Saying Goodbye to the Dome; A Legacy of Leadership

An interview with Steve Mermell

By Larry Hammond

The City of Pasadena, California, with a population of approximately 140,000, is the 44th largest city in California. Pasadena is a complex city for a municipality of its relative proportions. It operates more like a large city than one of comparable size. It is known around the world for hosting the annual Rose Bowl football game and the Tournament of Roses Parade. It is also the home to California institute of Technology, the ArtCenter College of Design, and other internationally known institutions.

The city’s complexities extend to managing a truly diverse population, ethnically and economically, as well as a deep historical commitment to its cultural and physical structures.  First, it owns and operates a football stadium and does not have a football team. It operates its own water and power department that supplies water, sewer services and electricity to Pasadena residents and businesses. It has its own police and fire departments with over five hundred dedicated public safety staff that includes a helicopter operation. Running a city that is laser focused on its citizens’ diverse needs, with over 2,300 employees and has an annual budget approaching $1 billion, takes a certain type of dedication and leadership. Enter, Steven B. Mermell, who served as this city’s city manager from 2016 through 2021.

Steven B. Mermell

Pasadena City Manager (2016-2021)

Before becoming the city manager, Steve’s more than 30-year stent with the city included serving as assistant city manager, finance director, budget administrator and purchasing administrator, just to name a few. Steve’s resume states that his areas of expertise include improving operations, municipal budgeting, policy analysis and project management and that he has a history of creative problem-solving, building consensus and strategic management.

I went on to explore Steve’s journey to become city manager and I asked him what he thought helped him to ascend to this position. He replied that he believed that his writing ability and analytical skills gave him a leg up. These attributes helped him to shine and get noticed. He also sees himself as a generalist which allowed him the flexibility to work in a variety of roles and not to be pigeon-holed in one area.

Steve said that one of the things that he believes made him successful in bringing his team together was that he never saw himself the smartest person in the room, “you can’t be totally egocentric and be an effective leader.”  Success requires a team effort. You pull from their strengths, manage weaknesses, and support the team. He relied on his team to get things done. During the COVID Pandemic he met daily with his leadership team to assess the situation and discuss options. “When facing a problem, you are just looking for an answer.”  He says that he does not have to be the person with the innovative idea but that he knows a good idea when he hears one.

Then, there was the response to COVID. While this certainly was an extraordinary event for all cities and was challenging for all municipal leaders, Steve pointed out that one of the major highlights of the pandemic was that the City of Pasadena did not lay off any employees as a result of the shutdown. This was not the case for many other cities. All staff pitched in to help get through the crisis. “The staff responded fabulously! It was a true team response. The pandemic rolled out in a crazy way. We all thought that the shutdown was only going to be a brief time.” As we know, that was not the case. The shutdown dragged out for months and the pandemic continued to get worse. Steve took immense pride in the team he was able to put together. During the pandemic, he saw them come together and do an amazing job keeping vital services going in Pasadena. Staff were eager and able to step in and help wherever needed to keep things going. When a crisis occurs, a talented team will rally and work collectively to keep operations functioning. This is the sign of good leadership. No one person gets through tough situations alone. Amassing a strong and capable team will help ensure that an organization can be agile and adapt to any situation.

After becoming city manager, and having been awfully familiar with the city’s budget, Steve knew that there were short and long - term issues that needed to be addressed. He immediately began to focus on these budget concerns. He was instrumental in modifying the contribution agreement with the city’s legacy fire and police pension system that ensured stability in this substantial financial obligation for years to come. The city’s budget needed a long- term structural solution. This problem was addressed, in large part, due to the efforts of Steve Mermell. He was the driving force that pushed a sales tax proposition that won approval by the City Council and the citizens of Pasadena to increase the local sales tax that helped to stabilize the city’s budget. These actions helped to secure the city’s AAA credit rating, a critical factor in fortifying the city’s financial status and borrowing power.

During the lockdown, Steve said that he sent out encouraging messages frequently to uplift the staff. People thanked him for the messages and talked about how much they appreciated personal concern. Leaders can play a key role in encouraging and uplifting staff during tough times. Showing support during a crisis and extolling positivity are crucial to coalescing a team.

