The Workplace as a Classroom for Self-Development

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Work harder on yourself than you do on your job. It was a phrase that changed Jim Rohn’s life. As the legendary personal development speaker and author famously said, “If you work on your job, you’ll make a living. If you work on yourself, you’ll make a fortune.”

The best leaders are committed to life-long learning. They understand that the greatest gift they bring to relationships is a stronger, wiser, more self-aware person. As people grow and improve their capabilities, they amplify their impact.

Where do you go to learn? We’re conditioned to learn by going somewhere: to school, to university or technical college, to the internet, to articles, to books.

While these are all great sources of information and learning, what if we could also make life itself a classroom, and our experiences the curriculum? This mindset could revolutionize how we perceive the challenges we face. Every “problem” we encounter would be seen as an opportunity for personal growth. Every setback a chance to learn. Everything that happens to us could be viewed as happening for us.

What if all those things we find ourselves complaining about are presenting themselves as lessons? What if all those people we gossip about are there to teach us something?

Have you ever noticed that if you don’t get the lesson, you keep repeating the class with the same experiences? It’s like Bill Murray in the classic movie Groundhog Day. The events kept repeating themselves until he understood the lesson he was meant to get.

Here are three strategies for turning your workplace into a classroom for self-development:

  1. Assess Your Situation. Take a close look at your work environment to discover the potential for growth it holds. Take an inventory of your frustrations, stuff you complain about, and the things you dislike about your job. List the people that irritate you and those you gossip about. What stresses you? What overwhelms you? What activates your fear response in your work environment? (You can take a similar inventory in your personal life.)
  2. Renew Your Perspective. Start embracing challenges by seeing problems as stepping stones rather than roadblocks along your path to success. Ask, “What lessons am I meant to get from this problem?” “What is this difficult, insensitive boss here to teach me?” “How can I respond differently to those putting all these demands on me?” “What lesson is to be learned from not being appreciated?” Maybe you are meant to learn to be more clear or brave or kind. Maybe what’s required is more commitment or self-care or compassion. Instead of hiding by complaining or gossiping, start facing reality rather than running from it.
  3. Take Action. Decide how you will apply the lesson you have learned. Knowing that growth lies outside your comfort zone, what risks will you take? What actions are required? Who will support you? How will you hold yourself accountable? Apply the lesson and contribute to a healthier, more vibrant workplace culture. If you think it’s time to exit, be sure you’re not escaping from a difficult learning opportunity. Be sure you get the lesson before you leave. Otherwise, you’ll meet the same experience in your next job (or relationship). Regardless, if you’re committed, you’ll find a way. If you aren’t, you’ll find an excuse.

ARE YOU CONNECTING?

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Everyone communicates but few connect.

–  John Maxwell

Our newly hired hand arrived early. When I saw an old man riding a rusted bicycle up our gravel road in the pouring rain and into the yard of our family farm, I wondered, “Who is this slightly scary, weird-looking guy, whistling and smiling, dressed in worn-out coveralls, a flannel shirt, a torn jacket, and rubber boots?”

I was a teenager and was expected to work with this newly hired hand—whose name was Norris—for the summer. I didn’t want much to do with him at first. I just hung around for a few days and quietly worked alongside him.

He didn’t seem to mind that I wasn’t talkative. He simply went on about his business. At the time, I thought it was a little odd that no matter what the weather was like, or if we were fencing or building something or hauling hay, Norris always showed up on time and was happy. Except for a short lunch break, he never stopped working and never complained. Whether we were fencing, hauling hay, cleaning stalls, building a corral or a barn, or working with the horses, from the moment he arrived until the moment he got back on his rusted-out, single-gear bicycle at the end of the day and peddled off, he was always smiling. Always whistling. Always working. Never grumpy. Always the same steady mood.

