Assessing with precision

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When you cannot see the wood for the trees it can be very difficult to know what you need to work on as a senior leader.

If your inbox is bursting at the seams, your hours growing longer by the week and the demands are ever-increasing it is not easy to step back and assess your own bigger picture.

Doing so effectively requires some form of structure, and for very busy senior leaders it needs not to take a lot of time.?

It also needs a precise set of results you can start to work with straight away.

With that in mind I put something together - a five minute assessment tool.?

Click here to give it a go!

This blog covers five of the key lessons I have learned, and been reminded of, from putting this together.

1. Workload is not a constant

An individual’s overall workload is affected by many factors, such as their position in the organisation, number of direct reports, the stakeholders they engage with and so on.

It is also affected by the hundreds of micro-decisions that senior leaders make. By that I do not mean big decisions about hiring or allocating resources.

I am referring to the micro-decisions about whether a senior leader chooses to engage with a task or not and for how long. These are often based on some core principles about how they work, some of which they are not always aware of or realise they represent a set of choices.

Between them they can make the difference between a 40 hour working week and one that is 60 plus and growing quickly.

2. Well-being is an outcome

Someone said to me recently that they assumed my work was all about reducing workload and increasing both work-life balance, potentially a series of ‘hacks’ as it were.

That is definitely part of it but I don’t call myself the ‘well-being guy’.?

This is because I primarily see well-being as an outcome rather than a starting point.

A leader who delegates well, manages upwards effectively and is confident enough to raise the difficult issue is also one that finds it easier to make time for family, friends, exercise and personal interests.?

And as indicated above, too often we can fixate on quantity and how hard someone works, rather than their overall level of effectiveness.

3. Results may vary

The results so far have been interesting!

How people feel about various aspects of their senior leader lives really varies.

One person feels they can manage up really well, but their workload remains a real problem. Elsewhere the opposite is true.

Another says they have a handle on all their responsibilities, but only at serious cost to their well-being. This makes me wonder what kind of handle they really need to have if that's the consequence.

Then another has their workload and well-being in a good place but not the extent to which they manage their tasks and people. Maybe that's not a bad place to be!

To read the whole article click here

How I can help you

1. One to one coaching programmes for senior leaders who are swamped by their jobs so they can thrive in life.

2. Team coaching programmes -?working IN a team is not the same as working AS a team and yet they are often treated as if they are the same. I help teams move from the former to the latter, and generate huge shifts in productivity and outcomes.?

3. Talks, workshops and seminars -?including topics relevant to the two areas above plus explaining Gen Z to Gen X.