I was just savouring a coffee from my newly purchased coffee maker when a wide-eyed and out of breath soldier stumbled into my makeshift office. My cup was poised in my hand – the aroma was fantastic – and the thought of drinking it was more alluring than anything I could imagine that this solider might interrupt me with. This had better be good, I thought.

“Sir! The guards think there is a bomb at the gates to the camp!”

I put the cup down; coffee time was over.

How do you make important decisions?

Let’s pause the story for a moment so I can ask you a question:

What is the most important decision you have ever made?

The most important decisions are generally not the critical, life threatening type. More likely it was choosing your school, selecting your career, buying a house, or committing to your life partner. How did you make that decision? Was it the right decision? (If you are sitting next to your spouse don’t feel you need to answer that last one just now).

As well as those big life decisions, how about the myriad of smaller decisions we have to make every day. What about those? What process (if any) did you use to make your choice? Every day we are all expected to make hundreds, if not thousands, of decisions. Research has shown we probably make more than 200 decisions a day relating to food alone (Wansink, Sobal). Yet, weirdly, despite all these decisions, very few people ever receive formal training in decision making.

Crawl, walk, run

For me it’s a bit like running.

Everyone just expects people to know how to run. For those of us blessed with full health and mobility it is a natural progression. We crawl, we walk, we run. Simple right?

But if you really want to improve your running you need to train. It was not until I started running ultra-marathons that I really started taking my running training seriously. As I did, I become more aware of the technical aspects of running such as breathing, foot fall, cadence and pace. It was only then, when I broke down my technique, I realized that I had been doing so many things wrong for so many years.

Such is the way with decision making. If you want to get better at making decisions you need to practice, but you must also understand some of the fundamentals of how choices are made.

The science and art of decision making

I started out my career as a Bomb Disposal Officer in the Army. From there I have gone on to lead in various contexts, often in some of the most challenging and hostile environments on the planet. This knowledge and experience, coupled with my love of learning, has led me to develop decision making tools that I teach, particularly to the leaders that I coach.

This is because a large part of being a leader is about making decisions. Effective leadership is dependent upon making good decisions.

The foundation of all my work is asking questions. Questions unlock understanding and understanding is a foundation of good decision making. One of my favourite quotes by Francis Bacon illustrates this:

“A prudent question is one half of wisdom.”

Francis Bacon

So, what are the right questions? This is a question I have been exploring for my whole career. I want to share with you some of the insights I have discovered on this journey over the past 20 years. My hope is that after reading this I can impart a small gift, a simple tool, to help you. Something that you need never forget and can assist you in your future choices and plans. My promise to you is a guarantee that you will be able to remember the framework. And that is because you already know it. All I am going to do is help you apply that framework.

Sound good?

Why do we need to ask the right questions?

Good questions are essential if we want to get the right information.

If we don’t ask the right questions, we won’t get the answers we need. Without the necessary information, we won’t be able to make good decisions. If we don’t make good decisions, we can lose our direction, fail in our leadership, and can end up ineffective, unhappy or worse.

As I mentioned previously, I found out how important questions are early on in my career as a Bomb Disposal Officer.

Nasty surprises

As I put my coffee down and walked out of the office, I asked my first question:

“What do you mean by a bomb?”

“There is a suspicious package, the guards think it could be a bomb.” was the reply.

It was Bosnia in 2001, and I was a young Lieutenant in the Royal Engineers leading the Explosive Ordnance Disposal (bomb disposal) team in the local region. The conflict in Bosnia had ended some time ago and we were there primarily to clear up the mess that a war leaves behind, namely the mines, mortar bombs and other explosives that littered the countryside. But in the post 9/11 world, the threat of terrorist attack was at the forefront of people’s minds. In this context, an unexplained bag, right up against the front gates of a military camp, was screaming out ‘IED!’ (Improvised Explosive Device) and required immediate and serious attention.

Red wire or blue wire?

Therefore, I went to take control of the scene and do an initial threat assessment. I met the guard commander and asked him some questions such as:

Where exactly was the package?

What did it look like?

Who had seen it first?

When had it been found?

Why was it suspicious?

How had it got there?

Very quickly a picture emerged that put my mind at ease. One of the guards had seen an old and infirm lady dropping off the parcel. Upon questioning the local interpreters, I found out that this lady was well known to them (as she was a little eccentric) and that she had made similar deliveries before. It was more than likely that this was just a gift for the soldiers. A short trip to visit the lady at her house confirmed that yes, she had just dropped off some biscuits for the troops. It just so happened that she thought that dropping off a ‘surprise’ in an unmarked bag, unannounced, at the front gate to a military base was a good thing to do!

After establishing all of this I was able to go back, safely deal with the package (no, I didn’t eat or blow up the biscuits), give the all-clear and return the security levels to normal. I thanked the lady for the kind thought and gift but asked her to refrain from such ‘surprise’ generosity in the future.

So, the right question was not ‘do we cut the red or the blue wire?’ In fact, the right questions were not technical ones at all.

The importance of questions

When you consider your life is under threat then it is very important to properly assess a situation. You have to overcome the ‘fight or flight’ response and use the decision space – the gap between stimulus and response – to work out what to do. In the time given you have to make an assessment. Asking the right questions and getting the right answers is essential before launching into action.

The military, the emergency services and medical services know this and train personnel in decision making. By employing decision making processes and then applying these first in exercises and in real-life situations, personnel can build up experience and become expert decision-makers. A good methodology coupled with experience and can help to make quick, effective decisions even in high-risk environments (Klein).

Outside of careers that deal with life-threatening situations very few people get training in asking questions and making decisions. This is despite the fact that numerous studies show that these competencies are essential to employers, particularly for leaders and managers (Harrell, Barbato). The need for decision making in leaders is often expressed in other terms such as:

• The need for analysing and overcoming problems (Zenger, Folkman)
• Taking the initiative (Maxwell)
• Setting direction and goals (Giles)
• Prioritisation (Tracy)
• Or having a clear vision and strategy (Kotter)

But all these things are related to, or dependent upon, good decision making.

Do we need decision making tools?

We generally take decision making for granted. After all, we each make thousands of choices every day, some conscious, some unconscious, and rarely need to apply more than our intuition to a decision. But there is a problem. Research, particularly by influential figures such as Daniel Kahneman, has demonstrated that our intuition is amazing, but it has limits.

Therefore, understanding decision making and how to make good decisions is critical to all of us, and good decision making starts with good questions. After all, as John Dewey says:

“A problem well put is half solved.”

John Dewey

The problem with many processes and tools, including those used for decision making, is that they are often non-intuitive and hard to remember. That is why we should start with what we already know and structures that are already embedded.

Start with the questions you already know

When I was training as a Bomb Disposal Officer we were taught a question technique called the ‘Five Ws’ which we used when we approached an incident. The ‘Five Ws’ is an interrogative style employed primarily by journalists and police officers, but it is a framework that can be used by anyone to make an appreciation of a given situation.

The Five Ws are:

• What?
• Where?
• When?
• Who?
• Why?

To this list ‘how?’ is also usually added. This ‘5Ws and an H’ provides an easy to remember checklist that is a useful starting point towards building a quick but rounded picture of a situation.

The idea is that by using the 5 Ws to construct open questions you are more likely to get factual answers and more information while avoiding presuppositions. This is in contrast to closed questions, that have just yes or no answers, or leading questions that push people down a certain line of thinking.

Using interrogatives

As I have done further research into question technique and applied the principles in my work, I have found that it is also useful to add another ‘W’ – that of ‘which?’ – to the list. The ‘which?’ question covers the concept of selection or choice and therefore helps to inspire options and to consider risk. This helps to complete the decision-making cycle, particularly when we are planning for the future, not just examining an event that has already happened.

This makes seven questions in a total and creates an easily remembered framework. It’s easy to recall as its based upon the most common interrogative words that we use in English. The methodology easily translates into other languages too. Seven is also a handy number as we find it harder to recall lists above seven or eight items (Buzan).

The application of the interrogatives provides a holistic approach to analysing a situation and making an informed decision. The use and application of these seven open questions is a technique I have dubbed ‘The Right Questions’, inspired by the question I had started with.

Applying The Right Questions

Simplicity is a large part of the system’s strength. But, as with any tool or model, the technique is only as good as its application and it is this application of the questions that we will start to look at here.

My experience of working as a coach and consultant has taught me that The Right Questions approach can be applied to everything from life direction and personal vision, to corporate strategy and organisational change.

The table below outlines the purpose and application of each interrogative word in sequence:

Interrogative	Use	Application
Why	Reason	Values, principles, priorities, passions
Where	Place	Situation (past and present), vision
What	Thing	Mission, end-state, success
Which	Selection	Options, courses of action, risks, reflection
How	Manner	Plan, route, tasks, resources
Who	Person	Self, team, network, relationships
When	Time	Timing, programming, prioritisation

When you learn how to apply the system it is very flexible. My starting point when faced with a challenge – whether it is developing a business case, starting a project, or writing an article – will be to write down the seven Right Questions (often as a mind-map) and start to brainstorm and explore my thoughts under each heading.

