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Inspired by Life: Lessons in Leadership from my kids (part 2)


My littlest skiing with her dad down the mountain
My littlest skiing with her dad down the mountain

A few weeks ago, watching my kids ski and snowboard caused some reflection. As I continue to watch them grow, they individually and collectively teach me things. Specifically, they reminded me recently the power we have to invite people to lead, understand context to build self-efficacy, and show up during the bumpy parts of the roads we are on together.


Big Idea Upfront: Inviting others to lead and honoring their context and bumps builds confidence and future leaders.


Questions to Consider: How do I see the leaders or potential leaders around me? How do I support those I lead through their context and unexpected bumps?



Invite others to lead  


I’m not a great skier. I challenge myself in a lot of spaces of my life; skiing I simply want to enjoy. So, skiing with my 7-year-old is right up my alley. On a recent ski day, we took turns on who she was following and who was following her. At one point, one of her older siblings asked - do you want to lead? My youngest’s eyes lit up, as she agreed. Can her sister out ski her? So far, yes. And she also knows that giving someone else the chance to be successful is a gift in confidence. I also watched her model actions and behaviors that were not only efficacy building for herself but also for her little sister.


I studied the work of Albert Bandura during my doctoral education and dissertation and keep his recommendations for efficacy building top of mind in building leaders (and also in parenting a bit too). I'll cover three of the four below that as leaders, we can utilize to strengthen those around us and their beliefs in themselves to accomplish things successfully (aka self-efficacy).


(1) Mastery experiences -- as leaders, we can help to create conditions for people to try and get to mastery. In other words, we can give those around us and those we lead the opportunities to take on new challenges and learn for themselves what they are capable of accomplishing.


(2) Vicarious experiences (sometimes called modeling experiences) -- as leaders, we are role models. We can provide people opportunities to see success in action (and failure too). This practice helps individuals decide their own readiness. Have you ever watched someone do something and then thought ... I could do that. You were having a vicarious experience.


(3) Verbal persuasion -- as leaders, we can provide encouragement and reminders of success to help someone try something new or make it through a challenge. I can think of many a time when someone told me they believed I could do something well before I did. What if we all did that more for those around us?


Question to consider: How might I invite those around me into leadership and help create conditions to grow their efficacy?


Context matters


Part of my studying of leadership is to engage with new models, different ways of thinking and to continually challenge my assumptions and what I think I know. Reading Barbara Kellerman's work has been important for this work. One idea of hers that helped me to rethink and reframe leadership is how she describes leadership as a system - leaders, followers, and context. In her writing, she often emphasizes how much context matters to leaders and to followers.


In her book Bad Leadership: What It Is, How It Happens, Why It Matters, she reminds readers,

Pay attention to context. Be contextually conscious, contextually informed, and contextually intelligent.

I thought of this idea as I watched the big sister coach the little sister... when the week before, the big sister was trying something new (snowboarding) and the little sister was encouraging her, cheering her on. One week one of them was confident and the next week it was the opposite. New things can challenge our sense of competence - and context matters.


To be a leader is to step back and consider a few things with context. Two that come to mind for me:


(1) What might I share to help add context to help someone be successful? (I learned this from a mentor and prior boss who would often ask me ... Sara, can I provide a little context? I have since understood that her asking was powerful how it taught me to pause, to ask a question, and then to get curious. Thanks, Kelly!)


(2) What about this person's context might I not know that could help me better understand or help them? This second question helps us as leaders to step away from our assumptions and beliefs that can often mean we rush to a judgment -- even when we are missing important pieces of that person's puzzle. I can think of more than one instance when I assumed someone knew how to do something or was comfortable with something, and then when action wasn't being taken, it took me getting curious to step into their context, so that I could realize they needed something different.


Reminding ourselves that context matters can help us to engage with the power of the pause and work on perspective getting. (Read more on that topic here: Clear Your Path with Pause & Perspective) It can also help us help others be successful in new contexts.


Question to consider: Where might you be missing context in a situation that you can get curious about and learn?


Unexpected bumps happen


I am often the one behind my kids skiing, watching them zoom in front of me. Those kids LOVE jumps (which are not my favorite). They get that from their dad. Sometimes one of us will accidentally hit a bump we don't see. Sometimes they topple. Sometimes they lose balance. Sometimes they crash into someone else (not often, fortunately). Sometimes they nail it. Watching my kids reminded me that even when things are unexpected, we can choose how we respond to a situation. I am a believer that leaders need to be the calm in the bumpy times (which I know isn't always easy), and leaders need to play an active role in helping people when they encounter bumps.


A few things that came to mind as I was thinking about bumps in the lives of people and leadership:


(1) See the bump: honestly, it can be easy for us as leaders to not see someone else's bumps along the way. We're busy. We have a different lens. We know people differently. We might even forget what is easy for us might be difficult for someone else.


(2) Acknowledge the bump: Acknowledging the struggles someone faces helps them to feel seen and also can help them to get back up from a trip or a fall. We all want to know when something goes sideways that we aren't on our own. It is in the bumps of our colleagues and teams that we can show what leadership looks like.


(3) Ask how you can help & take action to support: I wish I could say we all experience leaders who actively work to help us get back up when something doesn't go well, and I think we all have stories of leaders that blame, disengage, ignore, or dismiss when something goes sideways


Blaming sends a message that the leader doesn't want to create a psychologically safe environment.


Disengaging sends a message someone is on their own.


Ignoring sends a message you have higher priorities.


Dismissing sends a message you don't care.


If we consider ourselves the caretakers of the conditions for success of others (which does not mean never giving critical feedback or tough love), how might we all show up differently when someone stumbles or hits a bump?


Question to consider: How do you handle the bumps in the roads of others?


We all have the opportunities to notice, to welcome, and to unlock the greatness of others and to create more leaders that we support through context and bumps. I'll end with a quote that I love from Frances Frei and Anne Morriss's book Unleashed: The Unapologetic Leader's Guide to Empowering Everyone Around You,


We all have the ability to release the energy of possibility into someone else's life.

Question to consider: How can YOU take actions today to release the "energy of possibility" and create the conditions for efficacy and greatness in others?



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