When I asked him, what kept him up at night? He replied, “lots of things.”  When you go to sleep, there are always five other conversations going on in your head. The city’s budget was a big worry and the times that he had to make big presentations to the City Council usually rose to the top. Concerns with the city’s health department, which was in a serious budget emergency, was one of the issues that caused him to lose sleep. Pasadena is one of only three cities in the state to operate its own health department. The department is a unique and vital service provider to the city’s residents. It is true benefit was fully revealed during the pandemic. The department was losing $2 million/year out of a $14 million annual budget. This could not be sustained. Helping to rectify this problem is also one of the things that he is most proud to have resolved. The reward comes when you can truly make a difference. “We did right by the people that used the JWCH - Andrew Escaped Clinic – three hundred patients in the clinic receiving care for HIV were about to lose funding. Finding a solution to that issue had an immediate and direct impact on the people needing the services of this vital clinic.”  He reflected on a time when he had seen one of the patients on the street. She saw Steve and said the care was even better than before and expressed how happy she was that the clinic was providing excellent assistance to her and the other patients. “Situations like that makes it all worthwhile."

In the leadership realm, there are many different approaches to leading. When asked to describe his leadership style, Steve described himself like this: “I am a shy person. Being out in front is not my first choice.”  He said that he had to step into this role and go beyond his comfort level to function in the limelight. He says when he makes decisions, he sticks with them. He says that he tries to always “lead by example” and model the behavior that he would like others to emulate. He always tries to lead with integrity, honesty, and a sense of what is right, what is ethical - even when it would be easier to do something else or not having to tell your boss no.

One of the most important leadership qualities that Steve thought served him well was his ability to compartmentalize issues. He also says that his ability to compartmentalize was a benefit. In the city manager role, you need to be able to go from one extreme situation to another on a dime. While not everything matters equally, every problem is important in one way or another to some facet of the community.

Leaders are often faced with conflicting, often dueling, concepts and issues. Leaders that can effectively compartmentalize, can provide laser focus on complicated matters. The issues concerning local residents, are of paramount importance to various constituencies. As city manager, every issue must be delt with at an appropriate level of concern and diligence. Leaders also must set aside their personal thoughts and feelings to get the work done.

Leaders often have mentors that they look to for inspiration and guidance. When asked did he have a mentor or a leadership figure that he learned from to help him lead, he responded that he did look up to others for inspiration and he also looked at people that did the wrong things where he learned not to follow their example. He saw historical figures like Churchill and Roosevelt as leaders that knew what needed to be done during their challenges. He admired people in the city over the years that had more experience than he did. Great leaders do not operate in a vacuum. We have already established that having a formidable team is key to a leader’s ultimate success.  I believe that it is equally important to seek out others that have set to right examples and build on other’s strengths, successes, and mistakes.

“A pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty” 

-- Winston Churchill

This leads into how he managed really difficult situations. He did not consider dealing with problems to be difficult. He sees problems as challenges; “dealing with them is my job.”  Of course, problems related to police shootings that legitimately upset members of the public are disconcerting and are “angst ridden” bring about a great deal of anxiety and apprehension throughout the community. Getting to the root causes of these issues are complicated but not insurmountable. Steve believes that there are so few things that are so intractable that they cannot be solved.

He says that “What was difficult is when you have a solution to a problem and now you have to get others to sign on.”  One example of this is what to do with the historic YWCA building. In this case, there was a solution placed on the table and for other political reasons the city did not avail itself to the solution on the table. Now the problem continues.

One of the things that is getting lots of attention these days is finding work/life balance particularly in high demanding jobs like his. When asked about how he found balance in his life, he responded, “There was none.”  In this job you could get a call from the police chief in the middle of the night or while you are out to dinner informing you of a situation or even a tragedy that has just occurred in Pasadena. These types of circumstances happened relatively frequently and need to be addressed 24/7. He also stated that the City Council demanded immediate answers and when you have eight bosses that require answers to a variety of issues then you need to be constantly updated on the issues and prepared to provide answers. “You are expected to know everything.”  Steve was meticulous in staying on top of emails, text messages and whatever other forms of inquiry or communications that he needed to be addressed.

