Marsha Acker

Why You Should Consider Building Your Own Model of Leadership in 2023

Build Your Model of Leadership in 2023

Leadership is a constantly evolving concept. Hello, pandemic. Hello, quiet quitting. Hello, remote workforce. Hello, hybrid workforce. Hello, 2023!

It is more important now than ever to have a clear and personal understanding of what leadership means to you, your team, and your organization!

The world as we knew it has forever changed and continues to change rapidly. Organizations are facing new challenges and opportunities. Employees who previously came into the office demand to stay and work from home. Others want a more flexible, hybrid schedule. Companies are experiencing trouble with retaining talent, and many, particularly in the tech space, have had to announce massive layoffs due to restructuring.

In this context of constant change, the traditional models of leadership are becoming increasingly obsolete. To be an effective leader in 2023, you need to build your own model of leadership that is aligned with your values, goals, and the reality of your organization and your team. You need to build your own model for leading change to catalyze clarity and confidence in leading yourself and others!

Let’s explore the many reasons why building your own model of leadership is essential in 2023 and how to go about it.

What Exactly is a Leadership Model?

A leadership model is a framework that outlines the key principles and practices of effective leadership.

It provides a roadmap for leaders to follow, helping them to understand their role, set clear goals, and make effective decisions. A leadership model can take many forms, from a set of core values to a detailed action plan. It can be based on a particular leadership style, such as transformational or democratic leadership, or it can be a unique combination of different approaches.

The key is that a leadership model should be tailored to the specific needs of the leader and the organization or team they are leading. It should be a living and flexible document that can adapt to the changing environment and the unique challenges that arise.

What Can a Leadership Model Do For You?

A leadership model can provide a number of benefits for you, the leader.

Key advantages include:

Clarity: A leadership model can provide a clear and concise understanding of what leadership means to you and what you want to achieve. It can help you to set specific and measurable goals, and to align your actions with your values and vision.
Direction: A leadership model can provide a roadmap for your leadership journey. It can help you to navigate complex situations, to make effective decisions, and to lead with purpose and direction.
Flexibility: A leadership model can be tailored to the specific needs of the leader and the organization they are leading. It can be a living and flexible document that can adapt to the changing environment and the unique challenges that arise.
Personal Development: A leadership model can serve as a tool for personal development. It can help you to identify areas for improvement, measure your progress, and continuously develop your leadership skills.
Inspiration: A leadership model can serve as a source of inspiration and motivation. It can remind you of your purpose, of your goals, and of the positive impact you can have on your team and organization.

What Can a Leadership Model Do For Your Team?

A leadership model can also provide benefits for a leader’s team.

Key team advantages include:

Alignment: A leadership model can align the actions and goals of the leader with those of the team. It can create a shared understanding of the organization’s vision, values, and objectives, and foster a sense of common purpose.
Clarity: A leadership model can provide clear expectations and guidelines for team members, which can help to improve communication and collaboration.
Empowerment: A leadership model can empower team members to take ownership of their roles and responsibilities and to make decisions that are in line with the organization’s goals.
Trust: A leadership model can build trust within the team. It can demonstrate the leader’s commitment to ethical and transparent behavior, and create a positive and respectful work culture.
Development: A leadership model can also serve as a tool for team development. It can help to identify areas for improvement, measure progress, and continuously develop the team’s skills and capabilities.
Cohesion: A leadership model can build cohesion and teamwork, by providing a shared vision and values to the team, allowing them to work together with a common purpose.

Are You Ready to Build Your Own Model of Leadership?

Let’s do this!

My NEW BOOK “Build Your Model for Leading Change” will be published and available on Amazon.com starting Feb. 22, 2023. It’s the perfect tool for those leaders who are ready to lead change in their organization.

You can also preorder the book on our own website.

3 Ways You Can Help Increase Collective Team Performance

As a leader or an Agile leader, you are part of a fast-paced and dynamic work environment. As the leader, is team performance a critical measurement of your overall success? We think so!

In addition to your success as a leader, stakeholders want to see a continued increase in team performance, because… let’s be honest, who wouldn’t want to? If you are the leader of an agile team, may I assume that collaboration, flexibility, and continuous feedback are already fostered on a daily basis? How then can you influence and contribute to an increase in collective team performance?

In this article, we will explore three key strategies that you can implement that will increase collective team performance, including clear communication, team collaboration, and continuous improvement.

These approaches help leaders like you build high-performing teams that are capable of delivering exceptional results in a rapidly changing world. We know this to be true because we train people like you in our workshops and cohorts to be better team facilitators, better communicators, and better leaders.

Improve Collective Team Performance with Clear Communication

Clear communication is essential for improving collective team performance in any team environment. Agile principles emphasize the importance of collaboration and open communication between team members, as well as between the team and stakeholders. As a leader, you can promote clear communication by establishing a company culture of transparency, encouraging active listening, and promoting open and honest feedback.