After trying this you can also experiment with using the system as a decision-making cycle. My experience over the years has shown that most effective order is as follows:

I agree with Simon Sinek that we should ‘Start with Why’ when approaching any problem. Asking the ‘where’ and ‘what’ questions then help to frame the problem before moving on to the ‘how’, ‘when’ and ‘who’ elements that are most helpful in developing a plan.

The ‘which’ question then serves as an inflection point between these two loops. Asking the which question helps to identify different courses of actions that can be considered in the planning loop. It may also highlight risks and assumptions that send us back to the framing questions once again.

Putting decision making theory into practice

“Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler.”

Albert Einstein

Having just read this last section you may be thinking that the process no longer seems so simple. Don’t worry! The best thing to do now is immediately put the basics of the process into practice.

Start with something easy. What do you have to do today? Take any one task or decision – be that as simple as composing an email, planning a party or even just going to the shops – and start by writing down the seven interrogative questions. Use these to make sure you understand why you need to achieve the task and then how you are going to do it. I promise it will help!

Done? Congratulations! You have taken the first step to becoming better at making decisions.

Now, as with the running analogy, you need to train regularly. Commit to experimenting with method, perhaps for one task every day for the next week. Once you have used it a couple of times try and apply it to a more complicated issue or more important decision.

If you struggle don’t be disheartened. You don’t go from the couch to running marathons in one week. Instead, enjoy the learning journey. If this has piqued your interest and you want to find out more then, explore some of the links above, or references listed below, in order to delve into more detail.

Happy decision-making!

If you would like access to some bonus content and get updates then please do sign up to my email list.

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References:

Buzan, T (2010) Use Your Head, London: BBC

Giles, S (2016) The Most Important Leadership Competencies, According to Leaders Around the World, Harvard Business Review

Harrell, M and Barato, L (2018) Great Managers Still Matter: The Evolution of Google’s Project Oxygen, Google/Re:work

Kahneman, D (2011) Thinking Fast and Slow, New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Klein, G (1998) Sources of Power: How People Make Decisions, Cambridge: Massachusetts Institute of Technology Press

Kotter, J P (2012) Leading Change, Brighton: Harvard Business Review Press

Maxwell, J C (2007) The 21 Indispensable Qualities of a Leader, Nashville: Thomas Nelson

Sinek, S (2009) Start With Why, London: Penguin Books

Tracy, B (2010) How the Best Leaders Lead, New York: American Management Association

Wansink, B; Sobal, J (2007) Mindless Eating: The 200 Daily Food Decisions We Overlook, Environment and Behaviour, 39:1, 106-23

“Mindless Eating: The 200 Daily Food

Decisions We Overlook,” Environment and Behavior, 39:1 (January), 106-23

Zenger, J and Folkman, J (2014) The Skills Leaders Need at Every Level, Harvard Business Review

What is the biggest problem that you or your team are facing now? How would you define that problem? What specific type of challenge is it?

Maybe you have not even thought to define it, you are simply getting on with trying to solve it. But, research shows, that it is important we understand the nature of the challenge in order to bring the right solutions to bear.

As John Dewey put it:

“A problem well-defined is a problem half solved.”

Let me share some wisdom that has really helped me in problem solving.

You may well have heard people talk about ‘wicked’ problems. This phrase comes from a useful classification of types of problems based on work by Keith Grint. He identified that there are three different types of problems: tame, critical, and wicked.

If you can work out the sort of problem you are dealing with, you can then apply the right leadership style or management approach to solve the problem. Having led teams in various contexts – in large institutions, in fast-moving crisis situations, and in small start-ups – I have found this model very helpful for steering my approach to problem-solving.

So, whether you are working on your own, in a small team or as part of a huge organisation, this thought process can be extremely beneficial. Let’s look at each type of problem in turn. I will also provide some examples to explain each one, and consider the approaches that can help you solve them.

What are Tame Problems?

Tame problems may be complicated, but they are challenges that have a tried and tested solution you can use. These are the sort of problems where you can clearly picture the solution and then plan by working back from that end-state.

So, to take a simple example, imagine you had a puppy. That young dog would need house-training. House training is not particularly fun and can be quite hard work, but there are lots of people out there who can give you advice on how to effectively train the dog. If you follow that expertise properly, you should successfully train your pet.

To take a personal, real-life example, when I worked as a Project Manager on The Shard (the tallest building in the UK) the challenge was complex, but the problem was actually tame by this classification. The scale and exact design of the tower were new but the technology and processes to build the structure already existed. Traditional project management was the correct way to approach the problem and the tower was constructed successfully.

Manage people, create structures, and apply tested processes

Tame does not mean easy, but it does mean you can plan in detail and start to tackle the issue. With adequate planning, you can expect success with a high degree of certainty. Therefore, tame problems require good management.

It is about choosing the right process and then implementing the plan. Traditional management tools such as Gantt Charts can work well in these circumstances. The manager can also lean on other people’s data to make rational decisions. They can also use other people’s experience and established processes to develop a plan.

Traditional organisations have been structured to deal with these sorts of problems. Specialist teams can work in their own division without much need to interact with other teams and functions. Managers must ensure effective communication at the interfaces between these teams; but if the problem is well defined and planned for, then these structures can work just fine for solving tame problems.

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What are Critical Problems?

Critical problems are self-evident challenges that offer little time for decision making and action. They are urgent and immediate issues.

Let’s go back to the dog example. Now your dog is a bit older, and you are out on a walk. Unexpectedly, your dog attacks another dog. You now have a critical problem – something that needs to be solved fast to reduce the negative outcomes. If you do not act quickly the situation could go from bad to worse. In this instance you need to be firm, directive and – if needed – personally intervene to resolve the problem.

I faced a critical problem while climbing in the Alps with some friends. We had been on a long mountain climb and the weather had got worse as we continued to scale the peak. As we reached the summit the weather finally broke, and we found ourselves in the middle of an electrical storm. I was not the official leader of the team but when the storm hit, the person who had been leading the route became uncertain of what to do. The thunder was deafening, and I knew we had to descend as quickly and safely as possible before someone got hurt. Therefore, I immediately identified a route down, gave some quick instructions and took the lead down the mountain, setting the pace and encouraging the team as we went.

Be a ‘commander’, use the hierarchy and make decisions

Critical problems require command. In other words, they usually need a more directive leadership style to ensure timely decisions and swift action. The depth of experience of the leader will equip them to make quick intuitive decisions.

This type of directive approach can be reassuring to people in a crisis, but be aware, when used in other circumstances it can be condescending or stifling. For critical problems, hierarchical organisational structures, with clear lines of communication and decision making, work well.

What are Wicked Problems?

Wicked problems are complex problems that have no right or wrong answer. The problem might be a new one (like using artificial intelligence), or an evolving problem (like climate change) or an old problem to which there is just no good solution (such as poverty). The problem also does not have a ‘stopping rule’. In other words, you don’t really ever solve the problem, the problem just changes.

Let’s go back to the animal analogy. You would face a wicked problem if you owned a dog and a cat but could not afford to keep both. The problem is not novel (many other people have faced the same challenge) but there is no single right solution to that issue. You have various courses of action, some that might be more palatable than others. For example, finding a trusted friend to re-house one pet might be preferable to giving one to a stranger, but how do you choose which loved pet to give away? You will mourn the loss either way. And even if you do manage to re-house one pet that does not necessarily solve the underlying problem of income generation. Not being able to look after both pets was just one facet of the wicked problem of cash flow.

Recently, I was involved with a project that asked the question “what is the right amount of profit for a company”. That fascinating question pointed to a wicked problem. Even just the question itself raised a host of related questions such as: what are the ethics relating to what is ‘right’ regarding profit? How do you measure profit? Is profit purely financial or are there other types of capital? Can a company be profitable, ethical and sustainable? Trying to address these challenges required input from a breadth of academics, business leaders and pilot programmes. The leadership challenge was helping to build relationships, communication and agree on outputs to harness the creativity and facilitate the suite of projects born out of the initial question.

Apply leadership, employ ‘clumsy’ solutions, foster relational networks

Wicked problems require mature and transformational leadership. A leader needs to set a clear vision, have an over-arching strategy but flexibility and the confidence to make difficult decisions, and take responsibility for those decisions. A high-performing team that can bring a diversity of thought and creativity to the problem will be your best resource. You need a coherent strategy, but you are unlikely to be able to have a long-term and detailed plan.

You will need to experiment, learn, and adapt as you go and therefore a more agile, rather than a traditional approach to management, will be much more applicable. This allows pragmatic, or so-called ‘clumsy’ solutions, that enables forward progression without having to achieve perfection.

