Seeking & Learning from Different Vantage Points

When you look at Cinderella’s Castle at the Magic Kingdom, from any angle it looks beautiful. But when you are on the Engineering and Maintenance teams at #waltdisneyworld and responsible for the upkeep of it, you can see different things.?Some may see the need for new paint, others may see time for preventative maintenance and so on. What they see has implications for the guest experience and cost. A few years ago, the Engineering leaders set out to reconcile all these perspectives together and created the Vantage Point Index. This index pulls together all the different views from varied expertise and provides a common approach and mathematics to measure where things truly are and what needs attention and what doesn’t. The team uses the approach to plan out where investment is needed so that it doesn’t impact all those beautiful views. As one of the most photographed sites in the world, it's really important!?

How often do you take in and consider different vantage points? Said another way, how often do you take in different perspectives to help you get to the fullest possible perspective?

It’s such an important act of leadership, to be able to take in and appreciate a range of perspectives. And, perhaps most importantly, to then be able to reconcile and act on all varied perspectives. It can certainly get tricky, especially on topics that cannot necessarily be quantified. However, it’s a practice that can yield tremendous benefits which impact your leadership, organization, and the growth of your team and partnerships.?

Rasmus Hougaard Hougard and Jacqueline Carter of the Potential Project have brought a significant amount of knowledge to tapping into the mind of the leader. One of the biggest benefits I have gotten from working with them is that so much of accessing our potential resides in self-leadership.?A simple and great practice which they advocate is the concept of Zooming In & Zooming Out.?That is, being intentional to pause and choose when to look in to see great detail and when to step back and look at things from a broad view. This is important because, just as with Cinderella’s Castle, the view you choose can lead to different actions. It’s important to take the time to not only seek out the views but reflect on what you are seeing to get the full picture. This brings many benefits in terms of mental effectiveness when you consider, wrestle with, and reconcile varied perspectives.

You have to really study something to understand it deeply and fully.

And yet, the role of the leader is so complex today, the problems are harder, the speed is faster, and the flow of information is non stop and its all at high speed. This can lead to not wanting to seek out different vantage points because, well, why add yet another step? When you take this seemingly faster route, not only do you miss out on some beautiful views, you miss out on more efficient and effective ways to solve challenges.

You see, taking in different vantage points has real benefits to what leaders face every day: Problem Solving, Time Pressures, Employee Engagement, Differences of Opinion++.

Here are some straight forward actions you can do to help build in different vantage points throughout your day. ?

• Simply ask those you work with or encounter, “What do you see?” Or “What are you thinking or feeling?” (Don’t forget the most important part - truly listen and acknowledge). This gives you either validating information or a new perspective, plus lets people know you are present with them. ?
• Take a new mental route in working through a challenge, if you usually inclined to start at the bottom and build up, flip it and start big and broad and then get into the details. And don’t back away from the uncomfortable feeling as you do - that’s a sign of growing! This practice pushes you to establish new routes by being conscious of where are going.?
• Create conversation space with team members or partners focused on nothing more than sharing what people are seeing and learning. Intentionally grab a cross section of levels and roles, and talk about things like “What are your learning?”, “What’s working?”, “What’s not?”, “How can we be better?”. ?

The act of taking in and appreciating different perspectives is both an individual act as well as a social act. In each case, as you take the time to move around, see, and consider different vantage points you gain some great benefits. You help create an environment that is open, where people know their opinion matters. Plus, it helps people feel safe with one another. It also helps you grow as a leader, you recognize its not all on you, you obtain thoughts and opinions that you would not gain or appreciate otherwise. In turn this helps open up new pathways for your growth.?

If you need another reason, nature got this right from the get-go. We live in a world with incredible beauty up close and striking vistas when we extend our eye to the horizon. And isn't that what leadership is about too - seeing a destination and heading towards it all while moving together with those close to you.

Enjoy the views and learnings, they’re all beautiful!

#DonlonDifference #Leadership