Lesson Five: Remembering the Alamo doesn't have to mean defeat

Cruising to San Antonio - a short drive that day, less than three hours from desolate Sonora - I listened to my offspring share what they knew about the history of the Alamo.

"It's like 300… only in the Southwest and there were only 200 of them."

"The guy in the 'coon hat died there.  I'm going to get one of those hats."

"Davy Crockett, stupid."

I'll give them credit: they remembered more details… that the historic battle lasted 90 minutes, that there's speculation that Davy Crockett didn't die in battle at all, but was actually executed afterwards… and that the famous battle cry from Sam Houston a month later - Remember the Alamo! - reclaimed Texian victory in just 18 bloody minutes.

But the comparison with 300 caught my attention… tragic, gut-ripping defeats that, like a classic kung-fu drama, leaves no one alive.  Why does that appeal to us?  What draws us towards the fight we know we can't win? We flock to the movies that tell these stories… and often times, we willingly enter into office drama and politics with parallel effect.



Martyrdom, Tragedy and Utter Disaster
Ok, so maybe you're not fleeing your formica desk and Dell laptop (or perhaps maple and Macbook) for a fatal engagement on the battlefield with your flintlock… but then again, maybe you are.  We walk into situations every day where we can't win. How do you handle Captain Kirk's Kobayashi Maru

scenario? Captain James T. Kirk took the opportunity to "alter the parameters of the game"  and win the un-winnable.  We find ourselves in these situations - sometimes by choice, sometimes we are pushed - and what we do next is the difference between your Alamo or your Kobayashi Maru moment.

Last year I wrote about intentional pauses - in dialogue and decision making.  When walking into the no-win scenario, these pauses determine just how you lose: there is martyrdom, such as the Alamo and 300, there is pure tragedy, as in Curse of the Golden Flower and House of Flying Daggers,  and there is utter disaster like The Battle of Cannae and the Bay of Pigs (these, while they are certainly tragedies, the tactical and military mis-steps overshadow everything else).  The best possible outcome? That you situate yourself think like James Kirk and change the game at hand.

That's what a pause can do for you.  Before you react to an unfair criticism, before you offer an opinion that is unsolicited, before you step into an escalating debate as peacemaker… pause. Is what you're about to say Right Speech, (Right Speech is the third of the eight-fold path in Buddhism)?  Right Speech is spoken at the right time, in truth, with compassion, for a benefit and with the intent of goodwill.  That's five simple but powerful rules.  The world would be a much quieter place if we all adhered to even three of those five rules.

Lesson Five: Remembering the Alamo doesn't' have to mean defeat
For a benefit is key.  In our daily mini-Alamos or Kobayashi Marus, what is the outcome you hope to achieve with your next words? To avoid martyrdom, tragedy or utter defeat, what needs to be said?  I believe in speaking your mind and being yourself. But I have also learned the lesson - multiple times and I am still learning it - that taking that pause and carefully considering impact of my next word or action can either trigger the major battle or diffuse it.

Whether you walk into an ambush or are pushed into the middle of a political drama, take a moment to think of Captain Kirk crunching into that apple while everyone around him was in a tizzy.  He wasn't going to play their game and he wasn't going to play it their way.  You can kill anger with kindness… you can also crush a passive-aggressive attack with a show of force.  Which you choose to use, how you choose the change the game, depends entirely on what's happening in your Kobayashi Maru moment and who your other players are.  So pause. Pay attention. And use your Right Speech with deliberation.

Davy Crockett and King Leonidas didn't have the option of words in a cubicled workplace or over a conference room table.  And what drove them to un-winnable situation were broader themes of glory and political independence.  Well, in our mini-Alamos, we also fight for recognition and kudos, and we navigate office politics.  Fortunately, no one's standing there with a musket or spear… but some days it feels like it, doesn't it?

Lesson Four: My Children are Hobbits

"Stop touching my stuff!" 

"I don't want to go."

"Do we have to actually look at it?"

"Get your stuff off my seat!"