“Life balance is not really true. That’s a joke.”  The idea of letting a text or message wait was not an option for him.  That just caused more anxiety. For Steve, it was job first and, yes, his family did suffer for it. Even when traveling on vacation he still responded.

It is a tremendous benefit to knowing the organizational culture but Steve points out that within any large organization, there are many micro cultures. Cultural perceptions for all employees are shaped mostly by their specific experiences in their particular work groups. Getting to work in the different areas gave him a good sense of how the city functioned overall. This was especially important in managing the entire organization. The city is a multipronged organization that does a wide variety of things. It doesn’t just produce one kind of product.  The city is responsible for multiple lines of work ranging from many extremes like public safety, water and power, transportation, libraries, to emergency medical care and much, much more. There are certain things that you need to know. “When you have been around as long as I have, you have seen where things have worked and where things have gone wrong. That is a good way to learn stuff. “

A leader’s success is directly associated with their ability to maximize working in their strengths. One of Steve’s dominant strengths is that he is an insatiable learner. This talent has served him well as he has climbed the ladder within the city. His ability to learn new things, coupled with a really good memory, allowed him to move from one job to another with confidence and competence. He also says that his ability to remain calm was a positive attribute. A large part of remaining calm in challenging situations is a leader’s confidence in accepting that their actions are the only thing that they can really control and knowing that those actions will surely find a way out of difficult situations is the root to remaining calm. Also, knowing that difficult situations are a part of life and certainly in jobs like city manager. Problems and difficulties are part of self-development and should be seen as an opportunity to gain experience and learn.

We all have reflections on the decisions that we have made, paths we have chosen and things that, if we could, do differently. When I asked Steve, what would he have done differently if he had the chance, he said, “nothing really. There are a few things that I may have wished turned out otherwise, but I would not change anything. There are some things that you look back on that didn’t work out that well and you can say maybe I shouldn’t have tilted that windmill but those are few and far between.”  He is proud of what he has done. He did add that he would have networked more because he did not do much of that.  Although, it should be noted that during the pandemic, networking events and conferences were extremely limited.

Motivating team members in the best of times is a challenging task. When asked how he kept his team motivated during the pandemic, Steve said, that “it was always important to keep it top-of-mind that people are the most important aspect when leading any organization.”  His approach was to treat people as peers. He was not one that attempted to use gimmicks or tokens to motivate people. He felt that it was really important to be genuine and sincere and he believed that if you show people that their contributions are important, that was usually the best motivator. People will see right through you when you lack sincerity, and you will surely lose credibility.

One of the most important factors in leadership is the ability to prioritize effectively.  Steve’s approach to prioritizing is to focus on big issues and to push decision making down to the lowest reasonable level. People tend to push things upwards, and leaders have to learn not to get bogged down with smaller issues that should be managed by others.  In his role as city manager, he would prioritize about a half a dozen issues that he would focus on in a year. He would direct his attention to work to get those things done. If you lose focus on the really important things, then you will find yourself lost and bogged down with lesser priorities.

Because of his lengthy experience with matters in Pasadena, Steve believed that you have to develop a feeling for issues, that he had acquired a “six-sense,” so to speak, about how certain things would play out. He believed that this acumen served as a vital part in setting the right priorities for the city that he was charged to lead.

In the 2009, documentary concert-film, Michael Jackson’s This Is It, about the Pop star’s rehearsals for his upcoming concerts, depicted the artist’s proficiency of his artistry. In one particular scene, Michael needed to hit an exact mark at a certain time to coincide with video exhibition that was running simultaneously while he was performing. In a discussion with the Director, Kenny Ortega, about how he was going to pull this off since he could not see the video from where he was positioned, Michael confidently responded, “I’ll just feel it". In the next iteration of that scene, Michael nailed it and hit his mark perfectly – he felt it. This is a demonstration of the mastery of his craft from his years of preparation.

