Negotiating Your Business Whitewater!

"According to the ICF, 86 percent of organizations saw a return on their coaching investment, and 96 percent of those who have been coached said they would repeat the process again." -Suzanne Coonan

I read the quote above in an article by Suzann Coonan and I was reminded that in life, business, and whitewater rafting, there are some very real dangerous obstacles to deal with that a great coach can help you navigate and become successful! The more dangerous the mission, the more you’ll need a qualified and experienced guide to help. 

Drowning

I don’t know one successful executive that hasn’t felt overwhelmed by it all. That sinking feeling you get when you know you’ve been tasked with an assignment or project but not the resources to complete it. I mean, how do you perform well while you are in the process of dying! No matter what you do or how hard you paddle, the work just keeps coming, like an uncontrollable force of nature. Or even worse your team doesn’t have the training or expertise to meet the expectations of its fundamental mission and you’re still required to perform. Sometimes our time is so saturated with meetings, reports, and communication that we can’t seem to just get it all done. If someone were to task me with one more responsibility I just might Kirk out! This feeling of doom and dread pulls so many leaders down to the depths and they are totally and in reputably inundated by it.

But no matter how swamped and deluged with projects you are, a good executive coach can help you with a non-biased assessment of what is going on with whom and for what. She can help you organize your priorities so that your workload makes sense.  Know you know what you should do versus what you must do. You’ve got an idea of what might be delegated well if you can figure out the right trust factors. After some initial work, you might begin to rethink the speed or intensity at which you can achieve.

Hypothermia

The first pieces of failure begin to happen at the outer extremities of your organization. When your team is on a project and certain small initiatives and actions seem to lag behind others. There’s an indication that things might not be going well. A team member may be out of the communication loop for too long or find themselves under so much strenuous pressure that they aren’t pulling their weight. As a leader, you know that if parts of the system fail too much, too often, not only will the mission fail but reputations will be damaged and opportunities for future advancement and glory will be greatly diminished. You can’t afford to have experiences where the trust in you or your team weakened.

Leaders have to be able to step up here because this when team members start to fail far before they quit or give up. As they fall further behind the pack, they are more susceptible to feelings of isolation and abandonment. These team members are more likely to feel that they aren’t accepted by others because it’s becoming clear that they are not meeting performance expectations. 

A good coach that is working alongside you will see how your leadership affects the team and can help you make the necessary adjustments. Maybe you can add or request the necessary resources and training needed for the team members to keep pace. Maybe you slow the whole team down to show solidarity and win the moral victory as a team. If you’re already exceeding expectations, neither should be a problem to explain and justify to higher-ups. Of course, if the reputation of your team can’t take this one time hit you may be doing further damage.

Overexertion

We are taught in life and business to go all out and to put every effort towards winning. This causes big problems with leaders. Even when we win, often we lose because we’ve pushed every person and system past its capacity to perform leaving nothing but fatigue and failure. This could easily happen in the rapids of life. An injury to the shoulder or back means there is one less paddle to help provide stability and avoid danger. The team will not be able to benefit from your level of expertise and they’ll have to carry you to the finish while you add dead weight to the boat making things that much more difficult.

This is why I tell leaders, that they must look out for the total health and wellness of their teams. Yes, I mean emotional health as well. When people start complaining, you must listen to them and trust that they are not just lazy whiners that are unwilling to give it their best when you need them to. You must look for signs of fatigue and stress that are beyond the obvious. What if, someone suddenly becomes are truly unable to perform and they’ve hidden this fact even from themselves. If this were not a possibility there would be no phrase in the world of psychology like “imposter syndrome.” When a team member no longer believes that his or her success is deserved or legitimately earned, they start to manifest a level of failure that becomes evident to the discerning leader. At some point in their lives they may have gotten used to being praised as “smart one”, “beautiful one”, “intelligent one”, “good one” and now because of the intensity or pace of the workload of a current initiative, they are having a hard time showing the results required to match their previous self-image or brand.

