to create channels for knowledge sharing.

This gives people the opportunity to ask for help, especially when they have an unproven idea. An innovation tournament where problems and requests are presented and people work together on solving them is a good way to put this idea into action.

Adam Grant’s points at #SHRM18 and in any of his other talks or books show what makes him one of the world’s 10 most influential management thinkers and a part of Fortune’s 40 under 40. His ideas are 1) grounded in research and 2) unconventional. His ideas disprove the status quo with data and science. He’s the type of scientist-practitioner we should all strive to be.

Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World

Give and Take: Why Helping Others Drives Our Success

Like this post? You may also enjoy:

Consider Culture Contribution When Hiring

2017 Book of the Year

June 26, 2018
Top Takeaways (so far) from #SHRM18
So far, #SHRM18 has proven to be an inspiration of ideas and people. My top takeaways from the Windy City include:

“Drama is emotional waste.” @CyWakeman

I love Cy Wakeman and her book, Reality Based Leadership. In her presentation, Cy described how our brains are binary. We toggle between the lower order brain, our ego, where drama exists and our higher order brain. Our higher order brain allows us to focus on reality in order to respond in creative, innovative ways. Cy’s message is that a leader’s main job is to toggle people up to the higher order brain by focusing on facts and eliminating drama that comes from gossip, venting and assumptions. We toggle people up by getting them to self-reflect.

Jeb Bush was the opening general session keynote. He challenged the audience to consider what you would focus on if you were the head of HR for the United States. His three key focus areas, which I agree with are:
1. Comprehensive immigration reform and policy as an economic development strategy.
2. A change in how we see learning and education to focus on career readiness, personalized learning and reform in higher education costs.
3. A second chance society where people who have made mistakes (like having a criminal record) can contribute meaningfully through work. SHRM is focused on this. A great white paper to read on this from SHRM can be found here.
Key takeaways from my session on ROI as seen through the live tweets activity were:

Shared by Coretha M. Rushing, SHRM Board Chair, CHRO at Equifax:

From Paul Endress @paulendress about Reflective Listening:

“The less you talk and the more you seek to understand meaning from others, the better communicator you will be.”

The key thing I took away to set yourself up for reflective listening is body posture/physiology. Don’t cross your hands across your chest or put them back above your head. That is not setting yourself up to listen. Instead nod your head, put your hands on your desk or on your knees in a neutral position or have a reflective posture where one hand is on your chin and the other propping up your elbow. Maintaining these postures while you speak is just as important when you are listening.

The session I have been the most excited about is Neuroscience in HR. Led by David Rock @davidrock, Director of the NeuroLeadership Institute, his biggest reminder for me was something we often ignore when it comes to connecting brain science to individual and organizational behavior and that is the issue of capacity.

Capacity of the brain is the first issue that people ignore. For example, how many numbers can you add in your head? Once you get past adding three numbers at once, most people reach their capacity. Following this rule in the workplace is important. If you try to get people to focus on more than three things you lose them. Identify the fewest possible paths to drive individual change (through habit creation) that can drive organizational change.

What are your Top Takeways (so far) from #SHRM18? Have you been inspired too?
June 19, 2018
6 Ways to Build Energy
“…every movement of your body, every emotion you have, and every thought that passes through your mind is an expenditure of energy. Just as everything that happens outside in the physical world requires energy, everything that happens inside requires an expenditure of energy.” From The Untethered Soul

“Coach, I’m tired,” said one little boy to my husband on his 7-8 year-old baseball team. Practice had only been going on for ten minutes and they hadn’t even been running.

To which my husband asked, “Why are you tired?”

“Well, I played at the trampoline park all day. I’m wore out,” he said.

This humorous encounter led my husband to set guidelines for the team on what activities were okay for them to engage in prior to their first All-Star tournament game on Saturday.

Swimming? No. Riding your bike or running around the neighborhood all day? No. And definitely no trampoline park.

My husband’s goal is conserve his players’ energy so they have enough gas in their tanks for a 5:30 pm game in the summer heat.

He may take baseball too seriously, but I think this encounter holds an important lesson for us all.

We all have a finite amount of energy to give. Whether it is physical energy as in this example or emotional or mental energy, we often expend it on things and people that do not lead to positive outcomes or results. We come to things that we need to be fully engaged in totally drained. And it’s not because of the activity in the present, it’s the activity in the past.

I know I struggle with this, do you? In thinking about ways to combat it:
1. Examine your commitments and tasks by things that leave you drained, energized, or neutral. I’ve seen planners and time management systems organized around this mindset. It makes a lot of sense. Also, I would encourage you to analyze your relationships or people by this mindset as well.
2. Get rid of most of the things that drain you. We’ve all got to do laundry in our life, whether is actual laundry or metaphorical laundry, that no one find particular energy in. We also have relationships that leave us at a net loss in energy for a period, but dedication to this person(s) is important. Hello, anyone that has ever been sleep deprived because of a newborn at home. However, much of what drains us is optional. I would encourage you to eliminate at least two things this week that drain you. Say no to something.
3. For the draining tasks you just can’t abandon, chunk them together and schedule time to get them done. Often being able to check off multiple things on your to-do list at once, even if they are tasks you dislike, can lead to increased energy.
4. Add one thing to your week that builds energy for you. It could be a workout, a good night’s sleep, or a particular activity (like what I’m doing now, writing energizes me) that leads to more energy. Schedule a time to do this each week like it is any other appointment you can’t take off your calendar.
5. If you are a part of a team at work and/or a team at home, make your draining, energizing and neutral list as a group. You’ll probably be surprised to find that you aren’t assigning responsibilities based on what builds energy for individuals and thus the team. Swap tasks around as needed and appropriate.
6. Realize everything you do is an opportunity to shine your light. Light requires energy. Ask yourself regularly, Am I shining or am I not?
“The more you stay open, the more energy flow you can build…it starts flowing out of you…..What’s more, the energy [flowing out of you] affects other people. People can pick up on your energy, and you’re feeding them with this flow. You become a source of light for those around you.” From The Untethered Soul
June 12, 2018