Steve uses the analogy that some people have a very unique skill of determining the sex of newborn baby chicks. You just have to know… by looking at feathers, coloration, and other components that you just know by holding the chicks in your hand. He used the example of when he worked at Chucky Cheese, and he had to put 7 oz. of cheese on the pizza that after doing it over and over you can just pick up the cheese and you know that it is the right amount.

In his job managing the city, he asserts that with experience, you learn how to feel when you need to jump on something or wait – the level of importance of issues and whether or not it is important to your overall goals – and like Michael Jackson, you just have to feel it.

When asked, if he ever doubted himself, he replied, that “the good news is that nothing immediately comes to mind.”  That means that he did not have any nagging regrets. Leaders have to be comfortable in their decisions. Some decisions will be right, and some will not. He reiterated that everything was not just on him alone and that he had an amazing team working with him. He also pointed out that they did things incrementally by moving big decisions slowly and thoughtfully. He always acted in the city’s best interest.

 The job of city manager is an incredibly challenging position for the reasons explained heretofore.  So, I asked Steve how he would rate his performance and what he thought of the job in general.

“The job is incredibly interesting.  It was great.  COVID gave a great opportunity to lead.”  Problems of this magnitude show whether or not you have any leadership skills or not.  It gives you an opportunity to step up to the challenge. When everything is copasetic you do not really know if you can lead or not.  That’s when you see people fail when they are not up to it. Inertia is such a powerful force. It is hard to do something different and it can be a very heavy lift to get things done but it is gratifying to make important things happen. Crisis force you out of the zone of inertia. Leaders understand that one of their primary responsibilities is to solve problems. Leaders that see problems as opportunities thrive in their roles as leaders.

In reference to how he would grade his performance, he made a baseball analogy and said that he felt that he had a Rod Carew batting average. Rod had a batting average of 0.328 – 34th of all time. Average for the league is about 0.250.  So, I would put that in the top percentile in the world of public administration. While certainly many others will have varying opinions about Steve’s performance, it is amply apparent that his leadership skills and acumen were the right combination of aptitudes for a very unusual and demanding time.

Conclusion:

Excellence is not achieved in isolation. Excellence is created through the merging of people's differing strengths and creating teams that that are aligned on goals. Finding the right leader is where the true excellence and success happens.

 It is said that great leaders motivate others; assert themselves to overcome obstacles; build trusting relationships; make informed, unbiased decisions for the good of their team and organization; and create a positive culture that will flourish. Finding the right person to fulfill these responsibilities is a daunting task for any organization. While the debate as to if it is more advantageous to promote leaders from within or from the outside will continue, the bottom-line is that whichever decision is made, the new leader needs to be effective and consequential in moving organizations forward. When a person comes from within the ranks of your organization that can stand up and lead the organization through an unprecedented pandemic and the many challenges that have faced the city over the past several years, then, for this city, the answer of leadership, for this time period anyway, has been answered.

 Sometimes saying goodbye to a place, to a culture and to the people, who have been so much a part of your life can be extremely difficult. The memories, the successes and the challenges that were faced have become an integral part of you and will never be forgotten. In the case of Steve Mermell, saying goodbye to “the dome” is bittersweet. The friends left behind the laughs and maybe a few tears too, will all continue to be a big part of him and will guide his future endeavors. As for Pasadena, Steve’s legacy of leadership with the City of Pasadena will be part of the tapestry of the history of this great city for years to come.

City Hall, Pasadena, CA

Working in Your Strengths – Let our Talents Shine! →

We have recently witnessed the 2020 Summer Olympic Games (in 2021 due to COVID-19).  This sports spectacle allows athletes from all over the world to compete in a variety of sporting events that allows them to vigorously demonstrate their talents and abilities in the sporting world.  It always fascinates me how these incredible athletes, through their hard work and practice, exhibit their perfected competitive talents.  I marvel at the amazing feats that they can execute.  Even the ones that may not win a medal excel in their chosen sport.