We ended up working together for three summers, and in those six shorts months, Norris changed my life. While I could never have articulated it then, here’s some of the things I learned from him:

  1. Relationships are mostly about showing up. Being reliable, being able to be counted on, being calm under pressure, being steady in the storms – all go a long way in building unspoken trust.
  2. Norris, through his safe and steady presence, taught me to bond with horses rather than break them. People have a lot in common with horses. A horse doesn’t progress or perform as you want it to because you demand that they do so or because you threaten them. Horses, like people, will enlarge their capacity only when they have the right conditions and are given the proper care. You don’t have a right to the trust of another. You must earn it.
  3. You can have huge influence on others when you’re comfortable with yourself. You make a difference when you don’t have to pretend or impress or try to make yourself big or others small to prove that you are someone that you aren’t.
  4. Listen more than you talk. In all the time we worked together I can’t tell you one thing about Norris except what I saw. As a self-absorbed teenager, I never took the time to listen like he listened to me. I never asked anything about him. I only knew that he had only a grade seven education and was a bachelor who lived in a dirt shack (my father drove me there once) and was very selective about who he worked for. He liked and respected both my parents.
  5. Bring a firm handshake to everyone you meet. One of the only times I saw Norris’s gruffness was the first time I shook his hand. “You shake a hand like a fish,” he told me. “If you are going to go anywhere in life, learn to shake a hand like you mean it.” I found out that shaking a hand firmly is a confidence builder.
  6. Assess your ignorance. Always be a student. Everyone has something to teach you. Be a learner, not a knower. Humility goes a long way to earning trust. Norris was always curious, a consummate scholar of life.
  7. Pound a nail with your arm, not your hand. While building the new round corral one of those summers, Norris shook his head as he watched me pound in a nail. Quietly he took my hand with the hammer in his hand and taught me how to pound a nail with accuracy and the least amount of effort. “You have to drive a nail with your whole arm,” he told me, “Not your wrist. You’ll wear yourself out doing that.”
  8. Attitude makes a big difference. I once asked Norris how he can be so happy all the time. In his defined Scottish drawl, he responded, “Happiness, young man, is not a destination. Happiness is a method of travel.”

Years after I left home, and after my parents sold the farm, I received a note from one of my former neighbors telling me that Norris had died. The old dirt shack he lived in caught fire and burned to the ground. He passed away in the middle of the night, alone.

I’m sure that Norris had no idea of the impact he’d had on my life, and how that impact created ripples in time that will go on to generations yet unborn.  Not just impact in the here and now, but in the here and forever. People who influence us are like that. They come into our lives at important junctures, sometimes intentionally with a request, and sometimes unexpectedly—like a passerby who stops to help us when we’re stranded in our broken-down vehicle. Most never know the difference they make.

Our world seems to be more and more in flux. Things seem more unsettled and unpredictable. I’m not sure that the use of our devices has really helped us get more connected. I think John Maxwell got it right. Everyone communicates, but few connect.

Are you connecting?

Get the relationships right

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As I help CEOs and senior executives develop strategy and execute that strategy with a good accountability process, I have come to realize that if we don’t get the relationships right, none of this matters.

John Maxwell said, “People buy into the leader, then the vision.” But many people have this all backwards. They believe that if the cause is good enough, people will automatically buy into it. But that’s not how leadership works. You have to get the relationships right. It’s good to inspire people with a worthy vision, but you have to care about the people you need to realize that vision at least as much as you care about the cause. Otherwise they feel used and will eventually shut down, disengage, resist, or quit.

Three things I know about relationships:

  1. Care. If people know you care they’ll get behind you and cut you a lot of slack. If they know you don’t, it won’t end well. You might get compliance as a boss, but it takes a true leader to get commitment. And you won’t get commitment if people don’t genuinely know you’re in their corner and have their back.
  2. Listen with humility. Notice your ask/tell ratio. It’s good to spend at least twice as much time listening than talking. People will open up and provide input if you know you are aren’t the smartest person in the room and that everyone has something to teach you. And empathic listening becomes easier and builds trust if you sincerely care about the answers you get.
  3. Authenticity breeds connection. When it comes to leadership, ability matters. But inner qualities matter more. To bring these inner qualities out you need to get comfortable with yourself and past the gimmicks, fads, and flavours of the month and be real with each other.