A great coach or counselor understands all of the internal workings of professional productivity and can help you lead everyone correctly. They can assist you to put in the right performance drills to get the best that your people are capable of out of them without breaking them. Great coaches understand that all systems need a period of shut down and restoration, a time to heal and recuperate before the next big engagement. It’s training that increases capability and its readiness that wins on every initiative. Even if you have to take a player off of the field due to injury during a big game, it’s better than to have them gone temporarily than permanently damaged and unavailable.  It’s the leader’s responsibility to make sure that they are rested and ready to come back strong.

Smashing into Rocks

There are massively dangerous hazards to every project or program. Obstacles are seen and unseen need to be negotiated with a level of skill and expertise that allows leaders and their teams to press on with the mission and accomplish the win. There is no getting over the fact that there are huge rocks in the water and despite your best efforts, your training will fail you and you will hit them. That’s when your protective gear or risk mitigation strategy is supposed to save you. Whatever protocols you developed to deal with disasters as they come up need to be good and most of all they need to work.

Usually, it’s here when I hear people scream for help! When everything is failing, and doom is imminent. Someone will let me know that disaster is either forthcoming or has already occurred. No matter which it’s time for emergency response! It’s time to pull out those well-practiced procedural responses or place the call for rescue and recovery. The timeliness of the leader’s decision making is critical to being able to continue with the mission or even to survive and be ready to get back into the water at another time. 

Getting Stuck in River Features

Sometimes though, leaders and teams can become so thoroughly overwhelmed that no decision is a good one, no training could have prepared them, no motivation will suffice, there are no resources left to be deployed, no reserves to call in, and no rescue possibility. It’s time to accept, face, and own defeat. You need to do what is needed to help everyone survive to the best of their collective abilities.  People are often more resilient and tougher than they think so try not to lose hope. In these situations, you’ve got to try and relax and go with the flow. Nature is hard to beat, particularly when you struggle against it instead of with it. It’s not time to push blame or look for excuses.

It’s important to know when an obstacle is simply bigger and stronger than you. Try to change directions or go back to a previous position and regroup. Until you find your footing you will see hope quickly to dissipate as desperation escalate. This kind of panic will make a bad situation even worse. Great coaches will help you to restore calm and order even amidst chaos. They can help you to restore your resolve and recommit to dig deep enough to make a final push and then another if necessary. You’ll be back in the game and return to winning as long as you learn from each challenge.  With the right people around you, can stand up to any test or encounter. You’ll be able to make a formidable attempt during any and every trial. Every loss will take you that much closer to becoming a sustainable winner.

So, before you chose a coach, an advisor, a mentor, a consultant, or a therapist to work with you, make sure that they’ve got what it takes to help you face the whitewater in your profession or industry. Do this right and you’ll be the MVP of any game that you play!!

Are you ready?

For more than 18 years our VisionQuest90? process has been helping busy executives and small business leaders achieve amazing results!

Thousands have been able to intensify their FOCUS, maximize ENERGY, and multiply PERFORMANCE by implementing this simple system.

Think about it!

In just 120 days wouldn’t you like to see dramatic results!?

When I created this program, I had no clue how successful it would be, so I began tracking and measuring the results and I’m proud to say that we have a 100% track record.

We are so confident in this program that we offer a 100% money-back guarantee.

Still, I realize that trying times are upon us and I want to help as many people as possible so for the next few days I’m offering a 50% discount on our executive program!

That’s a savings of $2000! Our best clients never have to call on us again because VisionQuest90? is one of those unique systems that help leaders create dramatic changes to processes at any time that they can always deploy in the future without help. Once they understand and have practice with it, VisionQuest90? can be used over and over again to tackle even the most formidable business challenges, turning them into opportunities.

Just text the phrase “I want VisionQuest” to 703-201-4267 and I will contact you to get you qualified and answer your questions.

Depending on demand, I’ll probably have to shut this down quickly so now is your chance!

I’ll see you in the winner’s circle :-)!!

-Coach Powell