These Olympic athletes are the epitome of manifesting one’s talents into strengths.  Gallup defines strengths as the ability to use your talents to consistently provide near perfect performance.  The competitors in the Olympic Games demonstrate what it looks like to perform at the highest levels at near perfect performance.  This is truly an amazing thing to witness.  While the Olympics is a place that highlights this abundantly, it is not the only place. The Olympic spectacle itself is an amazing accomplishment. To make these international games materialize is a monumental task. I know that to pull off this incredible event, there are an incredible number of people that are behind the scenes that make this extraordinary tournament possible. These individuals are also using their talents and strengths to make the Olympics a success.

You witness this phenomenon all the time.  In the world of entertainment, we see masters at their crafts show us how they have perfected their talents.  In the business sector we see many creating innovative technologies every day.  We see it in healthcare, politics, in the arts and virtually every sector of our society. Outside of athletics and sports, people use their talents in all facets of life and work.  We have recently witnessed civilians being launched into space. This new era of space travel is being made possible by many, many people using their skills, talents, and strengths.

Talents are not restricted just to the Olympic athletes.  You witness people excelling in their excellence all around you. It is the singer in the church choir that makes you shed a tear; it is the teacher that gets your child to a breakthrough moment.  When you see that movie that touches your soul; that is evidence of people working in their strengths. When you see a sports team win that championship; they are demonstrating their strengths.  When you hear that song that you cannot forget; some exceptionally talented people have worked in their strengths to make that happen.  Watching people work in their strengths is magical.  It shows the power of human creativity and productivity.  It shows how teams work together to create great outcomes.

Achieving near perfection in using your talents requires dedication and work; just like the athletes.

You must first hone in on what your talents are and discover your talents.  This is a crucial step in perfecting them.  Just as Olympic athletes learn that they have abilities of speed and agility and then master those talents into track and field and other games.  Understanding that you have talents in communication, strategic thinking or relationship building lets you focus on advancing these talents into strengths.  People that are working in their strengths, then embrace their talents and declare to themselves and to others that they have these abilities and are now ready to cultivate them to near perfect proficiencies.  Through coaching and practicing techniques, you can expand and develop your talents into strengths.  

Most Olympic athletes have coaches; state of the art training centers to help them achieve their goals.

You too, can perfect your talents using Gallup’s Clifton StrenghtsFinder’s Assestment.

Based on Gallup’s 40-year study of human strengths, they have created a language of the 34 most common talents and developed the Clifton StrengthsFinder assessment to help people discover and describe these talents.  These talents can be viewed as your talent DNA.  And, just like your biological DNA, your talent “DNA” makes you unique in why you do the things that you do in your work and other life activities.

Just as the Olympic athletes, your talents make you unique.  The chance that two people share the same top five talents is an astonishing one in 33 million.  So, you need to know that there is tremendous diversity in how people express their strengths.  Applying these talents, just as the athletes, depends on many factors including knowledge, culture, experiences and practice.  To master your talents, you must cultivate them and nurture them so that you can flourish to achieve your goals, build higher self-awareness and confidence and are more engaged and productive.

To do this, you must develop those talents That is why the sports analogy works, especially using the Olympics as an example.  To be proficient, Olympic athletes get a great coach to help them refine their talents and techniques.  Then they practice their sport while developing their minds to compete at the highest levels.  When they are working in their strengths, amazing things happen during Olympic competition; records are broken, and stars shine on the world stage.

You too can shine when you develop your talents and work in your strengths. When you are working in your strengths you are strong.  Working in your strength’s cultivates excellence. Working in your strength’s garners positive attention.  Working in your strength’s bring self-satisfaction and joy into your life. Working in your strengths makes you a better person when you do what you love and let your talents shine!

Get our free gift for more information on flexing your talents and strengths: Free Gift

Larry Hammond, Sr. - V1H Consulting, LLC

You Were Built to Lead

My dad used to say “Life is a wonderful thing once you learn how to live it.”.  For a long time, I thought that this aphorism was about the big things in life, like building a solid career, raising a family or having a positive impact on your community.  While all of those things are certainly important, it wasn’t until I had an epiphany in my back yard that enlightened my idea on what my dad really meant.  This realization was demonstrated to me while I was folding some lawn chairs for storage.  For a couple of Summer seasons, I had great difficulty folding these particular chairs until one day in frustration, I slammed the chair legs on the ground only to find, much to my surprise, that the chair just collapsed and folded almost effortlessly.  After successfully testing my system on the other chairs, I was elated.  A great burden had been lifted from my soul.  It was then that I began to see the value of how knowing the nuances about things can be very liberating.  This led to me focusing on the “little” things that can really make a difference in maximizing my experiences on multiple levels.