A large organisation will suffer if it works in silos to deal with wicked problems. At the very least there needs to be a matrix of interactions across different teams and functions. Often, it is small, more cellular teams, with diverse approaches and more fluid roles, that can deal best with wicked problems. These sorts of teams are hard to manage – particularly at scale. They are more relational networks than organisations per se.

How would you define your problem now?

So, having looked at the typology how would you define your biggest problem? Is it tame, critical or wicked?

As you look for solutions remember these approaches:

• Tame Problems – manage an existing process to get the best result
• Critical Problems – take command and be decisive to win quick
• Wicked Problems – be flexible, creative, and pragmatic

Good luck with overcoming your next challenge!

The action-centred leadership model, proposed by John Adair is the first conceptual leadership theory I remember being taught. I still recall the lesson I had on this in school and can picture the three interlocking circles, projected onto a screen, of ‘task, team and individual’ that sum up the model.

You may well already know this tool and if so, here is a refresher. If you have not come across this before then read on, it is a theory I highly recommend and still use as it is one you can easily apply in the workplace.

Adair’s place in leadership theory

The leadership approach is born of the skills and behavioural trends of management theory as it is based on the assumptions that leadership can be taught.

This means that action-centred leadership is closely linked to contingency and behavioural leadership theories that propose that what a leader does is more important than who they are. This contrasts with much earlier theories that supposed you needed to be born to leadership. Adair wrote before the idea of transformational leadership became popular but that does not mean you should ignore his model.

The three core management responsibilities

The tool has served me well through my whole career and I love it because it is simple – and therefore easy to remember and apply – without being overly simplistic.

“Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler.”

Albert Einstein

The most important lesson it has helped me with is balancing the needs of the following three core management responsibilities:

1. The Task – the defined goal or mission
2. The Team – managing the defined group selected to achieve the task
3. The Individual – making sure that each person who makes up the team and every role is considered and supported

The three circles

These three elements are best known in their Venn diagram form where they become interlocking circles.

This model demonstrates the need for a leader has to have an intimate understanding of each element in order to achieve success. Success is more than just the task. Achieving a project is much more of a journey of ups and downs as compared to what a simple plan might suggest.

There will be times, to ensure the final success of the task, you might need to prioritise support to one individual if they are struggling. At another time, if working to a tight deadline, the task will take precedent and the team may suffer a bit to get the project over the line. Knowing this helps the leader manage the balance over time.

The PICSIE management and decision-making process

To complement these core responsibilities Adair also set out the core functions of a leader which can be remembered by the acronym ‘PICSIE’. These stand for:

• Plan – to define the goal, make a plan and assign resources
• Initiate – to communicate and start the task
• Control – to manage the team and measure progress
• Support – to support individuals and the team, through maintain morale,
• Inform – maintaining good communications internally and externally, providing insight
• Evaluate – assessing progress and success against the defined aims of the task

The astute among you will also see that this set of core functions also serves as a decision-making process. The process is effectively a loop where evaluation naturally leads back to another round of planning and so on.

Keep it simple stupid

In the military people often used the acronym KISS: Keep It Simple Stupid. In other words, don’t overcomplicate things.

John Adair really did create a useful but simple model. I put it to good use even at school and went from the quietest person in my year to the dizzy heights of college prefect.

Having this tool really helped me to start to grow as a leader, so, remember: “Who Adairs Wins!” No? Ok, but hopefully you will remember the key elements of task, team and individual and use this tool!

The Socratic method? What on earth is that and why should I care?

Great questions.

I have been professionally taught (as a bomb disposal officer) and teach (as an instructor) question technique.  I have also studied ancient history and modern psychology. With all that knowledge I have found there is little to beat the ancient wisdom of the Socratic method. That is why I use it, not only in my work as a professional coach but also in everyday discussions.

I recommend the Socratic method as it is a simple and practical approach to dialogue that you can use when having pretty much any discussion. As you read this you may find that you are using some of the techniques already.

So, whether you are a leader trying to manage your team, a frustrated buyer trying to deal with customer service, or just down in the bar putting the world to right, you will find something here for you.

I came here for an argument

Imagine that someone says something to you that you think is wrong. Time for a debate, right? You can point out their mistake and put your (obviously better) point across. Job done; argument won.

But what if winning the argument is at the expense of a relationship? What if you misunderstood what they were trying to say? Worse still, what if your position is wrong? I expect that we can all think of plenty of examples which is why we all have something to learn.

“Education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel.”

Socrates

Conversational game theory

We often treat discussions as a zero-sum game. In other words, there is only one winner: win-lose in game theory parlance.

This type of dialogue is debating; one party is trying to prove that their argument is better than the other persons. But there is the rub. A debate often places emphasis on the ‘better’ rather than the most truthful argument. This is why skilful orators and writers employ rhetorical devices to create forceful arguments. They want to win.

Deep down we all feel slightly soiled when assaulted by these sorts of arguments. But unfortunately, we tend to overlook the negatives of rhetoric when we agree with the point being put across. That is largely due to our own confirmation bias.

The problem is, even when we do agree with some of this rhetoric there is a niggling feeling that things are not quite right, that we cannot move forward. That can happen in personal relationships, at work or on big political and international issues. Try to discuss any wicked problem such as education, health care or the environment and you will see what I mean.

Take politics as another example. One of the things that put many people off politics is the endless rhetoric. This is not a new phenomenon; it did not start with The Daily Show. This Sophist style of rhetoric has been challenged and ridiculed since Aristophanes was writing hit comedies for the ancient Greeks circa 400 BC.

This is because this approach to a conversation leads to the polarised stances of people, issues, and political parties. This type of debate leaves little ground for commonality. Things often end in a stalemate rather than consensus. That is bad for everyone as now we have gone from win-lose to lose-lose.

But there is a better way. Win-win outcomes are possible.

Constructive discussion

Dialogue does not need to be a debate. It all depends on the outcome that you are pursuing and how you seek to achieve that endpoint. Are you trying to resolve the argument or win it?

Are you trying to confirm your truth or the truth? The idea of the truth or absolute truth is a post-modern conundrum so let’s park that philosophical debate for a moment. The point of the question is: are you trying to get to the actual best outcome or just what you think is the best outcome? Are you seeking understanding or is it just ‘my way or the highway’?

If you are truly seeking an understanding of an idea and the best outcome for all parties then a dialogue can be a truly creative process. This is the strong belief of Nancy Kline and her development of the ‘Thinking Environment‘ where quality thinking and dialogue can take place.

“Strong minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, weak minds discuss people.”

Socrates

From heated debate to challenging dialogue

That does not mean the dialogue is not robust. You do not have to agree with everything the other person says. In fact, just the opposite. The idea is to understand the other person’s viewpoint but then challenge presuppositions and wrong assumptions.

This is not only good for getting to the truth (whatever that might be) it can be truly liberating. Good coaches and therapists know that unpicking wrong assumptions is key to unlocking many people’s challenges. It frees people from wrong thinking and therefore frees them. Frequently it is our false beliefs that hold us back.

So, you can be robust but the approach to the discussion is key. You do not start with the presupposition that you are right.

“The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.”

Socrates

This approach to dialogue goes back a long way, to Aristophanes and before: it is the Socratic (or elenctic) method.

How to use the Socratic method

The Socratic Method (or method of elenchus), as outlined in Plato’s Theaetetus, is a process of questioning that inspires critical thinking and analysis. Primarily the method was designed for moral and philosophical enquiry, but the technique has been used for pretty much any discussion.

Here I have simplified the Socratic dialogue approach into 5 steps:

1. Receive 

First, receive what the other person has to say. This means listening to the other person’s premise, view or argument. And remember you must properly listen to be able to do the next step.

2. Reflect

Sum up the person’s viewpoint or argument and reflect it back. Do this by first getting them to clarify and sum up their position and then by paraphrasing or repeating it back to them.

3. Refine

Ask them to provide their evidence. Find out why they are thinking or acting in that way. Discover the facts, beliefs or assumptions that underpin their standpoint. Often the premise will be based on assumptions rather than hard facts. Challenge these assumptions to test their validity.

Use further questions to uncover the fallacy of any wrong presuppositions. These are often ‘why’ questions. For example: “why do you think that?” Sometimes it can be helpful to construct the ‘why’ question as a ‘what’ question for example: “what makes you think that?” This is because why questions can often feel confrontational.

At times you may need to provide contrary evidence to challenge an assumption but try and structure this as a question too if possible. If there is a cognitive fallacy (a wrong way of thinking) then try and get them to find an exception (or if necessary, provide one) that proves their own theory wrong. Discover and explore this circumstance to discover new, better thinking. In this way, you are refining the basic premise of the discussion.

4. Re-state

Now that you have refined your thinking get them to reformulate and re-state their position. If they see that they had a wrong assumption, get them to adapt or renew their wording and then re-state it.

