1. Understand and Share Your Personal Leadership Story

When my team and I work with leaders in our development programs, we ask them what has most influenced their leadership. They all say that experience was the best teacher. But you learn from your experiences only if you take time to reflect on them and consider how they have shaped you. When you don't know what your experiences have meant to you, you don't have the necessary foundation to put the leadership contract into action.

Start building this foundation by thinking about your own personal leadership story. I've outlined the steps for you here.

2. Define Your Value and Desired Impact as a Leader

I worked once with a leader who was the founder and CEO of his company. He was known to be a patriarchal leader. He also could be really rough with his people. I was lucky to have an hour of his time, because he didn't like consultants. He thought all the leadership development stuff we talked about was just fairy dust.

Yet now that he was in his early seventies and his career was coming to a close, he felt he wanted to leave a legacy for his company—one centered on building strong leadership for the future.

At one level, I respected him for this idea. Yet, at another level, I recognized that his thinking was faulty. This leader didn't realize that he didn't have to wait until the end of his career to start thinking about his personal leadership legacy. He had an opportunity to leave a leadership legacy every day of his career while he was running his company.

I have discovered that a lot of leaders tend to think about the idea of a leadership legacy only late in their careers. This is an outdated concept. The reality is that each of us leaves a legacy every single day. The question is: Are you leaving a legacy you are going to be proud of? What is the value you need to create? What is your desired impact on the people you lead?

You have to remember that once you decide to lead, you are going to be held to a higher standard. You have obligations that go beyond yourself. You have obligations to your customers, employees, shareholders, and communities.

To fulfill those obligations, you need to be clear on the value you must deliver as a leader—the desired impact you will have. It's about being clear on the legacy you need to leave. Take a moment to think about the people you're accountable to and ask yourself: How would they define the value I have to bring as a leader? What's the impact I need to have?

Better yet, go ask them. Talk to your customers, employees, peers across your organization, and stakeholders in your community who depend on you and your organization. They will have an answer. You will learn whether they see you as a leader with credibility. You just need to ask.

I've developed a set of six questions that I use in my own leadership role. These questions help me determine my value as a leader through the perspective of my customers, employees, and internal and external stakeholders:

1. What is the primary value that I provide as a leader?
2. What are my personal strengths as a leader?
3. Where do I need to be stronger as a leader to have greater impact on the organization?
4. What blind spots must I pay attention to?
5. How am I living up to the four terms of the leadership contract?
6. What is one action that I must implement to increase my value and impact as a leader?

I find this set of six straightforward questions is one of the best ways to get feedback on yourself as a leader. The feedback is always candid, direct, and extremely insightful. Instead of guessing what your key stakeholders value, go find out directly. The mere act of asking already demonstrates that you are an accountable leader who is committed to living up to your core leadership obligations. Once you have everyone's perspective, create a clear leadership obligation statement for yourself—one that clearly outlines the desired impact you must have as an accountable leader.

I find the truly great leaders with whom I've worked always have this obligation statement very clear in their minds. It becomes a central point of focus for their leadership.

3. Have the Tough Conversations

My colleague and I were conducting the final activity at a leadership forum event we were facilitating for the top 60 leaders of a global company. It was a three-day session with the first part dedicated to understanding the ideas of the leadership contract, and the rest of the meeting focused on the new business strategy for the company.

Throughout the three days, it became clear that although the company was successful, there were things that were still getting in the way. The leaders lacked the courage to have tough conversations with their direct reports and with one another.

Since launching this book, I have found this to be a recurring theme with many organizations. As we explored in Chapter 7, “Leadership Is Hard Work,” many leaders struggle with the hard work of their roles, such as giving candid feedback, managing poor performers, or calling out bad leadership behavior on the part of a peer or colleague. As we discussed, when we avoid this hard work (and it is hard work), we become weak and we make our organizations weaker.

Steve Jobs's reputation for candor—even mercilessness—is well-known. He clearly wasn't afraid of having tough conversations. According to New York magazine, when Sir Jonathan Ive, the chief design officer at Apple, saw his colleagues devastated by a conversation with Jobs, he challenged his boss. Jobs's response was, Why be vague? Jobs believed that ambiguity was a form of selfishness because it was rooted in a desire to be liked. This desire gets in the way of doing the right thing for the company and, ultimately, the individual. Remember what I also said in Chapter 7: Being liked as a leader is often overrated. It can lead you not to do the hard work of leadership for fear that others won't like you.

It's important to note that many people saw Jobs as a real jerk. And it's true he could be harsh. I suspect that had to do more with his style—in how he had a tough conversation. He probably confused being rough with tough. Despite this, it seems he was clear on his leadership accountability to have tough conversations when required.

How about you? As leaders, we all need to commit to have tough conversations—it is part and parcel of being a truly accountable leader. You do need to call out poor performance. You do need to speak truth to power and raise concerns that senior management may not want to hear. You do need to give feedback, even when it will be difficult for someone to hear it. You do need to engage in dialogue, even when there are dissenting views.