For example, there are so many little things that if you just know how they function it would make your life easier.  For years, I did not know that the hole in a soda can tab was designed to hold a straw.  I also did not realize that the lid on a standard paper coffee cup was designed to be used as a coaster.  These are only a few things that when you know how they work can make your life just a little bit better.

Applying this principal to understanding how things work like computers, smart phones and televisions can really make your life so much easier and richer.  Now don’t get me wrong, I am no expert at any of these, but I do know that the more you know about these technologies the happier life can be.

Cars are an excellent demonstration of what I am talking about.  Now when I go to rent a car it is a whole new experience.  With all of the new technology that is now infused in automobiles, you never quite know what you are going to get.  Not knowing the different features that a particular car has to offer; you can’t maximize the functionality.  After driving the car for several days, you begin to figure out the different features.

Looking at something that is a bit more complicated, just like soda cans, cups and rental cars, children don’t come with a manual either.  Parents raising children kind of have to figure it out as they go along.  And, as most parents that have more than one child know, raising one child is entirely different from raising another.

Knowing how things function and knowing how to apply the different functionalities to meet specific purposes to achieve specific goals is critical to successfully accomplishing your objectives.  Certain things are specifically designed for distinct functionalities.  Keeping with the car themed analogies, certain vehicles work better in different situations.  While race cars are perfectly suited to drive fast and handle with precision on a racetrack, they are not well suited for picking up groceries or carting the kids off to school.  And, while your SUV or mini-van will do a much better job moving kids and groceries, they are not designed for speed or precision maneuvers.

Obviously, people are exponentially more complicated.  Knowing how people in organizations function is fundamentally just as important as knowing the functionality of a car.  As a leader, it is important to know how specific parts of your organization work and how the people work together to get things done.

Athletes develop their natural skills and talents to become the best at what they do.  Whether their skill set is to dunk a basketball, score a goal or steal a base, it is the coach that needs to know how to put these talents together to formulate a winning strategy. Just like athletes that hone their skills to propel a team to victory and use their abilities to work in conjunction with other team members for the success of the team, people in organizations must do the same.  Leaders should focus on developing talents and work to maximize teams using their collective strengths to attain successful outcomes.  Just like knowing how to get the most out of your car or your technology; knowing how to get the most out of the people that you lead will get you the best results.

Unlike cars and technology, it is the human factor/emotional intelligence that connects us to others and enables us to lead with purpose; leading with heart matters.  How you motivate, retain talent and improve morale are crucial leadership skills that require a human approach.  All of us have had to make decisions, maintain relations and adapt to changes in our lives.  These are the same challenges that leaders face on a daily basis.

Just as there are features on our cars and technology that we need to master, there are many elements of the people that you work with that you need to take the time and effort to learn and cultivate.  You may work with people for years and not know their talents and nuances that may play a vital role in adding to your organizational operations. Learning these abilities will bolster your leadership impact.  Maximizing an individual’s potential begins with knowing their talents, developing their abilities and building their work and careers around their strengths.

As with the cars you were built differently - for different purposes - but ALL of you have talents and skills that are distinctly yours.  And, like the cars, can achieve a particular purpose in the leadership realm and make significant contributions to your organizations.

So, what does all of this mean?  Leading in the 21st century requires a new style of leadership.  I am not suggesting that everybody will be the CEO of a major corporation, or hold a high office in the political arena or marshal in a large scale cultural change – What I am saying is that we all poses talents that when cultivated contribute to organizational success.

No one person knows it all.  Leaders must rely on those that they associate with to make good decisions, implement effective policies and to execute changes effectively.

We have long built our organizational objectives by molding people around our leadership goals; we now need to mold our leadership goals around the people. Change from boss mentality to coach mentality”

- Jim Clifton

Leadership is no longer judged by accomplishing big changes but by the small but significant operational contributions that move the needle and promote positive change.