From the spectacular caves underneath the dusty pothole that was Sonora, the adventure of history beckoned.  I have avid historians in my brood… experts in Ancient Greece and Rome, Medieval European wars, Japanese samurai battles (and the ronin, of course), and all things World Wars related, I and II.  But the American Southwest?  Yawn…

But this is our own backyard… part of our vast and varied American culture.  This was also Day Three in a reliable but cramped Corolla in which the snacks were a little, shall we say, wilted… and tempers were a tiny bit crispy.  Thus, heading east to the Alamo carried a cacophony of whines, sulks and snark.  My young adults regressed to tiny tots… 

Lesson Four: Hobbits love the Shire. And food. So do my children.

"That's it!" I finally hit my limit.  In the tight little Corolla, even my usually optimistic gypsy nature is a bit frayed.  "You just want to eat, sleep and stay home.  And eat again.  We don't need second breakfast.  You're like Hobbits!  But I am Gandalf, damn it, and you are going on an adventure.  And you will like it."

Adventures… we have them at home, at work and, clearly, on the road.  Some people gravitate towards the mystery and risk inherent therein.  Some people fear them, the lack of control and predictability.

We learn new things when we go on adventures. At work, each new project is an adventure.  It might be with new coworkers we haven't yet worked closely with or it might be a new initiative that changes the way a team or department works.  Several years ago, I was part of a team managing the acquisition of a 200 person company into our own - our largest acquisition to date. I was paired with a project manager who was also my closest office friend.  After several weeks on this high stress project, I learned that I love her… and never wanted to work that closely with her again.  The funny woman who waffled about where we'd eat lunch each week was a rigid and harsh taskmaster if the tasks wavered at all from the project plan.  The flexibility in our personal time was no where present in our professional work.  It was a painful project. It ended all right, but the next time we were assigned a joint project, I was far better prepared to manage the new personality that had emerged.

Leaving the comfort of the Shire is a difficult boundary to cross sometimes.  Sometimes the Shire is a job we don't like, but don't feel safe leaving.  Sometimes the Shire is a relationship.  Sometimes, it's a habit… ordering the same meal at the same restaurant every time, for example.  Adventures can be small things - coloring your hair, finding a new coffee shop, speaking up when you'd normally stay silent.  We all have our Shires.  Do you know what yours is?

My Hobbits are more like Bilbo and Frodo than Sam

On our Corolla Adventure, I learned that my youngest son would eat anything we put in front of him. Including the scorpion inside the green candied lollipop.  I learned that my oldest son is fascinated by military maps.  He studies the details of the locations, the battle movements and the redeployment of forces.  And I learned that my daughter, usually such a control-freak-planner for every moment of her day, was able to let go of needing to know what was going to happen every minute, every day, and enjoy a spontaneous side trip to an unexpected (but glorious) shoe sale.  Yes, it set us back 40 minutes off our schedule. She didn't care.

In the end, what I actually learned is that my children are Bilbo type Hobbits. Initially reluctant, but curious enough to take the chance on an adventure after all. The only Hobbit aspect that they can't let go of is that damned second breakfast.


(My own Hobbits… left, David studying maps; top right, Liam before the scorpion snack; bottom right, Claudia on the Riverwalk in San Antonio, just prior to shoe shopping)

Lesson Three: What Lurks Beneath the Surface

Miles and miles of Texas oilfields. Endless horizon of hazy clouds.  An even, steady whirring comes from the backseat where my youngest is snoring.  My oldest is also dozing back there, headphones firmly implanted… the placement of the purple earbuds seems to be permanent.  In the front with me is my middle one, gazing at the endless panorama of dirt, scrub, tumbleweeds and oil field pumps.  There is no where to go but forward on the two lane road and there is no escape from the quiet inside our overpacked Toyota Corolla.

Quiet allows many things to happen… I can be with my own thoughts, let them roil and spread, and examine them more closely.  I can observe what's around me, what's happening and what's not happening, and take it in for what it is. Most important, in a quiet moment with another soul, you can listen.

In business, I have learned the value of silence. When you allow silence to hang, to expand into the space of that moment, to let silence alone be the answer… or sometimes the question… you learn more than if you tackled the topic directly.  Most of us are so uncomfortable with "awkward silences" that we rush to fill them.  And in our haste, the usual filters become flimsy - we are filling a void, not constructively participating in a dialogue.