Small Giants: Choosing To Be Better Rather Than Bigger

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As my life and business unfolded over the years, I became clearer about my values. My personal business model is based on an approach inspired by Bo Burlingham, who wrote, Small Giants: Companies that Choose To Be Great Instead of Big. To quote Bo, “It has long been a business article of faith that great companies, by definition, constantly focus on maximizing their revenues year after year.

Yet quietly, under the radar, a growing number of undeniably great companies have rejected the premise of endless growth to focus on more satisfying business results.”

In our organization we don’t measure success by how big we are, but by the impact we have on people. We prioritize maintaining authenticity as opposed to record-setting revenue streams. We resist the mainstream definitions of success and march to our own drummer.

And when I forget my values and get caught up in the hype, my spouse, my team, and my friends bring me back. It’s fascinating that those who find me and work with me share the same values in their own businesses and lives.

The journey is deeply satisfying and sustainable when I remember what I stand for.

When does ambition become harmful?

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I’m a person who has set goals all of my adult life. Ever since my dad introduced me to Earl Nightingale when I was a teenager, I was inspired to deliberately better myself. With ambition deeply ingrained, foundational habits were formed that built a road of success for me. But like anything in life, an asset can turn into a defect when it outgrows its function. Now, in retrospect, I offer what I’ve learned about how my drive for ambition has a harmful side.

  1. Bettering yourself is not the same as perfecting yourself. Perfection is an unattainable goal, but incremental, continuous self-awareness and growth is a target worth aiming for.
  2. Constant striving for perfection to prove something unprovable can create frustration, tension, and pressure on yourself and those around you.
  3. It’s great to have goals; however, the purpose of goals is not to measure your worth by your achievement of those goals. The purpose of goals is to inspire you to become the kind of person it takes to get you there.
  4. While it’s good to have intentions for the future, don’t miss the joy of life today. Ambition can be a thief of contentment and inner peace. At the end of our lives, I believe we’ll realize that this one precious life we have been given is not a destination. It’s a journey.

Trauma And Its Impact on Leadership

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One does not have to be a military veteran or live in a war zone to encounter trauma. Trauma happens to us, our friends, colleagues, families, and neighbours. Research suggests that up to thirty percent of women (and twenty percent of men) in this country have been sexually abused. Twenty-five percent have been beaten by a parent severe enough to leave a mark. Thirty percent of couples engage in physical violence. A quarter of us grew up with alcoholic relatives, and ten percent have witnessed their mother being beaten or hit. Many researchers feel these statistics are conservative, and they don’t even account for the unmeasured and unpredictable rage and verbal abuse many grew up with.

Human beings are a resilient species, but it’s naïve to think that such events in our upbringing don’t impact the way we relate to people in our homes, communities, and workplaces. Trauma leaves traces on our minds and bodies. It impacts the way we think, the way we feel, the way we interact with those around us, and the way we live.

When you move into a position of leadership, you don’t acquire more power. What you get is more accountability. Considering the trauma that many have experienced, here are five accountabilities of a positional leader in relation to trauma, stress, and psychological safety in the workplace:

  1. Learn why creating a psychologically safe work environment is critical to a successful work environment and why being at peace with yourself is the foundation of all good leadership.
  2. Become familiar with your own inner state and aware of how your moods impact others. Learn to know the difference between when you’re stressed and when you are relaxed.
  3. Recognize how any trauma in your life may have impacted your past or current actions and identify a plan for healing and working with this trauma.
  4. Get regular feedback from trusted colleagues and friends on how your actions may be inadvertently creating unnecessary tension in your leadership. We all have blind spots and need to take an inventory of these on a continual basis.
  5. Be open to keep learning about psychological safety and ways to ensure a safe, caring, and accountable workplace under your leadership.