Marin Luther King once said, “If I cannot do great things, I can do small things in a great way”.

An example of how making independent, relatively small decisions can make a huge difference in the grand scheme of things and can make a lasting imprint; Last year, one of the deadliest mass shootings in U.S. history occurred at an Orlando nightclub.  Chief Medical Examiner Joshua Stephany had been filling in as medical examiner for the county.  Dr. Stephany made the decision to separate the bodies of the 49 victims from the body of their executioner.  He said, - “There was no legal reason, no protocol” for separating the gunman, “It’s just what I felt was right.”.

 “True leadership is doing the right thing and making the right decision at the right time.”

“Becoming a leader is synonymous with becoming yourself. It is precisely that simple and it is also that difficult.”
- Warren Bennis

As automobiles were built to transport people and things, each with their own unique features and capabilities contribute to getting the right job done with the right capabilities, so are you. How this is done is defined by the specifications of the vehicle. How you lead is defined in your specifications.  Your specifications include many factors.  Talents, thinking and emotions are defined in your unique specifications.  They are your leadership tools.

You are built to make decisions and take actions to resolve problems.  You are specially designed to build and cultivate relationships that create synergistic teams.  When things go amiss, you are built to take decisive actions.  When making plans, you think strategically and when executing those plans you use your powers of persuasion to influence others to help you accomplish your goals. When leading, you are built to instill trust in others and demonstrate courage when taking risk while managing change. These are your talents - Your talents are your tools -Your talents are the keys to your success!

Contact us and let’s get your leadership style identified to help you flex your skills and improve your work and life.

You Were Built to Lead!

Written by: Larry Hammond, Sr.

What is Going to Make YOU the Next Great Leader? What Will Take YOU to the Next Level?

As the workplace dynamics and life situations are rapidly evolving, there are multiple opportunities to assume leadership roles.  Circumstances whether in your job or in your community or even in your family may require you to step up and lead.   For example, I have seen one of the biggest and most consequential leadership roles that I have had to undertake was addressing the needs of my aging parents.  In our communities, we often see that individuals are standing up to fight for what they believe in or to seek justice.  In the workplace, organizations are moving more aggressively toward team management and project-based operations.  These settings have made it even more imperative that organizations invest in growing leaders that can step into management roles to execute their organizational.

So, what do the experts say makes a great leader?

•  Great leaders get straight “A’s” on their leadership test.  They exemplify authenticity, accountability, adaptability and appreciation.

• Great leaders cast a compelling vision about where they want to go and they have faith in their beliefs - they create lasting solutions to problems not just band aide fixes and they create a thriving organizational culture.

• Great leaders stay positive, exhibit confidence and have a sense of humor - they are clear about their goals and decisive in their decisions - they lead with courage, passion and humility.

• Great leaders handle controversial issues or crisis calmly and confidently - they embrace failures and manage setbacks while taking responsibility for their actions - they learn from their mistakes and make the hard choices when they have to.

• Great leaders embrace change and lead by example - they communicate effectively and are transparent in their actions.

These are what I call the brass ring objectives.  These tend to be the buzz words of leadership development.  These are the things that we often shoot for to become better leaders.  While these are all good intentions and yes great qualities to have as a leader, they tend to be taught as the flavor of the month but, in reality, nobody embodies all of these leadership qualities. While a finely tuned racecar looks great and will perform competitively on the racetrack it won’t be a winner when you need to bring the groceries home from the store; your SUV will do a better job at that.

So how are you going to become the next great leader?  What will get you prepared to step into a leadership role, willingly or unwillingly, and have the best chance to succeed?

We all take on leadership roles in very different ways.  Depending on our talents and strengths as well as knowing our limitations we all approach the responsibilities of leading in very different ways.  Through Gallup’s research, it was determined that the most effective leaders are always investing in strengths.  Without an awareness of your strengths, it is almost impossible for you to lead effectively.