5. Repeat

Now they have a new viewpoint you can go back to the start of the process. You can assess the new premise and challenge any further wrong assumptions in their thinking. This method becomes a cycle of dialogue. The iterative or dialectic process helps to drill down further and further to get to the core of the issue.

And that’s it. Simple. The question technique framework is easy to remember; the skill comes in applying it. The challenge, as noted before, is to really listen to the other person and truly commit to coming to a better-shared understanding of the issue.

“I cannot teach anybody anything. I can only make them think”

Socrates

Why people (but particularly leaders) need to ask good questions

As a leader who prefers to lead in a non-directive style (in other words I ask lots of questions) and as a professional coach, I know that seeking understanding is vitally important to success.

That is because success is not just winning the prize or beating the competition. That is short term. Real leadership success is taking people with you, involving them in the journey and creating a future that is better for everyone. As a leader, you might have a fabulous vision of that better future but if you want to get there you need to take people with you.

Whoever you are, leader or not, you should want to embrace the diversity of thought others bring in order to learn, as well as to achieve your life goals. You will also want to unblock any negativity in relationships that you have. This means you need to develop an understanding and apply empathy. Remember:

“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.”

Socrates

Therefore, seek understanding. Seek knowledge. Have productive dialogue. Learn. Progress.

This is why I have found asking questions so powerful and the Socratic method so useful. The father of philosophy gives us the structure, all we need to bring is the right attitude.

So, next time you feel your argument becoming a polarised debate, remember the Socratic method and have a truly productive exchange of ideas.

In this series on leadership theories, we have already looked at early ideas such as the Great Man theory, Control and Domination and Leadership Traits. As research into leadership developed, studying leadership skills led to looking at the behaviours (behavioural leadership) and actions of leaders. (Action-Centred Leadership).

It was now recognised that leadership can take different forms. Therefore, studies were made into which situations certain leaders thrived in. This led to various theories of situational leadership.

Situational Leadership Theory

For example, Fiedler (1967), argued that there was no one right way to lead, but rather that the type of leader and style of leadership needed to suit the situation.Sometime later on, Paul Hersey and Ken Blanchard (author of The One Minute Manager) developed a model situational leadership that many people will be familiar with.

Blanchard and Hersey’s Situational Leadership Model

This model helps to show the most appropriate form of leadership, depending upon the nature of the task and the competency and commitment of the team. In simple terms it breaks down into four key leadership approaches:

• Directive – telling people what to do, usually used for enthusiastic novices
• Delegating – giving over whole tasks to people who are experienced and able to take responsibility. This is a more hands-off leadership approach
• Supporting – this is when there is a high level of trust in the team and individuals can manage themselves independently. But the leader has higher participation than in pure delegation, by providing moral support, encouraging and communicating proactively
• Coaching – this involves selling the task to the individual and helping them grow to take on more responsibility. This works particularly well with individuals who may have lost confidence in what they need to do

The following diagram summarises the Blanchard model:

Ken Blanchard’s Situational Leadership Model

Team Member Development and Maturity Levels

As well as the four leadership styles in the model there are also four development levels that relate to the maturity and capability of the team members. In the model these progress from D1, at the low end of maturity and development, to D4, where the person is highly capable to deal with the task.

It is important to remember that someone could be very experienced generally but, faced with a new task, they could find themselves out of their depth. Therefore, as a manager, it is important to think about someone’s ability to do the specific task and how to lead them in that situation rather than just the usual default approach.

For example, I have worked with CEOs who are incredibly experienced and gifted but who have required coaching support as their roles and organisations have evolved. It is an important lesson in humility for all leaders as well as team members. It does not matter how capable we are (or think we are), there will always be times where we are learners and need people to support us.

Situational Leadership Examples

I have found this situational leadership model useful in helping to understand how I can adapt my leadership style, depending on the situation. It has also assisted me in identifying my preferred approaches.

Delegating and Supporting

It has been my privilege to work with and lead some really experienced and capable teams. Therefore, a much as possible, I like to adopt a more non-directive leadership approach. I also like to be led this way and generally be left to get on with things (S4). Because I tend towards being a hands-off leader, I have learned to communicate this to teams early. I let them know that they can ask questions and, if necessary, demand more support from me (S3).

Coaching

When I see an individual who needs help, I trend towards a coaching style (S2). I really enjoy going with people on their learning journey. Seeing people confident and empowered is hugely motivating for me and that is a big reason why I actively coach leaders alongside my other leadership responsibilities.

Directing and Commanding

I keep the more directive approach (S1) for times of real crisis. Generally, I don’t tend to stay in this mode for long. My children might argue and say, “Daddy, you are always ordering me around!” But, in my defence, I would argue that if you visited our house around bedtime, it is a crisis zone!

I have used this command style of leadership at times in the military, which might be an obvious example. But it has also been critical to other situations. I have used this style when leading teams off mountains in bad weather and when reacting quickly to bad news in a business context. This directive style can be a reassuring approach in a crisis. However, it quickly becomes overbearing if used all the time, particular with an able team.

To be a Leader is to be a Learner

No matter where we are on our journey we can all discover something new about leadership. It does not even matter how much responsibility we have (or don’t have). Everyone can learn to lead better and flex their leadership style for different situations. The best leaders are not stuck in one mode of management all the time.

So think about your team and their tasks today. As a manager, do you need to direct, delegate, support or coach them through their next piece of work?

What does a leader look like? What qualities or traits should they have? Commonly people will say a leader should be, ‘tall, attractive, confident, charismatic, and intelligent’  But if this is the case it makes us all wonder; do we have what it takes to be a leader?

Unhealthy Comparisons

I found this stereotype of leadership very troubling when I was younger, particularly when I directly compared myself to this list and some leaders that ticked all the boxes.

Handsome Alexander the Great had unified (subdued) Greece by the age of 20 and the charismatic Joan of Arc led the relief of Orleans aged 17. How did I measure up in my teens?

Well, I was just over average height, mildly intelligent, but gawky, introverted and softly spoken. I struggled with huge self-esteem and confidence issues surrounding whether I was attractive. It did not help that I was your classic spotty and greasy-haired teenager. But this was exacerbated by suffering years of orthodontic dental work. To get an idea of how much metalwork I was displaying, let’s just say that I could set off the detectors in airport security while still at check-in!

Basically, I fell well short of the mark on pretty much every populist leader trait as listed above. But hey, Alexander the Great had achieved a lot by the age of 20, but he was born into a royal family, and he never had to deal with my dentist!

Are people born to be leaders?

Most of us are not born into privilege or are so naturally gifted that we can just switch on cruise control for the rest of our lives. So where does that leave us if we were not born leaders?

The debate around nature or nurture is one of the longest-running in the field of psychology. It basically comes down to whether one places more importance on our genetic inheritance, or on how environmental factors influence us. Nowhere has this been more hotly contested than in the field of leadership.

Initial leadership theories tended towards the idea that leaders were born, that we were sent ‘Great Men’ to lead us in times of crisis. This theory then evolved as people tried to identify the common traits these leaders were born with.

Leadership Traits

As alluded to previously, early lists of traits included the need for:

• Height
• Intelligence
• Attractiveness
• Self-confidence
• Charisma

As we have seen, these supposed leadership qualities were not ones I could readily associate with. I was at best an ugly duckling of a leader and there was no promise of great genes suddenly turning me into some great swan. That left me furiously paddling about, trying to live up to this supposed ideal of a leader.

In this desperation, I was tempted to pursue other negative leadership stereotypes and try to dominate people to make up for my lack of natural charisma.

The trap of toxic leadership

This view of leadership can entrap us. It can lead to unrealistic expectations and disappointment, or the rise of hubristic and toxic leaders.

If we hold up an unrealistic view of leaders, such as the list above, we preserve an unachievable ideal. What we are effectively after is a superhero rather than a manager. This leads to one of two outcomes, either all the people will encounter fall short of our ideal or we put people on a pedestal only to watch them fall off it. They are only human after all.

Putting people on a pedestal can lead to hubristic or toxic leadership. Even if a leader does not start out as arrogant and self-centred they can quickly become so given power and adulation. Stories of raising up such charismatic but flawed leaders go back at least as far as King Saul in the Old Testament. But, looking at the rise of populist leaders today, it seems we may not have learned that much in the last 3000 years.

Breaking the mould

Despite the perpetuation of this flawed ideal, and my fumbling start, I was surprised to find that people did continue to give me responsibility. What’s more, I could certainly influence people, even if it was just in some small way. These people were generally few in number, and among my school friends or sports-buddies, but it was something!

Therefore, I was able to lead in some contexts despite not living up to the leadership stereotype; why was that? When I looked around me, I could see plenty of other examples of leaders who did not fit this early leadership stereotype either. In fact, most of the people I knew in leadership positions did not exactly fit this mould.

Some well-known historical figures have also had huge influence despite not having all these traits. Mother Teresa comes to mind as someone who did not fit this typecast, yet she had a profound effect upon the world. She did this from a position of genuine humility. She did not worry about the power she lacked; but rather concentrated on the change, however small, she could affect:

“Not all of us can do great things. But we can do small things with great love.”