Silence reveals the stuff beneath the surface.  In that meeting with the uncomfortable pause, you can observe which of your coworkers rushes to fill that void first, and what he/she fills it with.  Sometimes the information filling the void can be more uncomfortable than the original silence.  You have to learn in those moments not to respond to the rush, not to help the other person fill the void.  But listen carefully to what he or she is filling it with and decide, consciously, how to respond. It can be tough. Because what he/she fills it with is a little bit like receiving a drunk text at midnight from one of them - it's raw, unfiltered thought.  But it's definitely enlightening.

Lesson Three: What lurks below doesn't have to be filled with drama
Teens are different, however. Have you met a teen uncomfortable with silence? Mine are not.  After a brief conversation about the history of the oil fields - David is a history buff and could share plenty of facts - he sat in that front seat for over an hour, not feeling the need to say a word. And not seeming antsy or bored, either.  As his mother, perhaps I should have been more concerned about the idea of him brooding or peppered him with questions about his school and his friends while we had a rare moment of just the two of us as his siblings slept.  But I let the silence be.

Dave occasionally turned to smile at me, or make a random comment… through these short conversations, I glimpsed what was going on underneath the surface of my son.  There is no big reveal here.  There was no dramatic confession, no sharing of secrets.  But in the quiet moments amid brush and big rigs, Dave let me see what was going on in his head, the inane, the serious, the funny. Silence was communication, too.  Recognition that we did not have to speak to be understood.

Sometimes, though, what lurks below is all drama
After hours of oil fields, we were ready for something different.  But rolling into Sonora, Texas, wasn't going to offer that to us. I was tempted to skip our planned sight-seeing - the Caverns at Sonora - and just head straight for New Orleans.  I rationalized that I may never be back in Sonora again, however, and should at least go take a peek.  Above ground, Sonora offered nothing but a Dairy Queen and Sonic Drive-In.  Not promising.

Below ground… the caverns were breathtaking.

We were on a two mile walk with a young tour guide named Logan from Wisconsin. He had come out to Sonora to work in the oil fields but wasn't old enough to drive the rigs, so he came to the caves.  When Logan turns 21, he plans to work in the oil fields and save money for college. Meanwhile, he worked in these beautiful underground tunnels that housed nature's secret artwork.

For one moment, Logan had us sit on wooden benches placed in a small cavern.  We had just come down 150 feet underground.  "I want you to see something," he said. "I need you all to sit very still and be very quiet."  And he tripped the light switch.

Absolute darkness.  Absolute silence.

"There are few places in the world where you can fully experience the loss of both sound and light.  But this is it."

Lesson Two: The Truth is Out There (and it's not always what you expect)

Day Two: The Truth is Out There

Like Mulder, we want to believe.  Like Scully, we can't quite get there.

We rolled into Roswell, New Mexico, ready to try, though. Roswell is not on the direct route between Phoenix and Naples, but we took the detour to seek the truth.  We are a family of sci-fi geeks. That truth is already out there.

So early morning on Day Two took us to Martin's Country Cafe.  It was loud with chatter and the waitress was friendly, however, it took over ten minutes to get a cup of coffee and another ten to place our order.  This was not setting up a great expectation for breakfast, as we were four hungry, grumpy tourists amid a cast of cowboys and rough hewn senior citizens.  No, really.  Real cowboys. And real seniors.

Lesson Two: Managing Expectations Requires Flexibility

When breakfast arrived, all prior concerns dissipated.  My eggs were over-easy just right (not too hard!) and the carne asada was spicy and simmering.  Silence hovered over the table we immersed ourselves into hot platters of pancakes, chorizo, tortillas, hash browns and more.  The cowboy/owner - Martin?  - replete with giant belt buckle and broad brimmed hat, kept my coffee topped off and brought extra cream and napkins.

We were now ready to find the truth.

I had planned a full morning of alien hunting and research.  After all, the crash of 1947 started a frenzy of newspaper articles and speculation about life beyond earth and government cover ups.  But we wanted to get into the details, see the evidence that has so many believers staring into the starry night skies.  We wanted to see what the residents of Roswell claimed to see 65 years ago.  So we were heading to every place in town that advertised a little more information about the truth being out there.

