Leadership Between the Lines

My team and I get asked questions all the time about the quickest three things to do for this or that or all of the above. Building a healthy culture and an authentic Positive Energy Workplace™ takes awareness, honesty, intention, energy, presence, and action. It doesn't have to take a ton of time, however, you want to watch out for "doing" those quick three things just to the "check cultural health" box off your list.

If you are truly tending to your IEP (Intentions/ Energy/ Presence) and taking action from a place of awareness and service... you won't need a quick checklist, your culture will take care of itself. That said, if you do want some quick things to start paying extra attention to, I've shared some in the below video (timestamp below post).

We are always becoming... more of ourselves, less of ourselves. More in alignment and in integrity with ourselves, less so. More helpful, less helpful. More in tune, less in tune. More on our path to mastery, less on our path. More of a contribution to the people and things we care about, less so.

You start a new exercise program. You're super motivated. You get rolling. Start to feel and see the shifts. Get comfortable. And then... you miss a workout, here. Have an extra treat meal, there. Get down on yourself for not "doing it right," there. And before you know it, you've tossed your program.

You decide to change your life, create more space, do the work you need to do to become who you want to become, be a better leader. You're ready to roll. You're a big "YES!" And then... Now that you've envisioned it and maybe even "achieved it in your head," your current circumstances don't seem so bad. OR, now that you've agreed to do the work for yourself, the work feels terrifying -- it's easier to just survive the status quo. After all, up-leveling your life and leadership often means creating changes in relationships, creating new boundaries, saying "no" to things that don't line up, saying "yes" to things that do, getting out of your comfort zones, and yep, doing the work.

We recently had a team meeting where we got very little done. We had a list of five things to knock out, we completed two. Why? We ended up having a significant conversation about our culture and how we were each doing. This conversation wasn’t planned – it organically unfolded through our Culture Check-In Questions:  

Last year I wrote a piece about “holding your space” in chaos. I wrote that piece sitting at a volleyball tournament rebooting between bouts of feeling tortured by “no coffee or food allowed on site,” a wicked early wake-up call on a weekend, a long-ass drive, a cold-ass gymnasium, screaming parents and whistles, and confusing scheduling. All of which resulted in my cumulative snarkiness. (I won’t even mention “their’s” ;-)).