“We spend a lot of time teaching leaders what to do. We don’t spend enough time teaching leaders what to stop. Half the leaders I have met don’t need to learn what to do. They need to learn what to stop.” – Peter Drucker
When you look at your schedule for the next day, do you think about what you need to do or what you need to stop? Of course, we all think about what we need to do. You may have a to do list for work, a to do list for home, a to do list for your kids, and also possibly a “honey do” list. We are always in the habit of doing.
Leaders are especially driven to do. In the midst of trying to get important things done, though, sometimes we end up with interpersonal habits that we need to stop doing. In fact, the things we need to stop doing may be keeping us from being effective with the things we are doing!
Recently I have been rereading a couple of leadership books. One is What Got You Here Won’t Get You There by Marshall Goldsmith. The other book is Leadership and Self-Deception by The Arbinger Institute. While Marshall Goldsmith’s work helps us to be aware of external habits that keep us from being effective with others, the Arbinger Institute’s work helps us to be aware of internal habits that impact our work with others.
I believe that being aware of both our internal and external habits are important to us being effective with others, and I will be sharing more in upcoming articles about this. But to kick-start us off, I want to give you a self-assessment to think about. Below are what Marshall Goldsmith has revealed as 20 habits we need to stop. Do you struggle with any of these?
1. Winning too much: The need to win at all costs and in all situations—when it matters, when it doesn’t, and when it’s totally beside the point.
2. Adding too much value: The overwhelming desire to add our two cents to every discussion.
3. Passing judgment: The need to rate others and impose our standards on them.
4. Making destructive comments: The needless sarcasms and cutting remarks that we think make us sound sharp and witty.
5. Starting with “No,” “But,” or “However”: The overuse of these negative qualifiers which secretly say to everyone, “I’m right. You’re wrong.”
6. Telling the world how smart we are: The need to show people we’re smarter than they think we are.
7. Speaking when angry: Using emotional volatility as a management tool.
8. Negativity, or “Let me explain why that won’t work”: The need to share our negative thoughts even when we weren’t asked.
9. Withholding information: The refusal to share information in order to maintain an advantage over others.
10. Failing to give proper recognition: The inability to praise and reward.
11. Claiming credit that we don’t deserve: The most annoying way to overestimate our contribution to any success.
12. Making excuses: The need to reposition our annoying behavior as a permanent fixture so people excuse us for it.
13. Clinging to the past: The need to deflect blame away from ourselves and onto events and people from our past; a subset of blaming everyone else.
14. Playing favorites: Failing to see that we are treating someone unfairly.
15. Refusing to express regret: The inability to take responsibility for our actions, admit we’re wrong, or recognize how our actions affect others.
16. Not listening: The most passive-aggressive form of disrespect for colleagues.
17. Failing to express gratitude: The most basic form of bad manners.
18. Punishing the messenger: The misguided need to attack the innocent who are usually only trying to help us.
19. Passing the buck: The need to blame everyone but ourselves.
20. An excessive need to be “me”: Exalting our faults as virtues simply because they’re who we are.
So, how did you do? Do you struggle with any of the habits above? Sometimes we may have one of these habits and may not even know it. A real test is to ask someone who knows you well and whom you trust to rate you on the above habits. What would they say? What would be on the top of your “Not To Do List?”