Being an Unmessable-With Leader – Where Can They Mess With You?

This is part 2 in our series on being an unmessable leader.  Here’s a link to part 1. 

Here’s a quick recap of what you missed.  Being a leader is being someone who communicates so that others imagine a future that matters to them and then act in service of that future’s fulfillment.  Being unmessable with as a leader involves having the capacity to do that in a way that meets the needs of the situation and the people involved.  It could mean being direct and demanding.  It could mean being gentle and nurturing.  The situation decides. 

The challenge was to identify ways of being that you don’t have much access to.  Some people reading this will find it really challenging to sit quietly and listen.  Others will have a hard time taking center stage and speaking up.  In leadership, each has its place.   The ways of being to which you don’t have access will be just what’s needed at some point.  If you don’t have access to them, it will cost you – both in terms of results and peace of mind. 

So how do you build capacity?   It start with getting that “ways of being” are simply general patterns of behaving, and much (much!) of behavior can be boiled down to two things: positive and negative reinforcers. 

For my non behavior analysts, positive reinforcers are those things we would move toward and want more of.  When behavior is about positive reinforcement, it feels free.  It’s flexible and adaptive.  It has a good, energetic vibe to it.  When organizations use a lot of positive reinforcement with their teams, you can feel the energy when you walk into the office.  It feels alive, like it’s a place you’d like to be. 

Negative reinforcers are those things we want to get away from.  We call them reinforcers because they will have us take action.  We just act to get away.  When we’re working to avoid something, behavior tends to get narrow.  We’re more likely to fall into old patterns.  And it feels heavy, anxious, and irritating.  Organizations that use a lot of negative reinforcement feel like a drag. 

Those two principles – positive and negative reinforcement – apply to any animal in God’s great kingdom.  The thing about people is that our thoughts and feelings can also function much like things we will move toward or away from.  Further, situations that remind us of those thoughts and feelings can take on the same functions. 

For example, the thought, “I’m weak…” can be an icky thought.  If that’s the case for you, any situation that reminds you of feeling weak of being called “weak” might be something you want to avoid.  If compassionate behavior reminds you of weakness, it’ll work against you in situations where compassion is what will move the team forward. 

On the other hand, you may have experienced being “pushy” or “demanding” as bad.  Then, situations where you might seem those ways will evoke behavior that (you think) shows the opposite.  You might be really nice in situations that call for laying firm boundaries. 

Last newsletter I mentioned how I tend to rigidly default to a casual, “it’ll all work out” way of being when I feel a threat.  That’s great when there’s chaos around me and everyone just needs to calm down.  My way of being chills people out. It’s detrimental when a situation calls for telling someone clearly and directly “this has to stop.”  It has me accept behavior that doesn’t work toward what I’m committed to fulfilling. 

I also mentioned that I have done a lot of work to build flexibility around those places I tend to get rigid.   Last week, that work paid off.  My phone provider broke a promise to me that cost me an extra hour and a half of time.  Old me would have pretended it was fine.  “I don’t want to waste my energy on petty things…” I would tell myself.  Then, I’d hold a resentment and feel frustrated with myself that I let people walk all over me. 

That’s not the flexible me, though.  I told them, politely and firmly that this wasn’t my mistake, that my time is valuable, here’s what it will take to make it right with me, and I will leave over this.  They cleaned it up to my satisfaction.  I wasn’t a jerk about it, just firm. 

Here’s the thing: the old me would have been more concerned about being called (or thought of) as a jerk.  Avoiding being seen as a jerk would have me accept things that really didn’t work, even if it meant allowing people to be jerky toward me. 

So… how do you start building flexibility like that?  Here’s some broad steps: 

1.     Get clear on your unworkable patterns.   And remember, if you default to a pattern that sometimes works in a place where it definitely doesn’t work – that’s unworkable!!

2.     Ask yourself: if I acted completely out of character, what would people think?  What would they see about me?  What would they find out? 

3.     Take the answer to that question and ask: what would that expose?  What would that mean?  What would almost certainly be true then? 

Iterate through those last couple of questions and get some answers that, if you were to share them with people, would really make you uncomfortable.  Find the things you’re mind tells you about being “too much…” of that, or “not enough” of this.  Pay attention to the feelings that go along with those thoughts and experiences.  Pay attention to what it feels like and where your behavior tends to track when those thoughts and experiences are there with you. 

Then, notice them in action, and notice them in action, and notice them in action.  In Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (or habit reversal, for that matter) we call that “awareness.”  Then, every time you catch it in action, gives yourself a cheerful little “attakid!”   Making a quick celebration of it is aimed at what we call “defusion” – that’s simply putting distance between the thought and experience and the weightiness that tends to accompany it. 

Do that enough, and with enough unworkable patterns, and you will start to find yourself clearer and more centered, ready to focus on what you’re really committed to – past keeping secrets about yourself that aren’t even really there to discover.    

And, if you’re looking for an environment where you can build capacity to communicate for a future that matters to people such that they take action – and to do that in a variety of circumstances and people, check out our Leading with Ease series.  And if unprecedented growth and development with other leaders would make a difference for you, apply here.   Curious if it’s right for you or your team?  Let’s chat.  Schedule time here.