First stop: The UFO Museum and Research Center sits on Main Street like an old style cinema.  Blazing lights on the marquee.  A few of the neighboring downtown storefronts have little green men painted on the windows and proclaim, "Aliens welcome here!"

We expected kitsch.  Really, we did.  But we also thought we would find that something more…  You know what it's like when you meet the ultimate coworker - smart, funny, great background - and then you're two days into a four day business trip and you learn he can't meet a deadline and has a Turrets-like affect whenever the client leaves the room?  This was the UFO Museum and Research center.  Only it took just fifteen minutes to fulfill our disillusionment.  We went in - healthy disbelievers but hopeful for that nugget, that little extra something that made it plausible, to so many people, that alien life was not only 'out there', but 'down here' as well.

We didn't find it.  There was no more evidence, no more research than you could find through a Google search and marathoning the X-Files.  It was a tangible let-down and left us staring at an agenda of alien-friendly destinations that no longer held any appeal.  Kitsch is fun for a few laughs, but how many photos of latex aliens does one really need?  In the case of that coworker, the jokes may be funny but you're still left doing double the work to meet client deadlines.

So we reset.  For future projects, you finagle a role for your coworker that doesn't impact your work load or better yet, keep him off your projects altogether.   In the case of alien hunting, we went to Starbucks. Having refueled on our expected caffeine-laden favorites, we changed our game plan and then made our way through three hours of Texas oil fields to face our next adventure.

Lesson One: On Any Journey, Bring Extra Napkins

Fellow Dirty Girl, Shirley Ramos, and I are forever talking about how life is a journey… we discuss the views, the weather and cautiously examine those 'less traveled' paths…

My new year journey is a real one, not just a metaphorical one.  And while it's personal, how much of our professional lives are truly isolated from our personal ones?  Especially as wives and mothers, fathers and husbands. It may be easy to keep the Tuesday afternoon dentist appointment and the Wednesday morning staff meeting distinctly compartmentalized, but that's mere scheduling.  Is the Mother-Me, the Wife-Me and the Personal-Me really so different, so distinct from the Work-Me?  I think not.  After all, whether it's my youngest son or a co-worker, talking with your mouth full of food still irks me.  You can be my 16 year old daughter or my graphic designer, and I will be equally annoyed when you interrupt me.  And say so.  In the work environment, I am still me… with every single personality quirk fully intact.  And why would we work so hard to create a separate Work-Me?  After all, we are hired for who we are and what we bring to the table.

So I am sharing some pieces of my journey in the next few blog posts, a few lessons from our very real journey and how the experience impacts the Total-Me.

Day One
I started a six day journey from Arizona to Florida.  Yes, it can be done it fewer days but I'm taking advantage of the drive to see some sights along the way - both noteworthy and notorious.  And while enjoying the physical beauty that is the southern swath of our country, I am also getting a closer glimpse into the inner workings of my traveling companions.  There are few situations that put you in such close contact with other physical beings - in this case, my children (ages 11, 15 and 16) - than cruising I-10 in a cozy 2004 Toyota Corolla through 550 miles of desert.

The first day of any long journey is the easiest - energy is up, adventure is forthcoming and, if you have a mother like mine, you've got plenty of snacks. Our cooler is apocalypse-ready: abundant with turkey sandwiches, ham sandwiches, chicken, ribs, chips, cookies, brownies, edamame and almonds, just for a start. Dad threw in the emergency kit, extra towels and had the car looked over by a mechanic. Twice.  (It doesn't matter if you're an adult over 40… your parents are still your parents).  All this prep meant that our nine hours of driving started with a punch colored sunrise and only stopped for coffee, diet coke and the loo.

Lesson One: Bring Extra Napkins for the Unexpected
Our journey took us east on I-10 to Las Cruces, NM, then we cut north on 70 to Roswell.  We didn't realize we'd be rising high enough in elevation to see snow, but we did.  And so we stopped the car to reacquaint ourselves with it… before our newly acquired Floridian genes kicked in and we jumped back into the Corolla with icy, wet fingers and glee.

