What are Your Blind Spots? by Jim Haudan and Rich Berens

I’ve read a lot of leadership and organizational development books in my life and would rank this as one of my favorites. It was packed with practical exercises leaders can use to make their organizations better places to work.

 

The authors quote Barry Schwartz from his book Firms of Endearment where he says “Ninety percent of adults spend half their working lives doing things that they would rather not be doing at places they would rather not be.” Why is this so? There are many reasons, but in short, the authors would say it has to do with the blind spots leaders have around purpose, story, engagement, trust, and truth.

 

Blind Spot 1 – Purpose: Research shows purpose is more important than hitting numbers for most employees. Yes, a business has to be profitable, but the impact employees make through what they do is what is most important to most employees.

 

Blind Spot 2 – Story: Leaders tend to believe their stories are compelling, but when seen through the eyes of employees, the complete opposite is true. If you want to bring your strategy to life, you have to connect your strategy and decisions in a meaningful way to employees. They boil it down to this: It’s not about you (leader); it’s about what excites and inspires your people.

Blind Spot 3 – Engagement: Employees want to have opportunities to learn and grow, to feel connected, respected, recognized and cared about, and to have pride in what they do. Employees want to engage in conversations about the essentials of the business, which means leaders need to create dialogue-rich environments.

Blind Spot 4 – Trust: Leaders often don’t trust their people so they create controls and compliance policies to minimize variability. Unfortunately, the result is usually mediocre performance not high performance. Research shows high performance is more likely to happen when people are developed and given leeway to make decisions that are best for their customers. The authors say leaders in high-performance organizations make their priorities clear, build the context of why that’s important, and invite people to use their strengths. My personal belief is if organizations focused on using people’s strengths, the 90/10 percent statistic quoted earlier would flip.

 

Blind Spot 5 – Truth: Recent research quoted indicates people don’t trust their leaders. In 2017 the Edelman Trust Barometer showed a 12 percent drop from 2016. To create a culture of truth, leaders must be vulnerable and make it safe for people to tell the truth.

Currently, I’m not in a leadership position, but I recognize the phenomenal job the authors have done in creating a clear, concise guidebook any leader can use to transform his/her organization.
 
It’s most definitely a five-star book.