I find that the biggest barrier for most leaders isn't that they lack the skills to have these tough conversations but rather that they need the right mindset.

Here's what I've learned through my own leadership roles and through working with accountable leaders at all levels: Ultimately, having a tough conversation is rooted in caring.

How can that be? Take a second to think about the people in your own life whom you would label as being tough. They were the ones who called you out when you needed calling out. They were the ones who sat you down and gave you the feedback no one else had the courage to give. These people may have seemed uncaring. But it's the complete opposite. They had the courage to have tough conversations with you because they cared deeply about you. Those individuals cared so deeply for you that they had the courage to sit you down and set you straight when you needed it.

By having the tough conversation with you, they were essentially saying: I care so much about you that I will give you the candid feedback you need to be successful.

I've seen this play out many times. The courage to have a tough conversation comes from the degree to which you care about a person, about the success of your company, and about positive outcomes for your stakeholders. If you didn't care, everything would be so easy. If you didn't care, you wouldn't bother having the tough conversations; you would just go on managing your own affairs and minding your own business.

However, when we do this we are doing a huge disservice to our people and our organizations. I've seen too many people not being given the feedback they need. Something they are doing is getting in their way and they are unaware of it. No one has the courage to speak up, and the person keeps going on, naïve and unaware. There is snickering behind his or her back. Eventually, the person might start to get an uneasy feeling that something is going on. But until someone has the courage to have the conversation, nothing will change.

Now one could argue that people need self-awareness so this doesn't happen. I agree with this, to a point. But in reality, some people just don't have that self-awareness. And holding back on constructive feedback does them a disservice. They keep on behaving the way they've always behaved until the day comes when something happens, and they are shocked that everyone knew but them.

I experienced this recently with a colleague. We were facing a challenging business situation, and he was struggling coming to a tough decision. He was taking forever to make up his mind. He didn't realize how the situation was eroding his credibility with his peers. It was clear to all of us what he needed to do, but he was struggling.

I reached out many times to have the discussion with him but he resisted. When we finally were able to have a discussion, he actually questioned whether my intentions were truly positive. I said, “If I didn't care, I wouldn't be putting myself through all this stress. I would just focus on my own business and let you manage your own. But because I care about you, your team, and our company, I believe it's important for us to have this discussion. I hope you can see that.” He did and quickly made his decision.

Does this resonate with you? Have you been in this situation before?

I find sometimes leaders struggle with having the tough conversation because they worry about the technique or how to structure the discussion. This certainly can be a barrier, but I find it can also be an excuse. The how is important. You certainly shouldn't have a tough conversation when you are angry or in a vengeful state.

In my experience, the first step is actually to focus on how much you care about the person, your company, and your collective success. When you begin from this starting point, having the conversation is easier because at the end of the day the person will know you have his or her back. The person may still not like what he or she hears but will appreciate your courage and the fact that you're looking out for his or her best interest. You will actually strengthen the level of trust between you and that person.

It's time we create organizations where we can have candid, frank, and adult conversations about our business, each other, and our collective performance. Our inability to do so wastes time, creates roadblocks that slow down our progress, and interferes with our success. Here's your challenge: to be the leader who commits to doing the hard work and having the tough conversations in your organization. Be that leader!

4. Be a Community Builder

The accountable leaders of the future will be community builders. Like Mary Barra of GM, they will take an inclusive approach to working with others. They will find ways to connect on a personal level with peers and colleagues. As we discussed in Chapter 7, too many leaders feel disconnected and isolated. We need more community builders to create that sense of connection we so desperately need and want. We need to create a new way of working across our organizations. It's a bold vision which I've summarized for you in The Community of Leaders Manifesto. Read it now.

As you can see, The Community of Leaders Manifesto outlines the commitment that you must make to create a strong community of leaders in your organization. It clarifies what you and your fellow leaders need to aspire to create. Use it as an on going source of inspiration for yourself and your fellow leaders. Imagine if your employees went to work each day knowing their leaders were truly committed to putting the ideas in this manifesto into practice. It would be a game changer—it would truly transform your culture!

Take The Community of Leaders Manifesto and share it with your colleagues. Discuss whether you are living up to the vision it presents. You can start with a small team of fellow leaders and make a commitment to one another. You can also work to implement it more broadly across a level of leaders or your entire leadership cadre. Don't worry that other leaders won't find this change worthwhile. In my experience, people are hungry for an open and honest conversation about leadership. This manifesto gives you the language to start having those conversations in your own organization.