By using tools such as:

daily stand-up meetings
team retrospectives
regular check-ins

leaders can help ensure that everyone is on the same page and working towards a common goal.

By not only promoting but modeling clear communication yourself, you build trust and alignment within your team. To start, have ‘thinking together’ conversations.

Improve Collective Team Performance with Collaboration

Collaboration and team building activities are two ways to improve team performance and go hand in hand. As the leader of any team, it’s of the utmost importance to organize team-building activities, consistently encourage collaboration within the team, and create a space for planned idea-sharing times. In other words, create a positive, safe, supportive work environment, aka an inclusive work culture.

In addition, fostering regular and clear communication between teams and stakeholders can help to build trust and alignment all around, leading to more effective and efficient decision-making.

By prioritizing collaboration along with clear communication, leaders can help to drive innovation and creativity, and increase overall team performance.

Improve Collective Team Performance with Continuous Improvement

After clear communication and collaboration, continuous improvement is the third key aspect of leadership and a key factor in improving collective team performance. By embracing a growth mindset and continuously seeking ways to optimize processes and workflows, teams can stay ahead of the curve and continuously improve their performance.

As the team leader, you promote continuous improvement by encouraging the following within your team.

Experimentation
Providing opportunities for skill development
Fostering a culture of learning

Leaders who help their teams stay adaptable, innovative, and always striving for excellence have some of the best-performing teams and a high rate of employee retention and satisfaction, too!

Are You Unintentionally Hindering Team Performance?

You *might* be the culprit and hindering your own team’s performance. Do you want to find out if your team is underperforming partly because of your leadership?

Read this article about team collaboration at its best and worst. TeamCatapult helps leaders like you (and teams like yours) increase their performance. Curious about what that looks like?

Start here.

How Interrupting a Pattern of Behavior Helps Conversation Flow!

Conversations are an essential part of our daily lives, and they play a crucial role in building and maintaining relationships. However, sometimes conversations can become stagnant, and the flow can be interrupted by patterns of behavior that prevent open and honest communication.

Whether it’s the tendency to interrupt, dominate the conversation, or avoid certain topics, these patterns of behavior can create barriers to effective communication.

The Case Study: Setting the Stage

In this story, the leader of an organization recognizes that the current approach to a reorganization is not working and is causing resistance and opposition among his team. He decides to try something different and interrupts the pattern by taking a break and listening to the team’s concerns.

This shift in approach leads to a more productive conversation and a greater willingness among the team to engage in co-creating solutions to their challenges. The leader’s actions demonstrate the power of suspending one’s own point of view and actively listening to others in order to create the conditions for change to occur.

The Story Starts Here: Leading a Reorganization

There once was a leader who was leading a re-org in his organization. He had been working with me for a while as part of the organization’s transformation process because he recognized that there were a lot of entrenched behaviors — including his own — that needed to shift if the re-org was going to be successful.

Then, one day, he was in a meeting that was going in the exact same direction as meetings had been going for weeks: it was heated and he was on the defense team. He was caught in a familiar pattern of explaining, justifying, and trying to convince others of his perspective and help them to see his viewpoint of why the reorganization was needed.

Recognizing a Pattern of Behavior

But on this day, in the heat of the moment, he had a moment of noticing. First, he noticed that he was in a familiar pattern. Then he noticed that the pattern was him digging in his heels, defending his point of view, and getting into a heated debate with his team.

This was his aha! moment.

He then decided to move through the steps of the “pattern interrupt” he’d been practicing with me in coaching sessions.

First, he called for a brief break and he got up and took a walk around the building. Then, when they reconvened, he sat down and acknowledged that he was defending what he believed to be right. And then he voiced his decision to shift into the mode of curiosity.

He shared with the team that he was going to listen. He was actually going to pause his active participation in the meeting so that he could really listen to what they were saying.

He moved to the back of the room, and he asked them to resume the conversation they were having previously about their concerns. The team began to talk with one another again, sharing the risk they saw, the personal impact this org change would have, and the individual fears that everyone shared. They also talked about the deep pain and frustration they had been experiencing because they felt like none of their concerns had been heard even after multiple weeks of trying to share them.

The Power of Pausing and Listening to Interrupt a Pattern of Behavior

After 45 minutes of listening, the leader re-joined the conversation and shared what he had heard. For him, it had been deeply moving and it radically shifted his understanding of what was happening to them. They weren’t just resisting his viewpoint, they were feeling totally unheard in their viewpoint. So, he apologized for the impact he had been having on the team, acknowledged the hurt and pain, and shared how he totally saw what they were seeing now.

When he finished sharing his experience of listening to them – one by one each leader leaned into the conversation and said ‘I’m in, let’s do this…’

A Defining Moment of Leadership

The executive would later share with me that it was the most profound moment of his leadership and that he didn’t really understand what he had done.