I thoroughly expected someone to spill a drink in the car - I have three kids, so really, when does someone NOT spill?  I did not expect it to be me, but there I was with my Starbucks soy mocha splashed generously across the front of my white shirt only two hours into our journey.

For entertainment, we have over 30 hours of audiobooks - a novel, a stand-up comic and a collection of short stories.  Turns out, the standup comic's schtick was so uncomfortably bad that even my 11 year old squirmed and the discs were duly pitched at the next rest stop. So the kids filled the void with their own jokes.  Some of these a mother does not need to hear.  Others were surprisingly clever and my 15 year old son laughed so hard at one of his own jokes that he vomited.  Down the front of his sweatshirt.  Humor is known to help heal but apparently an overdose can also make you sick.

The mass of napkins and paper towels we tossed at the end of the day were a mess of coffee, hot chocolate, melted snow, snot, vomit, zucchini bread crumbs and a lot of optimism that we will get through the next five days still speaking to each other.

Any journey has moments that get messy.  Look at your own Work-Me: for any project, you do a certain amount of preparation. Some of us prepare like my parents, for every possible contingency.  Others, like me, grab our keys and sunglasses and believe we'll figure it out as we go.  And our cast of coworkers/traveling companions then impacts the decisions we make, the amount of time we spend planning and the way in which we execute. There will be spills, spews and other mishaps that require cleaning up or brushing aside.

Fortunately, we brought a lot of extra napkins.

Smashing Status Quo: Creating Pauses in the Change Process

If you do not change direction, you may end up where you are heading. (Lao Tzu)

Human beings are primed for patterns.  We love consistency and predictability. It gives us a sense of security and control.  It allows us to create our own comfortable sphere in which we can rule and relax.

It is a knee-jerk reaction for most of us to resist any new proposal, whether we're in our personal life sphere or our professional life one.

Can Brandon spend the night? No... I'm too tired...  

Can we adjust the agenda to include a benefits discussion?  Sorry, no time...

Should we implement that new marketing automation software? That will change our lead process... oh, dear...

Our "no" response has slipped through our lips before we've given most proposals even two full seconds of consideration.  

But when you are the leader of an initiative to alter the status quo, how do you manage the tsunami of resistance that is inevitably crashing against your sandy shores of change? 

You have to create pauses. That pause is a momentary reflection - for you. For your team. It gives you space to breathe and think about what is really about to happen and put it in perspective.

First pause: let's recognize the status quo. Openly acknowledge and understand that this is where we are today, and this is what it means. Take your team through an "impact analysis" (current-state, future-state, gap analysis) exercise.  It's a common exercise, but it's one we often forget to do in the context of helping our teams through the change process. Going through this exercise reveals several important points to - and about - your team:

• it provides an agreed-upon understanding what today looks like
• it ensures a shared vision for where you're going
• it involves everyone in identifying the "gaps"
• it will show you the different levels of self-awareness among your team members
• it will show you who's bought in, who's not, and how far you have to go

Progress is a nice word. But change is a motivator. And change has its enemies. (Robert Kennedy)

The impact analysis exercise will help you identify who on your team can be helpful change agents, and who is going to require some nurturing to get them to the desired end state. While you want to employ your champions to help drive necessary actions, you also want to coach them along helping their more reluctant team members to open up to change. If your champions merely push forward with implementing change, they will be seen as puppets of the regime, enforcing an agenda... not a team player working to improve the business.

One way to help shake up the status quo way of thinking, and empower your team to embrace new and original approaches, is to stop talking and give them something to do.  Second pause: exercises that test their mettle when faced with non-traditional dilemmas.  Do you recall the exercise Mel Gibson went through in "What Women Want"?  He put on pantyhose, wore lipstick, tried to figure out how it felt to be a woman.  Way outside his comfort zone. Maybe you don't have to go that far, but looking at problem from a different point of view - from a different constituent, from a different industry - can be enlightening.  Or think about it from the "Apollo 13" angle: you have a limited number of supplies and you have to solve a life-saving problem - how can you use those tools, not at all designed for your problem, to save lives? 