The good news about building a strong community of leaders is that it rests on a few simple actions you can implement every single day. My team and I often ask participants in our leadership programs to identify the actions that build a strong leadership community within an organization. We hear the same ideas no matter what organization or industry we work in. These ideas are all based on connecting with others and are staggeringly simple. Here are the top five actions we hear all the time from leaders like you:

1. Connect Informally. Spend time over coffee breaks to get to know colleagues personally. It's hard to build community with strangers. Get to know your fellow leaders better.
2. Connect Over a Meal. It's surprising how often this idea emerges. It seems there's something really important about having a meal together with colleagues. It builds stronger connections. Now these should not be stuffy business meetings, but rather casual forms of conversation over some good food. Current research supports the value of connecting over meals. For example, an interdisciplinary group of researchers led by Kevin M. Kniffin, an economist at Cornell University, explored the interaction between eating together and group performance among firefighters across 50 firehouses. The researchers found that when firefighters ate meals together they tended to demonstrate stronger group performance compared to those who preferred solo dining.
3. Connect across Departments. Invite colleagues from different business units to your own meetings to learn about what they do and how you can work more effectively together. It's surprising to me how many leaders don't think to do this, and yet it's so simple to do. You don't need senior management's permission. Just do it.
4. Connect via Technology. There are so many more options available today to connect using technology. More and more of us work virtually across time zones and geographies. In a world of text messaging, e-mails, and collaboration tools, people still feel disconnected from each other. Despite all the tools, real relationships are lacking. In practice, I've heard over and over again the need for leaders to commit to simple ways of connecting via technology. What is the single most frequent strategy I hear all the time? Get ready for it: Pick up the phone. That's right. While we have more technologies to keep us connected, few feel a real sense of connection with the people we work with. The technologies can be great, but we need to infuse the human element—a voice or an image. So when you have a few minutes to spare in your day, pick up the phone or have a Skype call and make a real personal connection.
5. Connect People to One Another. Be the person who helps others build a network of relationships. Make introductions. Bring colleagues together. Many leaders excel at this externally. I've known some to be really well connected within their industry, yet they rarely think to apply those same skills within their organization. Be the person who helps others connect to others within your company. Be the connector.

Daily Actions

After the senior vice president of human resources for a large financial services organization read about the leadership contract, she sent me an e-mail telling me how much she loved it. She also said she would put the four terms into action daily by asking herself the following four questions every single morning before she started work:

1. What leadership decision do I have to make today? Is there a Big D or small d leadership decision that I will face?
2. What leadership obligation do I have to live up to today?
3. What hard work do I have to tackle today as a leader?
4. Which relationship with a colleague do I need to make stronger today to continue to build a community of leaders?

Imagine the focus that answering these questions brings to her leadership role. When I do my keynote presentations with audiences, I typically give out a small card that has these four questions on it. The participants in these sessions love taking the cards. They often ask for extras for their colleagues. It seems having a simple set of questions to focus one's leadership mindset every single day is valuable to many leaders.

Other leaders have shared with me that they also use these four questions when they are dealing with a business or leadership dilemma and no clear answer is apparent. Imagine that something comes up during the day, something that's a real challenge for you: an issue with an employee, a serious conflict with a customer or supplier, or something that's gone awry with a stakeholder.

All eyes are on you. You have to resolve the issue. How do you make sure you respond in the best possible way? Ask yourself the four questions presented in this chapter, and the way forward will be perfectly clear. You'll immediately know what you have to do as a leader. I know this because I've done it many times in my own role, and it works. These questions force you to think about your dilemmas more objectively. You'll keep your leadership obligations in sight. You'll end up doing the right thing as a leader.

Quarterly and Annual Actions

Each quarter, set aside two to three hours to reflect on your leadership. How did you do over the past three months? What were some of the critical leadership decisions (Big D and small d) that you made? What value did you bring to those you are obligated to? What hard work did you tackle? What hard work did you avoid? Over these months, did you become stronger as a leader or weaker? How did you strengthen the sense of community among the leaders in your organization? Looking ahead to the next quarter, how will you continue to put the four terms of the leadership contract into action? If you are working with a leadership coach, discuss these questions with her or him. You may also find it helpful to work with a trusted colleague who is part of your community of leaders.

I believe it is also important to invest some time annually to reflect more formally on your personal level of leadership accountability. Here are some questions (categorized under each of the four terms) that you can use to assess your own level of accountability as a leader.

1. Leadership Is a Decision—Make It
   • In what specific ways did you demonstrate your decisiveness as a leader?
   • Describe how you fully embraced the challenges and difficulties that come with being a leader?
   • Are you still excited about your leadership role, and do the people you lead know it?
   • How did you pay attention to how you showed up as a leader each and every day?
2. Leadership Is an Obligation—Step Up
   • Do the people you lead know you are fully committed to being the best leader you can be?
   • In what ways did you put what is best for your organization ahead of what is best for you personally?
   • How did you actively work to leave your organization in better shape than you found it?
   • Do you remain clear on what your personal obligations are as a leader?
3. Leadership Is Hard Work—Get Tough
   • In what ways did you effectively handle the pressures and scrutiny of your leadership role?
   • Did you consistently tackle the tough conversations with the people you work with?
   • What difficult decisions did you make, even if they were unpopular with those you lead?
   • How did you demonstrate resilience and resolve in the face of adversity?
4. Leadership Is a Community—Connect
   • How did you lead with a one-company mindset?
   • What relationships with direct reports, peers, and colleagues did you make stronger?
   • How did you look for ways to collaborate with your peers and colleagues?
   • Who did you support so that they could become better and more accountable leaders?