Here’s what I told him happened. You suspended your point of view long enough to hear their perspective and experience. By doing this, you brought the real conversation in the room – it actually wasn’t an opposition to the re-org as much as it was opposition to not having their concerns addressed.

By the leader’s action, people felt seen and heard, and were ready to engage in co-creating solutions to some of their challenges instead of resisting and blocking the change.

Creating Space for Change to Occur

This is the power of the conversation. It had created the space for change to occur, it helped people feel seen and heard so that they could buy-in to the change.

There had been a pattern established by the leader resisting their perspectives. He was advocating rather than inquiring — defending rather than suspending. As a result, the concerns of the group continued to persist in the form of roadblocks and opposition. And what you resist ALWAYS persists.

Once this leader had shifted the course of the conversation by starting to inquire more, when he recognized that it was time to stop resisting, …something new happened.

By creating the conditions for change to really happen, he was able to lead the change within his organization in a radically different and more effective way.

When You Are Stuck, Try Interrupting Your Pattern of Behavior!

Interrupting patterns of behavior is a powerful tool for improving the flow of conversation and enhancing the overall quality of our interactions with others.

Next time you find yourself stuck in a conversation or relationship that is not flowing well, try interrupting your pattern of behavior.

This can be as simple as taking a pause by stepping away, changing the subject, or listening more actively. By interrupting these patterns, we can create new opportunities for growth and connection with others.

Remember, effective communication is not about being perfect, it’s about being open and willing to make changes when necessary.

Are You Limiting Your Team’s Ability to Make Important Decisions?

Making important decisions is a crucial part of running a successful business. However, many managers unknowingly limit their team’s ability to make these decisions, which can have a significant impact on the overall success of the company.

Whether it’s through micromanaging, lack of communication, or a lack of trust, there are several ways managers can unintentionally stifle their team’s decision-making abilities.

The Leadership Team That Couldn’t Make Decisions

In this case study, the hired consultant realized that her focus on process-oriented conversations was limiting the team’s ability to make important decisions.

She realized that people need space to talk about how changes will impact them personally, and that ignoring these personal factors can create roadblocks to success. She has since devoted her career to helping teams create space for these types of conversations and addressing the personal impact of change.

Setting the Stage: My Experience and Point of View

At the time, I was an experienced consultant and leader, with two degrees in software engineering and ten years of experience working with companies to help bridge the gap between end users and developers. I was about 3 years into a slightly new career of working with teams in large-scale transformations. Being the seasoned techie and ‘process chick’ that I am, I was prepared to come in and help this organization reach their desired change – and I knew just how to do it: with re-engineered processes and new tools!

I’m sure no one else has ever entered a team with all the answers but here I was… convinced that I could help them do this “the right way” and it was too focused on process.

An Executive Team and Difficult Decisions

Then one day, I was sitting in a room with the executive team I’d been working with for about nine months. We were in the deep end of the pool. They were making one of the most difficult decisions of their careers – to fundamentally re-organize – not just positions but departments and workflow. It included major geographical relocations for virtually everyone in the company and collectively rethinking everything. It was big.

So far, my approach had been to give people space to talk about the process of the transformation: the business decisions, the data analysis, cost analysis, and defining the scope of the transformation.

But at the crux of this particular conversation — the conversation that changed everything for me — the leaders were being asked to weigh-in on a decision that would impact them both professionally and personally.

They were torn between making a decision that could result in them either losing their job or having to uproot their families and employees. There was arguing, tears, anguish, strife and ultimately a stale-mate.

They simply could not reach a consensus on the future.

The Aha Moment That Changed Everything

This is when I had one of the biggest aha’s! of my entire career. We had spent so much of our time focusing on the process that we had not created space for people to talk about how this massive transformation would actually impact them.

We were re-engineering processes, identifying desired outcomes, and collecting data, but nowhere had anyone done the “dangerous” thing – of asking how people felt – either as individuals or as a group. They were being asked to “check their personal baggage at the door” and yet have a conversation that had a radical impact on them and their teams personally.

They were being asked to transform everything about their professional landscape, including their job functions, their rank in the organization AND where they would be living – and we’d never asked the question about how it would impact them personally!

Probably not too unlike being a project manager and one day being told you’re now an agile coach, moving from managing tasks to leading change.

And oh by the way, you’re in charge of figuring out what that really means.

Or executives that are told to be agile but also meet the quarterly financial returns. And they get lost in what feels like a dichotomy of figuring out how exactly to be agile and meet unrealistic goals.

It can be a complete identity change.

My Career Changed By Talking About the Scary Things!

This experience with this executive team haunted me. It has become my origin story — the basis for everything I have devoted my career to for the last 25 years. I had seen in no uncertain terms the limits of relying on process-focused conversations. And time after time since then, I’ve seen that it’s the things people feel like they can’t talk about that become the roadblocks.

