On Trust

Trust has become a word that is so overused that it has almost lost all meaning. Trust is a key foundation of successful teams, so important in fact, that without it, teams will never reach their productive potential. Traditionally, we think of trust as predictability—a person has been dependable in the past, and I “trust” that they will act that way in the future. In this sense, trust has become more about predictability and reliability, which is necessary, but not sufficient to develop a truly high performing team.

In, “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team” Patrick Lencioni defines trust in a different way—as a vulnerability. Trust is achieved when team members are able to make their vulnerabilities known to others—their weaknesses, skill deficiencies, interpersonal shortcomings, and help requests—and are confident that their respective vulnerabilities will not be used against them or jeopardize their status within the team.

However, this goes against our human nature; the job of the ego in all of us is to protect us from being hurt, and exposing weaknesses and vulnerabilities does just that—it places us in a position where we can be judged, humiliated, etc. It is difficult to turn those instincts off for the good of the team, but that is exactly what needs to happen. One of the things we constantly ask our teams is, “Are you giving everything you can to the team, and are you taking everything you need from the team?” We have found that people really struggle with asking for help for many reasons, but failing to ask for help when you need it, failing to be vulnerable with your teammates, can lead to catastrophic failure on a mountain climb or on a team project —from how long it takes, how you feel about your teammates, and whether or not you reach the summit.

So how does a team go about developing this kind of trust? It is not easy, but it requires the team, especially the leaders of that team, formal or informal, to demonstrate genuine vulnerability first. This helps to relieve the burden of all other teammates who are feeling the same way, but are afraid to speak up due to fears of being exposed. Essentially, it establishes the norm that it is both acceptable and desirable for teammates to ask for help. And once this happens, teams can truly perform at an optimal level.

Darrin Kass is a Professor of Management at Bloomsburg University and occasionally partners with LEEP in trainings.  His area of expertise is leadership and team development.

dkass@bloomu.edu

On Getting Punched in the Face

"Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face" — Mike Tyson

Regardless of how well you prepare; regardless of how well you have thought through every course of action; regardless of how well you planned for every potential outcome, you are going to get punched in the face. What happens next is far more important than all of your planning and preparation. We see this all the time when we take teams to climb mountains—inevitably a mountain will punch you in the face. Our teams prepare for months for what usually turns to out to be one of the most physically and mentally challenging experience of their lives—they are well trained, have all the right gear, and know all they can about the mountain—and then everything goes sideways. Regardless of whether you are climbing a mountain, or preparing for a new product launch, marketing campaign, or major project, what really matters is not how well you and your team has prepared, but how well you manage yourself and others after you get hit. So, how do you prepare for a punch you haven’t yet received?

1. Don’t stick to a failing course of action. Regardless of all the time that goes into developing a plan, a plan is really just a “best guess.” Avoid putting so much weight into this guess. Is your plan working? If it isn’t, change it. However, once we have committed to something, we tend to commit more and more resources to make it succeed, even when it continues to fail. This is the so called ‘sunk cost effect’.   We hope that with just a little more time, effort, resources, etc. we can turn things around. We tend to forget the old proverb ‘If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging’.  On the mountain, we have seen groups maintain dysfunctional pattern for 8-10 hours, and yet no one speaks up to make a change.  It’s hard to admit that a project or product launch isn’t going well, but you can’t make positive changes until you acknowledge there is a problem. 

2. Lean on your team. Are you taking everything you need from the team? When you get punched in the face, you go into survival mode. This “fight or flight” mode actually bypasses rational thought and we innately begin to narrow our focus to all the potential threats in our environment. We tend to get very focused on our own safety and survival, and forget that we have a ton of resources that surround us. Think of the last time you were really hungry, or really cold. What was your mindset? You could probably focus on little else other than food or warmth. It is exactly the same when you feel stress or pressure at work.  Use your teammates for physical, emotional, psychological, etc. support.

3. Are you giving everything you can to the team? We can become very self-focused when we are placed in challenging situations, concentrating and worrying about our own needs. Naturally, we become less aware of the needs of our teammates, but this can really undermine performance in the long run. On one of our recent trips, we encountered some unseasonably cold and wet weather, and it really challenged the team physically, mentally, and interpersonally. There were team members who were clearly struggling very early into the trip, but the challenging conditions prevented team members from focusing on anything but themselves. By the time we stepped in to address this a good portion of the team was mildly hypothermic, and it had sapped a good deal of the mental and physical energy of the team.  Does someone look cold? Make them add layers or change wet clothing. Does someone look exhausted? Lighten their load by carrying some of their equipment, or just take their back pack.  At work, can you see other team members who are stressed over a deadline or tired from multiple long days on the job?  Ask what you can do to help.  Sometimes asking is all it takes to help the person out, as they feel less isolated and part of the team again. 