Mother Teresa

She was literally the antithesis of the ‘Great Man’, but she will be remembered far longer than most of the populist world leaders of today. If leadership is influence, then her legacy proves that she was indeed a great leader.

What makes a good leader?

So, there must be other important and useful leadership attributes. More recent research has identified and used other traits to assess good leaders. Common among these are:

• Personal Integrity
• Drive and Determination
• Emotional Stability or Maturity
• Self-confidence

These are certainly more instructive than earlier traits and I am sure we can all think of a lot more leaders who show a larger measure of these characteristics, as compared to the earlier list. But even with a new list of attributes, one big question is still unanswered.

Are Leaders Born or Bred?

In the middle of the twentieth century, the emphasis shifted from nature (innate) to nurture (learned) aspects of leadership. In other words, people started to believe that leadership could be taught. This put an increasing emphasis on what a leader did, rather than just a person’s supposed God-given right to lead.

This is somewhat unsurprising in the aftermath of the Second World War when so much of the planet had been ravaged by the excesses of ‘Great Men’ such as Hitler. Many others were still suffering under Stalin and Mao. People started to wake up to the idea that a person assuming they were in the right (just because they were in control and claimed some sort of destiny) was a flawed basis for leadership.

From Being to Doing

The emphasis on leadership now turned to the skills that leaders needed to be effective. These were grouped as technical, human and conceptual skills. There was also an appreciation that certain traits can also be developed over time. Experience certainly reinforces the idea that we can improve. This has been my personal experience and the story of my own leadership development over the years.

Integrity

Personal integrity is reinforced every time we act in accordance with what we say. It is the opposite of the ‘do what I say but not what I do’ type of management.

The first real test of integrity for me happened at school. When I was made a prefect, I suddenly had to ensure that my standards of behaviour matched the rules I was there to reinforce. It required self-discipline and moral courage (two more important traits) as I could not just walk past things I knew were wrong, even if it was my friends who were out of line. This concept of ‘you are only as good as the wrong you pass by’ was reinforced in my career in the military. As a leader you have to uphold the values you espouse, or your credibility and authority will crumble.

Determination

You need determination as a leader if you are to persuade people to come with you, overcome obstacles and achieve your goal.

I did not realise it at the time but some of my determination was forged in the outdoors. As I pushed myself to climb mountains or explore jungles, I developed what Angela Lee Duckworth calls ‘grit’. Grit is the dogged determination that you need to see things through in the face of adversity. This grit turns out to be more important than IQ when it comes to succeeding.

And there is the rub. You have to face troubles and hardship if you want to develop grit and determination. So don’t back down from a challenge. Embrace it, even if you fail, you will be stronger – battle-hardened – afterwards. These challenges don’t need to be huge, just anything that pushes you out of your comfort zone.

Emotional Maturity

Have you ever had a boss who everyone tip-toed around? In this situation, the team feels like villagers living under the shadow of a volcano that is always on the verge of eruption. Or how about a manager who cannot read the situation? They make inappropriate jokes, try to be chummy in an important meeting but then authoritarian at the office social. They are impossible to read or predict. This is the opposite of emotional maturity and emotional intelligence.

People who are emotionally mature can manage their emotions in a way that is appropriate to the situation. That does not mean being unemotional though. We are humans, not automatons. Being emotional maturity means we can laugh when people laugh, cry when people cry, but at the same time we are not ruled by our emotions. The emotionally mature person is not the rubber dingy being thrown about by the waves. They are the harbour of calm; an environment where people can be secure in themselves and confident they can work without fear of a sudden storm.

Some parts of emotional stability and intelligence are innate but we can also learn to be more stable and empathetic as leaders. Self-awareness, proper rest, breathing techniques and mindfulness can all help. Over the years I have found that walking is one of my best ways to re-stabilise my thoughts and emotions. I walk to and from work and in between meetings to give me time to reflect and process emotions. It is worth experimenting with a few techniques and finding out what works best for you.

Self-confidence

As alluded to earlier, I am an introvert and was not born with huge self-confidence. My confidence has developed over time. Experience, as with the other traits above, has built my confidence. Somewhat counterintuitively, my self-confidence has grown as I have been more willing to share and learn from my mistakes. That is because humility and confidence are not opposites. Equally, confidence is not arrogance.

One area that many people struggle with, but particularly introverts, is public speaking. Getting up in front of a crowd to do a presentation, or even just to ask a question in a meeting, takes courage. Here once again I have found that with practice, taking on a new mindset and applying a few techniques I have learned to love public speaking.

Leadership development happens one step at a time

Therefore, there is hope for us all. We don’t have to be born a fully-fledged leader. Strengths and weaknesses, in our character and skillset, can all be improved upon. This has certainly been my experience and having been given opportunities to lead, over many years, my confidence and capability as a leader have certainly grown.

How about you? Which characteristic or trait do you most want to develop as a leader? Think of a small practical way you can develop that today. That might be something as small as tackling that task you have been avoiding, having that difficult conversation you have been dodging, or just speaking up in your next meeting.

Practice does not make perfect, but it does make practice easier. If you make that little bit of progress today, the same action will be a little easier tomorrow. You may not have been born a leader, but you can certainly learn to be a better leader than you are now. Make that first step!

Being a leader means being a learner, no matter where we are on our leadership journey. Whether we are a CEO leading a multi-national business, an entrepreneur managing a start-up, or a freelancer just leading ourselves, we all have areas for development. That is why leaders need a growth mindset.

But we cannot improve everything at once so how do we identify where we need the most development as a leader? One of the easiest ways to identify areas for growth is by looking at leadership competencies; the essential skills we need as leaders and managers.

Over the years researchers have come up with extensive lists of leadership skills. We can use these as a guide to thinking about our strengths and weaknesses. Then we can think about whether those areas need personal development (where we need to improve), people to support us, or a process to ensure that work gets done effectively.

My own leadership skill development

I initially trained as a civil engineer. This gave me the technical skills, and some credibility, in early jobs in the military and then leading other engineers and tradespeople in industry. I progressed from engineer to team leader to project manager.

I put effort into developing my human, interpersonal skills, and as I gained further responsibility, my conceptual skills developed too. Being part of a start-up for a few years really helped this area of growth. All this allowed me to take on more general management roles at increasingly senior levels.

As I have developed as a leader and taken roles in senior management those initial technical skills have become less important. Most of my work now has very little to do with engineering as such. I now rely much more on my human and conceptual skills. For example, my work as a leadership coach relies heavily on my interpersonal skills whereas my strategy consulting work is very dependent upon my conceptual skills.

As you can see, my professional career followed quite a classic trajectory. It is a journey through different types and levels of competencies. This sort of progression, and the specific areas of skills, have been well studied and documented.

The essential types of leadership skills

One of the most well-known of these skill development frameworks comes from the research of Robert Katz. He divided leadership skills into 3 primary domains. These were:

• Technical
• Human
• Conceptual

You will notice these categories in my own story but now let’s look at each in more detail.

1. Technical skills

Technical skills relate to the competency and specialist knowledge of a worker or manager. These are primarily the trade skills you need to operate in your profession or industry. This framework recognises that professional knowledge and experience are the primary platforms for leading people at the lower levels of management.

For example, you might be a computer programmer. Over time, as you work and build competence, it is likely that you will be given responsibility for newer programmers. Even if you do not have an official management position, other less experienced programmers will seek you out for your knowledge. In both cases, you now have leadership influence based on your technical skills.

These technical skills are often considered alongside basic business and work skills. Putting these together you get the following list of foundational skills:

• Trade/industry knowledge and experience
• Professional qualifications
• Reading and writing skills
• Verbal communication skills
• Administration
• Budgeting
• Computer, electronic communication, and internet skills

2. Human skills

Technical skills are foundational but if we are going to work in a team then we need to overlay these with human skills. Human skills are the interpersonal skills needed to work effectively with others. These are often referred to a people skills or soft skills.

So, going back to the computer programmer example, having programming skills is not enough to make you an effective manager. You also need to get along with others. You need to learn to understand, communicate with and motivate them. Therefore, alongside the technical skills we can add these human or interpersonal skills:

• Active listening skills
• Speaking and presentation skills
• Negotiation, influence and handling conflict
• Empathy and emotional intelligence
• Coaching and mentoring
• Networking and rapport building
• Team and relationship building
• Identifying talent and people development

3. Conceptual skills

The third layer of leadership skills is conceptual skills. Conceptual skills are the cognitive competencies that give us the ability to develop ideas, solve problems and initiate strategies. These conceptual skills get more important as you gain responsibility and work with ever-larger teams.