In this team, it was a strictly business and numbers conversation that was not giving space for the personal impact conversation that held them back from making a final decision.

How to Overcome the Roadblocks

I have also worked with a team where the leader would pull people aside after meetings to give them feedback about needing to have better-informed answers in the next meeting. And he was not the least bit curious about what might be the reason the person did not have a solid answer in the first place.

And then there was the department that continues to re-org in an effort to improve performance but does not talk about what’s really impacting performance in the first place.

Just think for a moment, where might you be experiencing a scenario where there is something in the conversation that is not okay for you to talk about. You might even make a note as we go through today about where familiarity comes up for you. These are places I would invite you to come back to and think about — these are the places where there are roadblocks, and this is where to start overcoming the roadblocks.

These kinds of roadblocks come up when there is a tendency to defend our assumptions and perspectives. To assume we’re right. And to either not ask questions of what other people think, or to not share our perspective when we think the other person doesn’t want to hear it.

This I Know To Be True About Making Important Decisions as a Team

For me, I vowed at that moment that anytime I led change in the future it would be from the perspective of helping people talk about the things they didn’t think they could talk about or were scared to bring into the room.

And these two things I know now to be true:

Change cannot happen until people feel seen and heard
What you resist persists.

How hard is it for you to talk about the things that scare you? Are you allowing your team to bring scary things into the room?

All along, it might have been you who is limiting your team’s ability to make important decisions!

Are you ready to make a change?

~ Marsha

Why Agile Team Facilitation is an Important Leadership Skill

…are leaders facilitators, or are facilitators leaders?

Facilitation is a skill best learned and improved through practical experience as a facilitator. A deep understanding of Agile Team Facilitation coupled with practical experience is the way to gain confidence and competency in Agile Team Facilitation.

Four Reasons Leaders Need Agile Team Facilitation Skills

If you are wondering if this skill – and this workshop – is right for you, here are four reasons to get you motivated to learn more about Agile Team Facilitation.

Stop spinning your wheels! Stop making the same mistakes you are making and instead learn and implement a system that has been proven to work and yield favorable results!
Motivate high performance teams! Motivation is what gets a team moving. Transforming a team into a high performing team, into the direction they build can be tricky, however. Agile team facilitation skills can help you move the dial in the right direction.
Gain a different perspective on how to interact with others! Look at the issues at hand through a different lens. Listen with the purpose to understand, not respond.
Achieve Results! While this makes sense for any meeting you facilitate, as the team members are high performing, the outcome usually has higher stakes. Achieving results is an important aspect to learning team facilitation skills.

TeamCatapult faculty has been leading Agile Team Facilitation for years. We have an amazing program ready so that you can grow as a leader with Agile Team Facilitation skills.

In a fast-paced, multi-day workshop, full of hands-on opportunities for practicing new skills, participants explore the five cornerstones of successful facilitation so they confidently know what’s needed in any situation.

In Our Agile Team Facilitation Workshops We Cover:

The beliefs and assumptions of the facilitation mindset
The art of planning, designing, and conducting collaborative sessions
Strategies to define and reach consensus on decisions
How to make confident, impactful decisions in the moment
How to give and receive feedback to grow your facilitation skills

But that is not all. You’ll receive planning and design templates to help you prepare, plus abundant opportunities for practice and implementation.

Agile Team Facilitation, Agile Team Coaching and More!

When I wrote the book The Art & Science of Facilitation I intended it to be a road map for anyone on their journey to leading effective collaboration with Agile teams.

How can readers like you put these facilitation skills into practice? By “getting on the road” with this road map, that is, by joining us for one of the workshops we offer.

Here are some of the upcoming opportunities for the experiential learning our workshops offer:.

Agile Team Facilitation

February 27-March 3, 2023
12:00 PM – 4:30 PM ET

Advanced Facilitation

May 15-19, 2023
12:00 PM – 3:00 PM ET

Agile Coaching

March 20-24, 2023
12:00 PM – 4:30 PM ET

Changing Behavior in High Stakes

Part 1: March 22-24, 2023
Part 2: May 10-12, 2023

Last but not least, for those leaders who crave to be the kind of leader who:

Understands how to evaluate and assess where a team is at on their journey to high performance
Can step in and help teams have difficult conversations with grace and ease
Has the capacity and understanding to grow other leaders

…we invite you to look at our cohort program!

The Coaching Agility From Within Cohort Program is an in-depth, 9-month program emphasizing rigorous practice and rich feedback opportunities including skill drills, peer coaching, team coaching, ongoing group work, professional one-on-one coaching, and one-on-one supervision of actual Agile coaching sessions in your own work environment.

We would love to meet you in one of our workshops in 2023!