4. Change your lens. This is both the easiest and the hardest one to accomplish; however, we can choose how we frame our reality.  Decades of research has unequivocally shown that what we experience is far less important than how we perceive what we experience. Are you a victim, or a survivor? Is this a setback, or a challenge? This lens through which you view your experiences affects everything from learning and health to happiness and resilience.

Remember that everyone gets punched in the face sometime. It is your response that determines your long term success as a leader. 

Darrin Kass is a Professor of Management at Bloomsburg University and occasionally partners with LEEP on trainings.  His area of expertise is leadership and team development.

dkass@bloomu.edu

Going Outside the Norm with LEEP

We are temporarily stopped at 17,500 feet on our way toward the summit of Pico De Orizaba in Mexico.  I stand off from my team and slowly look across their faces as they sit huddled in space blankets, waiting out a storm. I know that as guide and leader, I am responsible for every one of them.  The wind is blowing, the snow is falling harder, and it’s decision time.  My decision.  We've worked for almost 2 weeks to get to this point, and we're so close to the summit we can taste it, but a big weather front has just moved in.  My initial plan was to wait out the storm for thirty minutes and see what happens.  But within two minutes, looking deeply into each one of those faces, I know it's time to turn around.  There's a mix of anticipation, cold, fear, excitement and the unknown in those faces. It’s painful to call it quits when we’re so close to our goal, and though some are disappointed everyone knows that retreating is the right decision. The mountain will always be there to climb another day, and the words of Ed Visteurs, a famous American Mountaineer, ring in my head.  “Getting to the top is optional, getting down is mandatory."  

Leading a team is easy when everything is going well. The team doesn't even need to be high-functioning to do well, they can just be lucky or in the right place at the right time. The true test of the leader is in times of difficultly, transition, and failure.  

My story now moves from the top of that mountain to a meeting in the comfort of an office, with my partner at LEEP (Leadership and Executive Education Program).  We are discussing our goals as an organization, and trying to define the unique ways in which LEEP takes on the challenge of pushing groups and individuals to become more competent leaders.  

Why does LEEP combine the classroom with outdoor and indoor team activities?  Why do we take groups to climb mountains, paddle rivers, or even just work their way through a maze set up in a conference room? How do we create the most effective and powerful learning environment we can?

Very early in my professional career I got connected with the outdoor industry. At the time, the idea of guiding people on adventures around the world was very appealing.  What I didn't realize was that by choosing this career, I was deeply immersing myself into the psychology of interpersonal dynamics.  As I observed people and teams in stressful environments, I wanted to gain a deeper understanding of how we, as humans, operate.  And so it made sense that in order to understand others, I first had to understand myself, and how I operated in these situations. Over a period of years I put myself into increasingly difficult and complex situations to see how I responded, where I struggled, what I could learn.

Some of my most formative experiences have been on mountains, rock faces, and rivers. I continue to seek challenging situations to this day and they are some of my favorite experiences each year. I have guided outdoor trips for the adventure-oriented for years, but eventually delved into training, starting with youth and non-profit (adult) organizations. Though these groups were seeking team-building and other ostensibly non-adventure related skills, I started to see the similarities between the challenges that they faced and those faced by my adventure groups in outdoor situations.  As I moved on to working with a variety of corporate groups, I started to realize that there is a common set of challenges that groups and individuals face, no matter their age or position. And even though they face these challenges in their work environment, the outdoors can be harnessed as a powerful training ground that allows us to put leaders and teams in difficult and sometimes uncontrollable situations.  My experience as an outdoor leader allows me to put our teams into increasingly challenging scenarios where I can help with safety but I can't control the weather for them, or the ways in which their group will respond. It is in these circumstances that profound learning can take place.  I have also learned that much of this learning can also be accomplished by giving teams difficult physical and mental challenges in an indoor environment, where success can only come when the entire team works together. 

Our goal at LEEP is to provide high caliber leadership training along with training in other areas including customer service, process improvement, and strategic planning.  Rather than focusing on just a classroom learning environment, we utilize experiential activities to simulate work dynamics.  We have found that these experiential activities allow participants to have a fresh perspective on professional challenges, because they aren't tied to the emotional baggage of work.  These exercises can be anything from a short session in a conference room to a multi-day wilderness trip, depending on the goals of the team. These non-traditional and non-controllable experiences, and the deep learning that ensues, are a hallmark of training with LEEP.

 Brett Simpson

Brett has been a consultant and experiential education for over 20 years. He was the Executive Director of the Questand Quest Professional Training at Bloomsburg University (www.buquest.org) and is also a Principal Partner in LEEP (www.experienceLEEP.com).  His expertise revolves around leadership in remote, difficult and dangerous environments.