As per the former example: if you were a programmer who worked up to become the CEO of a large tech firm, your conceptual skills now become of primary importance. You would be unlikely to spend much time writing code, so your technical skills would now be of secondary or tertiary importance. This is why very senior leaders can move to key positions in industries where they have little or no technical expertise. They are being employed for their conceptual skills.

Here are examples of a leader’s conceptual skills:

• Setting priorities
• Decision making (with understanding of bias, values and ethics)
• Vision setting
• Problem identification and problem solving
• Critical thinking
• Creative thinking
• Organisational change
• Strategic planning
• Financial planning and resource management

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Strengths and weaknesses

When I look at the lists of competencies above, I can quickly see skills that I am either stronger or weaker at. I am sure you can quickly do the same.

So how do we deal with our weaknesses? What is the most effective approach? Should we work more on our strengths or our weaknesses?

This is where we need to be self-aware but also strategic about our own development. We want to maximise our gifts but limit any downsides that could come from areas of weakness. We cannot improve everything at once, so we must prioritise our growth and yet ensure that we are still effective across the broad range of competencies.

To do this we can explore the skill sets, and how to address them, through the 3 Ps of personal growth, people, and process.

Personal Growth

As mentioned previously, leaders need to have a growth mindset. Leadership is a journey of learning and improvement. A lot of this learning is gained through experience but we also need to be proactive about our learning and set development goals.

It would be tempting to dive straight in at this point and start to work on our biggest weakness. But this would be a mistake. We can never be good at everything and that is why we consider people and processes before we go any further.

People

Leaders are nothing without the team. This is true in a very literal sense: a leader is defined by the group they are leading or influencing.

The leader is there for the team, but the team is also there for the leader. The best teams complement each other by bringing a diversity of thought and skill. In this way, as Meredith Belbin has shown, high performing teams embody all the required component parts of a team.

We do not need to excel at everything. This is actually great news. It ensures a leader remains humble and gives opportunities for every team member to contribute and shine.

A good leader can build, shape, and develop the team to ensure the right people are doing the right jobs and that there are strengths to balance out other people’s weaknesses (including their own).

For example, I am not motivated by finance and budgeting. I can budget and manage a cash flow, but I don’t enjoy it. So, I make sure I have people in my teams who can both help me with this and can keep me accountable. These are people with a passion for numbers and an eye for detail. I could spend more time working on this weakness, but I have found it more effective to find others who simply do it better than I ever will.

But what happens if you don’t get to choose your team or if there just aren’t enough people to cover all the bases?

Processes

This is where a process comes in. Put simply, a process is a system that helps people to do things. It is most useful when it is something they don’t do naturally.

For example, keeping things tidy is a strength of mine. Unfortunately, it is not a strength for everyone in my household and therefore we have a process (a shared rota and routine) to ensure that I am not left to fill and empty the dishwasher every time!

The same goes for a business, if there is something that people don’t do well naturally then institute a process. For example, many organisations employ particularly processes to run their meetings. The creation of agendas, actions and minutes support these structures.

But a word of warning: don’t let the process become the driver! The principle or the need should drive any process not the other way around. Bad behaviours creep in when people doggedly keep to a process, not willing to adapt as the situation evolves or the team changes. Build processes and use them as tools but hold them lightly.

Which skill do you most want to develop?

Now that we have identified strengths and weaknesses and considered the options of personal development, people and processes we can ask ourselves the following question: of the list of skills above, which one is the one you most need to develop, and which one do you most need to compensate for?

The first one, the skill to develop, could be a strength that you want to make your superpower or a weaker area that you just can’t ignore. The second skill, the one you need to compensate for, is probably a weakness, one that you have been able to ignore, but it is tripping you up. That is where another person or process could help.

So now set yourself two goals:

1. Skill development: Create a plan for how you are going to develop that first skill. What book, course or coach could help you? Give yourself a score of 1-10 for that skill. What would it take for you to increase your level by 1? Make that your goal.

• Skill Compensation. Find a person or create a process to help you with that. Who do you know who could help? Have you seen a system or tool that can help you? Try working with that person or process for a set time – maybe a week or month – then assess how you are doing.

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I am an introvert. But people often mistake me for an extrovert because I am a leader, confident at public speaking and can be gregarious at gatherings.

The thing is I have learned to be confident and sociable. It did not all come naturally. I am more inclined to listen than to speak, to watch from the back than to step up to the front. I had to teach myself to be more outgoing and self-confident.

And that is an important fact. You can teach yourself to be more outgoing and to actually enjoy presentations and public speaking. I regularly have to speak to large groups of people – often in their hundreds – and I have learned to love it. Yes, you heard me right; love it!

You don’t need to lose your introvert superpowers; embrace them but also draw on extrovert strengths to give yourself an extra boost.

Overcoming stage fright

I first had to grapple with stage-fright in primary school. I was very self-conscious if I was called out in class or had to stand up in front of people. In these situations, I would immediately feel the panic rise and would blush, get confused, or clam up. When it came to the fight, flight or freeze stress response I would be the bunny in the headlights.

But then came The School Play.

I loved playing make-believe and (like any other kid) desperately wanted to be popular. The thought of being in the school play was both alluring and terrifying in equal measure. At this point, I must give full credit to one of my teachers. They had obviously spotted something of this conflicted dynamic in me and they cast me as the crocodile in the school production of Peter Pan.

Enter the crocodile

The crocodile? Surely that is a non-speaking part I hear you think (as an introvert you did not voice your objection out loud). But that was the point. I did not have to remember any words, I just had to play a character. Even better, I was dressed head to toe in a costume that meant that no one could recognise me.

The result was revolutionary. I was free to inhabit the stage and have fun. My stomach still tried to exit my mouth before going on, but the mask was enough to help me push through this and get onto the stage.

Then came the applause. Oh, the applause! As any introvert will know, we are just as much in need of praise as extroverts, if not more so because we are all so darned self-deprecating. The acclaim of an audience was intoxicating. I wanted more.

In terms of changing my habit loop, I had found my new reward. Now all I needed to do was link back the new confident routine to the cue of being in front of a crowd.

I can hear you musing again. You are wondering what the point of all this is. Am I expecting you to dress up as a crocodile for every public engagement?

Engage your alter-ego

The good news is no, you don’t need a crocodile suit every time you are speaking in public. Although come to think of it, it could be fun.

The real point here is that being someone else can be releasing. That is why so many famous actors are introverts. The ranks of the gloriously introverted include Tom Hanks, Harrison Ford, Gwyneth Paltrow and Julia Roberts, to name just a few. As an actor, you can be someone else. Method acting, where you continue to embody a character even when off stage or camera, is the extreme version of this.

Our fear is based on our negative assumptions of ourselves. This is the negative side of introverted humility. But you don’t need to be someone else entirely, you just need to put yourself into a different frame of mind. You need to be the best version of yourself; your mega alter-ego.

Engage your mind

So how do you make the change? You cannot always put on a mask but even getting into certain clothes or having a certain item can help prompt this switch. It is all about associating yourself with the feelings and persona you want to embody. You envision yourself as charming, funny and confident. That envisioning process can be aided by a totemic item, such as a photo of you smiling and exuding confidence. Some actors use a similar device to get into character but it is not essential.

By clearly picturing yourself as that person, on the stage, at the party or wherever your mind will start to build constructive associations. The more senses you can engage in this process – imagining the sights, sounds and affirmative feelings of that moment – the more securely you will anchor yourself to that positive projection of the confident you.

By preparing your mind in this way you are literally prepping the synapses, so they start to fire the right way, for when you step out before the crowd.

Engage your body

Your psychology is hard-wired to your physiology. In other words, what you do with your body affects your frame of mind. Having the right posture and body language can immediately change the way you feel and improve the quality of your public speaking.

Walking confidently towards an audience, looking directly at them with a smile and an open posture will set you off on the right start (even if you are not feeling necessarily confident and happy inside).

By holding our bodies in a certain way and projecting openness and confidence, not only do we reassure the audience, but we also calm ourselves. Simply put, the physical signals from our body start to tell our brain that everything is ok, and you start to overcome the freeze, fight or flight response.

Don’t think like a prey animal faced by a group of predators. When you take the stage, you become the alpha; the animal at the top of the food chain. You pursue them, not the other way around; so, don’t hide behind a lectern!

When you are up on show you want to avoid negative body language and posture. This includes:

• Folding arms (can appear defensive)
• Wringing hands or fidgeting (appears nervous)
• Avoiding eye contact (appears nervous or untrustworthy)
• Not keeping still (appears anxious and projects avoidance)
• Face and eyes downcast (appears unhappy, reduces energy and volume)

This takes practice and self-awareness but there is a simple hack to help start in the right way. I find it really useful and regularly employ the technique before I go in front of an audience. I learned this trick from psychologist Amy Cuddy and found it so helpful that I now teach to the people I coach.

