The Nose and Mouth of a Leader

These parts are all aspects of a whole body of skills. Skills are like muscles. If you exercise them, they get stronger. If you neglect them, they atrophy. The article offers an overview of the skills and questions that can be used to generate discussion among leaders. Questions are powerful tools for learning and dialogue. The series covers all of the below body parts. This article looks at the Nose and Mouth of a Leader.

Eyes:See the vision; see the future in the present

Ears: Listen carefully to what the needs are, and act

Nose: Sniff out opportunities, build relationships

Mouth: Your organizations voice, communication

Neck: Don't be a stiff neck, be flexible

Heart: Value driven mission

Shoulders: Bear the responsibility, coping

Brain:Thinking clearly, thinking strategically

Hands: Be a servant leader

Legs: Walk the talk, be congruent

Stomach: Guts, courage, risk taking

Nose

Are you a good 'sniffer' of opportunities? An excellent leader stays abreast of all opportunities for service for the organization. You cannot be a good 'sniffer' of opportunities without being an excellent relationship builder. The real skill behind having a good nose for opportunities is to have cultivated the right relationships to be invited to the table for opportunities. Relationships are built on trust. We trust those who behave consistently to what they say they will do. If you were to make a list of those whom you trust, I'm sure they would be people who you can count on to do what you ask them to do.

The Power to Persuade, by Richard Haas uses a compass as a model to show the need to build relationships: North- with your bosses, South- with your subordinates, East- with those within the organization with whom you need cooperation, but, they do not report to you, West, with those with you work outside of the organization, and Center, with your clients. Even though each of these populations has unique needs and agendas, the relationship building strategies are similar. Get to know what they want and need, and help them get their needs met. Then, they will be more likely to help you get your needs met.

Relationships are built on favor banks. Banks work like this: You put money in, and then you can take money out. You can't take out more money than you put in. Relationships begin with an initial investment. It is always wise for you to make the first installment. Maybe it's a favor, or a random act of kindness. There is a natural give and take in relationships. If you have just given me a favor, then, I will feel more inclined to extend a favor in return.

If you want to know all of the opportunities that there are available for your organization, then it is critically important that you build relationships with all the people who may have the information about those opportunities. Examples of sources of information include people connected to: professional associations, funders, benefactors, clients, consumers, colleagues, politicians, researchers, trade or membership organizations etc.

Here are some key questions for you to consider:

1. Who are the key people that have information about program or service opportunities for my organization?

2. Do I have a strong and healthy relationship with all of these people?

3. If not, what can I do today that will help me gain or improve these relationships?

Mouth

What is the voice of your organization? Do you really know what messages you are sending to those outside your organization? You are communicating organizational messages, whether you realize it or not. I remember a professor in my undergraduate school said once; "You cannot, not communicate. Even when you are dead, you are communicating deadness."

I have never met an organization that could not benefit from improvement in their organizational communication. The issue of communication is really two-fold. What are the messages you are sending to the outside world? And, What are the messages you are sending internally? To both of these questions, I would also ask; are these the messages that you really want to be sending?

Your personal communication style can impact your effectiveness as a leader. If you are approachable, honest, and friendly, your messages will be more easily received. If your style is rough, critical and unfriendly, you will have a harder time getting the best of ideas across. The first step to improvement is self-consciousness. Do you know how you come across to others? Do you have the courage to ask?

Having strong communication structures is often overlooked in many organizations. Communicating a message to the top level of management in your organization does not automatically mean that the message will trickle down to all those who need to hear it. In fact, if the message is bad news, or is connected to a change, you can bet, that the message will bottleneck with the top leadership. Why? Because, no one wants to be the bearer of bad news. Tough messages need to be sent by courageous leaders, those who realize that taking lumps is part of the job description of a leader. The worse the news or the bigger the change, the more the message should be sent by the top leader.

Your meetings can be effective tools for two-way communication if they are carefully designed to be. If you were to ask the staff to list the characteristics of an excellent meeting, they would create a comprehensive list that would include things such as: well planned agenda, decisions are made, we have input in the decisions, people come prepared, people follow through with their commitments. If you asked them if they came up with this list because this is their most common experience of meetings, they will probably tell you that it is the opposite of their experience. You can use the staff's time in meetings to reinforce messages, get feedback, reactions, or just let them work through tough organizational issues. Time that is built into your meetings for these purposes will be an investment that will lead to strength and growth. Building in questions that promote dialogue about organizational issues into each important meeting is one easy way to get on the same page about key messages.

Assess your organizational communication:

1. What are the key organizational messages or themes that you want to communicate to our staff, clients, consumers, and providers?

2. Do you have the correct communication structures in place? Do you employ the right method for the message?

3. What strategies can you incorporate to improve our organizational communication?

Check out Part 3; where we will address the Neck and Heart of a Leader.

I hope that this series has been a helpful filter for you as you examine your strengths and weaknesses as a leader. If you didn't catch the rest of the articles, here is a brief overview of what they covered:

Part 1: The Eyes and Ears of a Leader
Part 2: The Nose and Mouth of a Leader
Part 3: The Neck and Heart of a Leader
Part 4: The Shoulders and Brain of a Leader
Part 5: The Hands, Legs and Stomach of a Leader