Feet Up. Eyes Forward.

Through some scheduling changes, last Tuesday afternoon, I found myself with a block of time with nothing on the calendar. I was tempted to jump back into my normal pattern of catching up on emails and tackling my long “TO DO” list. Perhaps because I had just finished a long Zoom call and the thought of more computer time was exhausting, but somewhere in the back of my head, three voices rang out. The first was that of an old military commander who remarked once after observing me running around like a chicken with his head cut off, “One of the most valuable things you can do as a leader is to stop what you’re doing, put your feet up on your desk and simply THINK. And the more chaotic and stressful the environment, the more important it is.”? The second was from our team’s recent Traction teacher who spoke to us of “clarity breaks”. Clarity breaks are blocks of time you deliberately schedule every so often where you sit in a comfortable place with nothing but a pad of paper, a pencil, and your thoughts. ?

The third was from Steven Covey, author of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. His seventh habit is Sharpening the Saw.? Covey tells the story of a hiker approaching a person in the woods working feverishly to cut down a tree.? The hiker asks the man what he’s doing, the man impatiently replies, “Can’t you see? I’m sawing down this tree?”?

“You look exhausted! How long have you been at it?” asks the hiker.?

“Over five hours,” the sawyer replies, “and I’m beat!? This is hard work.”?

“Well, why don’t you take a break for a few minutes and sharpen the saw? I’m sure it would go a lot faster.”?

“I don’t have time to sharpen the saw,” the man grumbles, “I’m too busy sawing!” ?

Maybe my brain was telling me to try something different with my Tuesday afternoon.?

So, I decided to sit back in my chair, leave the computer and the phone blacked out on my desk, grab my notebook, and simply think.? I’ve tried this before but have generally lasted only a few minutes. I’ve tended to jump back into emails, screw around on the internet, or run errands. The pull of the whirlwind was too much. This time, I vowed to myself, I would stick to it.?

Sitting and thinking for 90 minutes is a heck of a lot harder than I thought it would be.?

My first reaction was guilt.? Spring is our busiest time of year.? Across our business, most of you are working your tails off.? Here I am sitting in a comfortable chair staring out the window doing nothing. What kind of leader does that?? I should be out visiting customers, loading fertilizer, or making phone calls!

My second reaction was worry.? If I could afford to take an hour or two to sit quietly during the middle of the week during the busiest time of year, how truly necessary am I?? What if GreenPoint didn’t need me as much as I needed it?? I started to worry I needed to make myself useful before someone figured otherwise.

My third reaction was frustration.? After several minutes of sitting quietly, I got frustrated.? This “clarity break” wasn’t providing a lot of clarity. And it certainly wasn’t producing any flashes of brilliance.?

I then began to question why I was struggling. Intellectually, clarity breaks make sense. Part of our jobs as leaders is to step back and see the larger picture – to see the forest and the trees. We can’t see the larger picture if we’re so busy running from crisis to crisis or running ourselves ragged with busy work. Emotionally, however, I struggle. Despite studying and practicing leadership for 30 years, I struggle with “doing nothing.” Heck, I am nervous admitting to you all I sat on my butt and did nothing but think for nearly 90 minutes. During the week!? During spring!? A huge chunk of me feels like I should apologize.? ?

The challenge is when we are students and just starting our careers, we are individual contributors.? Our job is to make stuff and do things. We are likely part of a team, but we are “do-ers” or makers of things.? As individual contributors, our value is based on our output. Thus, most of us succeed because we work hard.? I may not have been the smartest person in the room, but I was dang sure going to be one of the hardest working. That work ethic and the work it generated got us promoted. As we become leaders, however, our value shifts away from individual output to the output of our team. And as we move more fully into the leadership roles, our individual contribution nearly disappears, replaced entirely with leading teams, building culture, and setting the course for our teams. Our value becomes based on our ability to influence others to work together to achieve a common goal. ? ?

The problem for many of us leaders is, while our roles have changed, we continue to judge ourselves by the same old rules – output instead of influence.? We judge ourselves by the very standards we grew up with. There is an adage that says, “Work hard for eight hours a day, get lucky, become boss and work 12.” Therefore, we are convinced we’re not adding value unless we’re running around “doing things” at 500 miles an hour. Many of us can’t let go. We lose perspective, over-work, micromanage, and burn out.? ?

After working my way through this, I decided to lean back in the chair, calm my mind, and step away from my emotions. My attitude shifted. I began to think about the long-term impacts of Russia and Ukraine, about China and how their lockdowns may impact long-term manufacturing there and how it might impact US agriculture.? I thought about the environment, carbon trading, and emerging agricultural technologies. Then I thought about GreenPoint, our culture, and our people. I thought about how we could be better at helping our growers and our owner-members continue to thrive through all the coming craziness.? ?

As my thoughts moved further to the future, my guilt and fear gave way to appreciation and gratefulness.? I am incredibly grateful to have the time to be able to think. I don’t like the term privilege but in this case it seems right. I am also grateful for where we are as a company. GreenPoint is running well without my constant intervention.? Our leadership team has largely moved beyond crisis mode – it knows where we need to go and is executing.? Our people are doing exactly what they’re supposed to be doing -- taking care of each other and our customers.?

Sometimes the best place for a leader to be is out front, with the people.? On the front lines.? Sometimes it is helping manage the chaos – often from the headquarters where the lines of communications are well established, and information is most readily available.? But sometimes the best place for a leader to be is in a quiet space with a pencil and paper and nothing else.? Just to think.? It took me a very long time to give myself permission to do this.

I hope this helps you find the courage to do the same for yourself. I think you’ll find it worth the time. ??

Onward!???

Jeff????

Jeff Blair is President and CEO of GreenPoint Ag, a farmer-owned agronomy company serving farmers and member farmer-owned cooperatives across the southern US. He’s passionate about leadership and wants to share some of the lessons he’s learning on his leadership journey.