Before I go onto a stage or in front of a crowd, I find somewhere quiet (this is often the restroom) and then look in the mirror and punch my arms into the air in the same way an athlete does when they win a race, or a fan does when their team scores a goal. This is the body language of success. Do this and smile, say ‘yes!’ out loud, and you will immediately transform your frame of mind. Your body language and tone will immediately be better when you step out.

You might need to do it a few times to get over being self-conscious and start to really mean it. While you do it envision that amazing version of yourself and let the transformation begin.

Engage your empathy

Empathy is another superpower of extroverts so use it. When you are in front of a crowd you are already equipped to assess their thoughts and feelings. Use your emotional intelligence to adapt your message, body language and tone, and communicate more effectively.

This does not mean homing in on your negative assumptions of what you think people are feeling. People may be tired, bored, or defensive, but it is very unlikely (especially if you have just stepped up to speak) that you are the cause of this.

Remember, every audience is just made up of people, like you. It does not matter how important or famous they are; they have many of the same cares, worries, fears and challenges as you. You have so much in common.

And you can assist them. You have a unique contribution. Even just by being positive, or being honest about your feelings, you can help them.

The experts at this are professional comedians so I recommend you study them. They know how to gauge the temperature of a room and adapt their routine accordingly. We may not all become stand-up comedians, but this is homework that we can all at least enjoy!

Exit, pursued by a bear

I cannot promise that overnight you are going to turn into Tony Robbins or Michelle Obama. Nor can I promise that you won’t feel awful before having to speak in public. But I can, both from my experience and the wonders of psychology, say that by applying these techniques and principles you can be better at public speaking.

My last bit of advice? As with any skill, start small and practice. Use these techniques before your next family gathering, rather than waiting until your first TED talk.

Public speaking is an art. But apply the science to the art and then your introverted nature will follow.

“This is an art,

Which does mend nature, change it rather, but,

The art itself is nature.”

Shakespeare, A Winter’s Tale

I looked around the room. Various factions sat apart and determinedly avoided eye contact with each other. The whole group glowered with distrust. Somehow, in a matter of days, I would have to take this bunch of misfits and develop them into a team. Success was critical. We were about to deploy on a military operation where, if we could not work together, we faced not only the failure of our mission but also our own physical wellbeing.

I am sure you can empathise. Whether you are a leader or have been a member of a newly formed team, I am sure you can recall similar scenes. Experience tells us that a bunch of people is not a team. It is just that, a group of random individuals. But we also know that teams are vitally important. They help us achieve what we could not do alone. So, how does a group of individuals develop into a team and how can we help manage that process?

What is team development and why is it important?

Research has shown that a group must progress through certain development stages to become a high performing team. A leader is responsible for managing this process, but it is one that affects us all, no matter our role.

The process of development is also continual. Our situation changes, as do the challenges we face. The people in our teams come and go. Sometimes things just seem to go wrong, and a team becomes dysfunctional. Therefore, team performance needs continual management.

We are all responsible for this management, to some degree, as we are all members of teams. That could be a work team, sports squad, music band or just your family. Structures, locations, and purposes of groupings may vary but they are still teams if they share a common goal. That is what defines a team: people with varying roles but a common purpose.

Whether we are officially leading that group we can make an important contribution to team development. And that is not just in playing our team role effectively. Through understanding team development, we can all help our teams become more effective.

A career of managing team development

I started off my career as a Bomb Disposal Officer in the Army, working in situations where working together as a team was potentially a life or death matter. Creating and maintaining high-performing teams really mattered.

Since then, as a senior manager, then consultant and leadership coach, I have worked within and alongside organisations in the commercial, governmental, and voluntary sectors. In each role I have equipped teams with the skills they need to be more effective in working together and managed the development of the team as well as the roles of the individuals within that team. I will share some specific examples of these as we progress.

How to build a strong team

Team building is not reliant on away days and fun activities. These things are great but are not the foundation of team development. You can build a successful team in the harshest of environments if you understand the fundamentals of team roles and development.

A well-functioning team is dependent upon good leadership. If a team is failing in some way, then the manager must shoulder the bulk of the blame and take responsibility for finding a solution. But that does not let team members off the hook. Any individual can make things better (and they certainly can make things worse) for the rest of the team at any stage in its development.

“Coming together is a beginning. Keeping together is progress. Working together is success.”

Henry Ford

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The Stages of Team Development

So, what are the stages of team development?

A group needs to evolve through certain steps to become an effective team. The most well-known (and memorable) theoretical model of this development process is the Tuckman Model.

Bruce Tuckman did research that demonstrated that every team goes through various stages. He first identified four stages and then, upon further research, amended this to five stages of team development.

The 5 stages of team development:

1. Forming
2. Storming
3. Norming
4. Performing
5. Adjourning

A manager can do things to speed the process through these steps to the performing stage. It is especially important to get through the painful storming phase, but you cannot completely short circuit the system to get straight to performance. There has to be some pain to get to the gain.

Tuckman Model

Forming

Going back to the story I started with. As the group sat in that room on the first day, we were in the forming stage. Fortunately, we had a clear mission statement, and I knew we had lots of quality people. But given the dark-cloudy looks I was getting I knew that the storming stage would soon be upon us.

Storming

Therefore, right from the start, I forced the issue of integration. I immediately re-structured the group into smaller cross-functional teams that broke down the various cliques. They would have to learn together and learn to rely on one another from the start. The storming phase could commence – as people worked out their exact roles, preferences, and approaches – and the intense work gave them focus. The enemy was now the challenge rather than other team members.

Norming

If these smaller teams still struggled it was easier to identify the problem. Team dynamics and individual characteristics were easy to identify. In a couple of cases, I moved people around until we reached the norming phase.

Performing

I would love to say we were in the performing stage before we deployed but that would not be strictly true. We finished our training and were able to operate but it was some time into the task before I would have called us a high performing team. We had been effective to a degree until that point but there was a moment where we got into a flow. We were not just getting work done, we were being creative, teams worked fluidly and independently, and results were exponential. This was high performance.

Adjourning

Sadly, all things come to an end. At the end of our tour of duty we handed over to another team and we went into the adjourning stage. We celebrated our success, shared our experience, and went off to join other teams.

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How to manage progress through the team development stages

It is useful to know these steps because it helps, particularly as the leader, to identify what stage of development your team is at. But just knowing which stage does not necessarily equip us to manage the team progression.

Being properly equipped is often down to knowing the right questions to ask. As a leader, I am constantly asking questions or myself, my situation and my team. Therefore, I have found another theoretical process, the Drexler-Sibbet model of Team Performance, a really helpful complement to the Tuckman model.

The Drexler-Sibbet model poses a set of questions that a team needs to work through to progress through each level of performance. In this model, there are seven (rather than five) stages of progression. The stages and questions are as follows:

1. Orientation: Why am I here?
2. Trust Building: Who are you?
3. Goal Clarification: What are we doing?
4. Commitment: How will we do it?
5. Implementation: Who does what, when, where?
6. High Performance: Wow!
7. Renewal: Why continue?

Let’s use another example to highlight the different stages and questions. Another very different and yet equally challenging management role I had was leading a large group of volunteers for a non-profit organisation. I did not have any of the levers of military rank, money, or contract to make people work together or at all.

Drexler-Sibbet Model of Team Development

Orientation: Why am I here?

This question needed to be answered even to just recruit volunteers. The good news is that most people want to make a difference. What a good leader does is cast vision and link people’s values to that purpose.

My team was responsible for production; the setting up and running of large events. There were plenty of people supporting the organisation, my challenge was to link those individuals who enjoyed that sort of physical work and show them that they could contribute to achieving the overall mission by serving on my team.

Trust Building: Who are you?

Trust is the foundation of any relationship. The way to kick-start any relationship is by quickly building rapport. People do start to get to know each other as they work together but this is where I find creating opportunities to socialise really fast-forward this stage.

These can be as simple as water-cooler moments or coffee breaks where people can chat. For my team, we found that in what was a long hard day of work, eating together at lunch really helped team building and fostering inter-team relationships.

Goal Clarification: What are we doing?

The next step is to turn the vision into a tangible mission or goal. A leader’s responsibility is to articulate this end-state or success criteria.

With my production team, the mission was to set up, manage and then set down all the equipment in order to enable a successful event. The events supported the overall purpose of the organisation so in this way, I could link the what to the why.

Commitment: How will we do it?

Then you need to work out how to achieve the mission. In other words, you need a plan. This is breaking down the overall goal into smaller tasks and activities.

In my case, we systematically took each bit of equipment we needed to set up and worked out an overall sequence (effectively a project programme) and then worked out an efficient process for each individual task. The team played a significant role in this last part. They used their creativity and experience to find the best ways to do things; I then captured and managed the activities.

Implementation: Who does what, when, where?

This question of who links the individuals to the plan. Answering the who question is about delegating tasks and roles according to skill, preference, and experience. For working out roles within a team I have found the Belbin Team Roles model the most useful and comprehensive.

