leadership | The Caleb Barney Collection

Welcoming disagreements

“One of the most difficult lessons many leaders learn (or fail to learn) is the necessity to welcome and tolerate disagreement.”

There are two ends of the agreement spectrum that we should try to avoid…

The first is to be 💯% agreeable on everything, aka a “yes man.” This is conflict avoidance at its worst.

The other end of the spectrum is to always shut others’ ideas down right away because they don’t align with your thoughts. Nobody can tell you anything if it doesn’t support your opinion. This is someone who craves confrontation and seeks it out.

I’m working on improving in this area (on both ends of the spectrum) – trying to learn the best ways to tactfully disagree. You should have original thoughts and feel comfortable voicing your opinion. But there are things that matter more and things that matter less which should/shouldn’t be argued about or debated. You don’t have to “win” every argument, and by always “needing” to be right, you will eventually discourage others from voicing their opinions around you.

Speak softly and carry a big stick.

When you’re negotiating, try to work cooperatively with the other side which will often lead to the best “win-win” outcomes. The opposite can be said when trying to negotiate competitively with the other side, where there is usually a winner and a loser. Sure, you may win that time, but who will want to keep working with you if they keep walking away with a sour taste in their mouth?

Having the “power” or perceived ability to get things done if things don’t work out exactly as planned will also help with the negotiation. What this means will change in different situations…sometimes it will mean that you can get what you want done by force or persuasion, other times it will mean that you will work to get the best possible outcome for both parties. Either way, you should be able to follow through with any promises you make and people should feel confident that you’ll do what you say.

Lastly, don’t constantly “blab” or else people will tune you out (almost like Charlie Brown’s teacher). Your words carry less weight the more you talk and your reputation will get dinged every time you don’t follow through with your words.

On growing (and maintaining) relationships

You can avoid growing apart by focusing on growing together. This goes for any relationship – with your spouse, your kids, your parents, siblings, or friends. If you don’t do things with them, you will eventually lose touch. If you don’t keep in contact with them and reach out occasionally, you will be an afterthought to their current life. It’s not because you or the other person don’t like each other anymore, but growing and keeping a relationship strong takes work. If you don’t work at it, it will weaken over time.

Random thoughts on leading, managing, business, and goals

One difference between great leaders and great managers is the ability to innovate. Being creative, progressive, and moving forward with new ideas is important for visionary leaders. But keeping the boat from rocking too much and making sure to implement the visionary’s ideas intelligently are key to great management. You need both to be successful…ideas are great, but if they are scattered all over the place and not aligned with the stated future overarching goal(s), and if they are changed before really being given time to succeed, the business will flounder.

Start out with a couple of great goals. Know why you want to achieve those things. Then figure out what milestones you need to hit along the way and what processes you need to develop/follow to make those milestones happen. After you achieve them (or when you’re 90%+ done), start thinking of adding new goals, techniques, and strategies that are natural extensions of your current goals. Don’t do a 180 degree turn and pivot to something completely unrelated where you have limited-to-no experience.

Tolerant with others. Strict with yourself.

You know what you should do, so go do it. It doesn’t matter if you don’t feel like it. If it’s the right thing to do and it needs to be done, don’t waste anymore time procrastinating. It may be easier to skip that workout, to eat fast food, to go on a spending spree, or to not speak up against injustice, but that doesn’t give you the excuse to not do what you feel is right. Or, maybe you do what is needed, but you only do the bare minimum. Be careful of this. How you do anything is how you do everything. If you start looking for shortcuts, eventually that will be your default behavior.

That being said, that’s what YOU should do. That doesn’t mean that you should hold others to the same standards. Don’t mistake this for letting them off the hook and letting them get away with things that are dangerous, amoral, or illegal. They shouldn’t take advantage of people and still need to be called out (or stopped) when they’re doing something egregious. But for the little things that don’t really matter? Skip the criticism.

Others may do things differently than you – in a way that appears to be less effective and less efficient – but at least they’re doing it. If they ask for advice or for help, then offer it. But don’t do it before then. And don’t judge them for not doing something like you would. After all, those are your standards, not theirs. Be tolerant of their decisions, but strict with your own. If you feel your way of doing things is the “best way” to currently do them, don’t lower your standards just to make things easier for yourself.