Less dramatic but no less illuminating is an example I read about in an article last week: hand your team a candle, a book of matches and a box of thumbtacks.  Their mission is to somehow attach the candle to the wall, light it and ensure no wax drips on the floor or wall.  What do you do?  You empty the box of thumbtacks, tack the box to the wall and put the candle in it.  Who in your group, however, will literally think "outside the box"?  But once they see the light (pun intended)... you've shaken up the status quo.

For the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked, "If this were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" 

And if the answer is "no" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.  (Steve Jobs)

Sometimes going beyond simple acknowledgement can help your team let go of an entrenched pattern. Years ago when we were integrating a new team from a company we had recently acquired, I was battling the newcomers over the fact that we were changing the product name to be more in line with our corporate standards. While logically the team understood why we were making the change, there was still resentment and concern over the process.  Third pause: a mentor of mine made a suggestion that I thought was bizarre... and yet... at that stage I had nothing to lose and after pausing long enough to consider what affect it could have, we did it. We hosted a funeral.  The old product name was dead, but the spirit of the product lives on... in a different name, of course.  But the act of hosting a funeral - well, truthfully, more like an Irish wake with many rounds of Guinness and some great story-telling - allowed the acquired team to both laugh at the absurdity and mark the end of an era.  

We can't always promise that change is for the better. We can't ensure that every team member will embrace it and go forth. But we can be sensitive to the fact that our patterns are ingrained in us, for better and for worse, and if we work with them instead of pushing so hard against them, we can move forward a lot farther and a lot faster.  So pause. Breathe. Reflect. And then find a new way to smash through that status quo that brings everyone along with you, and not just staring at shattered pieces.

Is Debate Derailing Your Decisions? Four Keys to Stay On-Track

Deja vu.  I am leading a team meeting that starts off as an energetic brainstorming session. It evolves into a practical discussion around strategy. Then it devolves into a debate over execution. How can I keep the debate from derailing what has been, so far, a productive team session?

As a leader, it's my job to solve a problem.  I've called my best and brightest to help.  Now, how do I manage a passionate conversation to a practical outcome?  I've ridden this train before and I can still smell the fumes from the wreckage. So now a little wiser and with some help from my friends, here are four keys that keep me, and my team, on track.

Key #1: Maintain focus. Often times we get side-railed once a debate begins.  Whether it's bubbling up from a personality clash, burgeoning egos or a philosophical difference in tackling the issue, the bottom line is that there is an impersonal but very real business problem you are trying to solve.  Keep the focus of your team on the best possible outcome for the business - and acknowledge that there may be more than one path to getting there.  If you can keep a difference of opinion from escalating into more personal or emotional zones, you increase your chance of coming to a mutually agreed upon resolution.

Key #2: Establish evaluation criteria. Agreeing upon which elements are important when selecting a course of action is critical for the team to be able to come to consensus.  Your criteria might include the basics of budget, location, revenue generation, new market opportunity... it might also be "never been done before".

Key #3: Drive decision-making, not approval.  The difference here is driven by Keys #1 and #2. By maintaining focus on the desired business outcomes, you can keep everyone focused on making decisions that achieve those goals. The mission of the team isn't to nod their approval for every good idea. If you have a smart, motivated team, you're going to have a plethora of smart, executable ideas.  The goal is to drive to a smart decision that achieves your desired outcomes, aligned to your established criteria.

Key #4: Be willing to call a time-out. Just because we are all big boys and girls doesn't mean we don't occasionally require a time-out.  If a team member loses her temper, storms out of a meeting, or starts injecting outside issues into the conversation, it may just be time for a break. Acknowledge you're at this point and walk away.  But schedule a session to regroup within the next few days and before you re-start, review the focus and criteria for your meeting. Bring everyone back to the real purpose.

Differences of opinion are often great fodder for getting beyond our comfort zones.  A very smart person recently said to me, "There are probably 26 ways to solve every problem."  When we can acknowledge that as a leader, we are then more open to the depth our team brings to every situation and can encourage smarter, more original problem-solving approaches.  It enriches our experience, our leadership capabilities and our teams.