As my team grew the crew leaders took on more of this responsibility of working out the who. They knew the plan and they knew their people best. They also knew how to take on new recruits and train them up.

High Performance: Wow!

The only part of this model that I dislike is the ‘wow’ instead of a question for performing teams. It can give the impression that once you get there all you need to do is just exclaim “wow!” and watch the magic happen.

But in my experience, what great teams do that keeps them at the top and maximising their performance is continual learning and improvement.

Therefore, there are some questions that teams should remember at this stage and these are the ones related to continued learning. I use a simple model based on traffic lights for this. I ask:

• Stop – What do we stop?
• Start – What do we start?
• Continue – What do we continue?

I would reflect on these questions at the end of every event. I would discuss these with my crew leaders and they, in turn, did so with their crews. In this way, we created an environment of continual learning and empowered everyone in the team to challenge and improve performance.

Team performance review process

Renewal: Why continue?

If the vision (why) and mission (what) remain the same, then things can generally continue. But projects end and team members come and go as a normal process of life. Therefore, we always need to answer this question, which as you will notice, takes us full circle.

With my production team, every new event was a small renewal and an opportunity to reinforce the why. So, we met at the beginning of the day to remind ourselves of how our actions would contribute to something much bigger.

The team grew and changed. When people joined our team, we made them part of the family. When people left, we grieved but also celebrated what they had done and shared their excitement for what they were moving on to. We made the process as natural and positive as possible. We ate a lot of cake along the way!

As a leader, when a team is functioning well, it is often easy to neglect the continued answering of this question. But you do so at your peril. Hard work is hard work. It makes people ask, “why bother?” Leaders need to reinforce the vision to stop people from becoming disillusioned.

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Combining team development theories for effective management

To bring all this theory together I have put the two models side by side in the picture below. The colours show how the 5 stages of the Tuckman model relate to the 7 stages of the Drexler-Sibbet model.

The Tuckman and Drexler-Sibbet Models combined

 

Putting team development theory into practice

Hopefully, you are now clear on the stages of team development and the questions that need to be answered to manage the building of a team from a group of individuals to a high-performance team.

Remember too that all teams experience change. That change might be faster or slower depending on the circumstances but that is why teams need continual leadership. Without this management, a team can get stuck, or even worse, can regress back through the development process.

Finally, remember that we all have a part to play, leaders or not. By understanding the stages of team development, we can all help our teams to improve, whatever our role or the purpose of that group.

So, think about the teams you are a part of. What stage are they in? Is it forming, storming, norming, performing or adjourning? Which question do you need to answer to help them evolve?

The rope snaked out in front of me, linking me to my three climbing buddies. I could see each one, in turn, slowly progressing up the ridge. The problem was that they were getting harder to see. The lead climber was beginning to face into the mist as she scaled higher up the peak. It was getting darker too. Not a good sign.

We had started our Alpine climb in the sunshine but had been scrambling up the ridge for hours. While we had been edging up the rock, ominous clouds were forming on the far side of the mountain. Now, as we neared the peak, we were ambushed.

When you look at a cloud from afar it is a giant cotton ball, majestically suspended in the air, silent and ethereal. But climb into a Cumulonimbus and the experience is very different. Clouds become loud, scary and very tangible.

Within seconds of summiting, we were in a gale and had to huddle together to communicate. Rain and hail started to pummel us and, just when we thought things could not get any worse, lightning struck a nearby peak. The air crackled and spat. We were in trouble.

We had conquered the climb, but the mountain was reminding us that it did not consider itself subdued as a result. It was time to beat a hasty retreat. But the strangest thing had happened. The person who had been leading all the way up the mountain just froze. When the thunder sounded, they just stood there, wide-eyed, and did not say anything. Instead, for some reason, everyone was looking at me.

Fight, Flight or Freeze

The fight, flight or freeze response is a natural psychological reaction to a threat. It is hardwired in for good reason. As with our cousins in the animal kingdom, this response can often save our lives.

But it does not always work, and we can all react differently. The leader had frozen, but when leading, you cannot afford to just react. You must think too. You have to engage in the decision space, the opportunity that lies between stimulus and response.

“Between stimulus and response, there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”

Victor Frankl

In our case, we actually did need to flee, but we also needed to go together and safely. This would require leadership.

Something within me grasped all of this, even if just as at a subconscious decision-making level. And so, I had started taking command. I shouted my hasty plan as we gripped the rock and tasked the team to sort their kit quickly. I looked everyone in the eye, made sure we were good, then led the way off the peak and down the mountain.

Within an hour we were out of danger. Within two we were back in beautiful sunshine. No one thought that what had happened within our team was in any way strange. We trusted each other, we shared roles and responsibility. But what had just happened?

The situational leadership model and how it can help

To be a good leader you need to know how to vary your leadership style depending upon the circumstances. Leading in a crisis requires a different approach to managing everyday circumstances.

On that day I was climbing with an experienced team. But when managing someone inexperienced they will require more support than other team members.

Therefore, as a leader, you need to adapt your style accordingly. This is called situational leadership. Paul Hersey and Ken Blanchard developed the most well-known model for situational leadership. This model helps to show the most appropriate form of leadership, depending upon the nature of the task and the competency and commitment of the team. In simple terms it breaks down into four key leadership styles; directive, delegating, supporting and coaching.

“We can’t always control what happens in our lives — things will go well, things will go poorly — but what we can control is our response to those events.”

Kenneth Blanchard

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Directing

Directing is telling people what to do. This is usually used for enthusiastic novices or when in a crisis. This command style is suitable for critical problems.

When things went wrong on the mountain this was the approach I had to adopt. This is certainly not my normal and preferred way of working. In my experience, if a leader uses this style the whole time or out of context then it can be overbearing, condescending or both.

“When placed in command, take charge.”

Norman Schwarzkopf

Delegating

Delegating is giving over whole tasks to people who are experienced and able to take responsibility. This is a more hands-off leadership approach used with competent team members.

On the mountain, as soon as I had taken command, I started to delegate tasks. I did have a competent team; they were just in shock and the previous leader was exhausted. As soon as I gave out tasks the team started to break out of the stupor. Their experience broke through as they went into action and became themselves again.

“Surround yourself with the best people you can find, delegate authority, and don’t interfere as long as the policy you’ve decided upon is being carried out.”

Ronald Reagan

Supporting

This style suits when there is a high level of trust in the team and individuals can manage themselves independently. But the leader employing this style has higher participation than in pure delegation, by providing moral support, encouraging and communicating proactively.

For most of the climb, we had been in this situation. The leader knew that we could manage ourselves, but she had worked hard to support the team. This was the right approach but meant she was very tired when the storm broke.

“A leader is great not because of his or her power, but because of his or her ability to empower others.”

John Maxwell

Coaching

In this context, coaching involves selling the task to the individual and helping them grow to take on more responsibility. This works particularly well with individuals who may have lost confidence in what they need to do.

I had to use this approach with the person who had been leading. We had previously relied on her energy and enthusiasm up until we reached the summit. They were now exhausted, a little shell-shocked and probably embarrassed that they had frozen. I was able to share small tasks and responsibilities with her as we started to enact the plan. In this way, she quickly recovered her confidence and came alive again.

“A good leader inspires people to have confidence in the leader; a great leader inspires people to have confidence in themselves.”

Eleanor Roosevelt

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Team member development and maturity levels

On my climb that day we were all of a similar experience and so picking the right style for the situation was the most important thing. But as well as the leadership styles we also need to consider the development levels that relate to the maturity and capability of the team members. These progress from the low end of maturity and development (for example, a new worker who has just joined the firm), to the expert level, where the person is highly capable to deal with the task.

It is important to remember that someone could be very experienced in some areas but, faced with a new task, they could find themselves out of their depth. Equally, the new joiner might have expertise that long-term team members are lacking. Therefore, as a manager, it is important to think about someone’s ability to do the specific task and how to lead them in that situation rather than just assume a default approach based on the time in a given job.

This applies no matter how senior we get. I have worked with entrepreneur CEOs who are incredibly experienced and gifted but who have required coaching support as their roles and organisations have evolved. It is an important lesson in humility for all leaders as well as team members. It does not matter how capable we are (or think we are), there will always be times where we are learners and need people to support us.

To be a leader is to be flexible in style

We all have our preferred leadership style. For me, I prefer a more non-directive approach to leading. I like to put trust in my team and support them to achieve the result rather than just telling them what to do. But I can’t always lead that way.

The best leaders are not stuck in one mode of management all the time. Fortunately, the situational leadership model can help us identify the times when we need to adapt our approach. It might be the external circumstances that prompt the change, or it could be the experience level of a team member; the important thing is to be aware of the changes in your situation so you are ready to adapt as a leader.

“Effective leaders need to be flexible, and must adapt themselves according to the situation.”

Paul Hersey and Kenneth Blanchard

Think about your team and their tasks today. As a manager, do you need to direct, delegate, support, or coach them through their next piece of work?