Be Kind
I am introspective this week. There has been tragedy among family and friends that leaves me shaken. Charlie Kirk’s assassination last week equally so. Others on the left and right before him. Am I living in Lord of the Flies? I wonder sometimes.
A meeting last week among association CEOs, (thank you Karyn Schoenbart) and my own daily conversations with CEOs brings up the common sentiment that leading now is harder, more demanding, more exhausting, than leading through COVID. In five years, our world has gone further upside down. It keeps going upside down. It promises to continue going upside down. OMG.
I am challenging myself every day to look at the good, see the good, hear the good and make lemonade, create silver linings, fill glasses are half-full. Thank you, Utah Governor Spencer Cox, for reminding all of us to disagree better, turn off social media, take our noses out of devices and just talk to people. Be with people. Thank you for reminding us words are not violence. Violence is violence. Thank you for taking the time to so eloquently tell us to be better and for your leadership during awful circumstances.
We must all focus more on what matters and simply be nice. We can’t succumb to being the lowest common denominator. When did LinkedIn become a political venting-ground? I won’t participate. Why are people so ugly when they can hide behind a pseudonym. Not ok. Let’s all be a better version of ourselves. No vitriol. No complaining. No my politics are better than yours; my religion is too.
It starts small. Tell the guy in the elevator you like his tie. Tell the woman you see in the grocery store her eyes are a lovely color. Thank the postman (or woman,) the clerk at the bank, the plumber, and the car mechanic that you appreciate their service.
Let them see that you see they matter.
Smile more. Tell your loved ones every day that you love them. Tell someone you agree to disagree, and you both are OK. We do not know when our exchanges will be our last. It is not being macabre. It is being real. Because all we have each day is the moment. And we must add civility and kindness to each one of those moments and keep putting deposits in the bank of positivity. Please let’s be authentically nice. We have to have it in us. We must have it in us. There is a lot of light out there. We just have to attract ourselves to it.
Sometimes being nice is to tell the honest truth. I call it clarity with compassion. This week I had to share with a client my concern for their business model, lay bare an area they asked about in which they are not performing, counsel one leader about a PE deal that went south and share with another a need to face a decision to let a key person go.
One struggled with new owners, another cash flow issues. Still another is dealing with painful succession planning in a family-run business. (Actually, there are four clients right now all facing versions of that story). I have consoled a grieving employee, helped provide space for others to get well or stay well, asked another to take a few words out of his vocabulary that are ambushing him every time clients hear them. And last but most — we must all take the time to celebrate the wins. Memo to me here for sure!
Today, I asked one of our analysts to contribute to ‘me’ asking him to advise me as if I were his client. Because we can all do better. Here at Outsell, I am focusing on focus. Pulling no-cards as a coach once said. Limiting the aperture for us so we can execute better. And yes, I’m doing two of my favorite things — putting the finishing touches on our CEO Summit in London — I love getting our clients, prospects, and community together, and having daily calls with clients about topics personal to them like those mentioned above. And as time permits jumping into the analytic sand box to collaborate with our team on a new benchmarking framework or reviewing a specific piece of research.
As our analyst advised me today: focus on core and let go of the rest. Because that too is an act of kindness.