“We believe that when the right talent meets the right opportunity in a company with the right philosophy, amazing transformation can happen.”  -- Reid Hoffman

In order to be an effective leader, you need to take stock of your personal characteristics and skill sets and assess your strengths and weaknesses.  Further education in leadership and management coupled with continued professional development of your skills are key.   In this age of digital enlightenment and rapidly evolving workplaces, the definition of effective leadership is constantly changing and to keep up, leaders need to continuously ask questions of themselves.

In the popular TV show, Game of Thrones – Peter Dinklage plays Tyrion Lannister a dwarf living in this fictional world where physical strength and the ability to engage in warfare are rewarded.  When asked why he reads so many books, his answer is to improve his already strong mind.  Knowing that because of his physical limitations, that he would never excel as a warrior, his best chance to lead and succeed was through his intellectual abilities.  He knew his strength was his intelligence and that by enhancing his strongest asset he could not only survive in a chaotic world but he would excel as a leader.

Knowing your strongest assets are your best chance to be a successful leader.  Understanding not only your strengths but those of your team and bringing those talents to bear in your leadership endeavors is your best path to being a great leader.  Knowing your strengths and those of your team is like having a blueprint of why you are or why your team members are the way that they are is like having a manual on how to make yourself or your team members function at optimal efficiency.

In my previous articles, I have been talking about knowing your strengths is understanding your “YUR”.  Why you tackle certain challenges the way you do; why you react the way you do; why you lead the way you do are all encompassed in how you use your strengths.  For example, if one of your strengths is communication you will lead best if you use this talent to influence others.  Empathizing easily with others will take you a long way in your leadership responsibilities by helping to build strong relationships.  Having strong analytical skills, will help you devise effective strategies while leading a team and if you are a person possessing an acute ability to focus then you will use this strength to lead your team in successfully executing their projects.

“Before you are a leader, success is all about growing yourself.  When you become a leader, success is about growing others.”  – Jack Welch

As a person that has “Maximizer” as my top talent theme according to the Gallup StrenghtsFinder assessment, I understand that great leaders know that people are key to your success.  One of the keys to being a great leader, in my opinion, is being able to instill power within others.  Lifting others up, inspiring them to grow and bringing out the best in people is the best way to create more leaders.  A true leader is able to inspire their team to encourage them to go beyond excellence and accomplish far more than anyone expects them to – or they expect of themselves.  Great leaders earn their team’s respect.  They do this by getting to know their team by listening, providing productive feedback and they encourage cooperation over competition.

“You cannot have faith in people unless you take action to improve and develop them.”  -- Sumantra Ghoshal

The other side of the leadership equation is encompassed in why followers follow.  In the book written by Tom Rath and Barry Conchie, Strengths Based Leadership, Rath and Conchie outline how you can effectively lead using your unique strengths.  I highly recommend reading this book and with it you will get a code that will allow you to take Gallup’s StrengthsFinder Assessment.

If you are ready to find out what shapes your ability to be an effective leader and you are ready to maximize your “YUR” by discovering your talents, declaring your strengths and developing them into dynamic tools that will make you the next great leader V1H Consulting will help you to evolve your “YUR”.

“What great leaders have in common is that each truly knows his or her strengths – and can call on the right at the right time.”  --Tom Rath

“How You Do Anything is How You Do Everything”

A Strengths Based Approach

Martha Beck is credited with coining the quote, “How you do anything is how you do everything”.  This quotation has been widely used in a variety of training seminars, motivational talks and many books and periodicals.  It would suggest that how you manage most situations, challenges or other experiences in your life is probably a good indication of how you handle almost all of the occurrences in your life.  When I first heard this quote in a leadership seminar a few years ago, I wasn’t quite sure if this was really true and, if it was, how I would process this information.  Typically, statements that include words like anything or everything are usually very broad expressions and, quite frankly, I interpret them with guarded reservations.  For example, when I looked at the relationships that I have had in my life, or some of the actions that I have taken, I didn’t necessarily see a correlation to that statement.  My relationships varied widely and because I may procrastinate on doing yard work that didn’t necessarily mean that I procrastinated in doing other things, especially things that I enjoyed doing.  Also, while my desk may get a little messy, my car stays clean.  And, I certainly would not want to compare how I play basketball or sing, for example, with how I do other things in my life.  So, while I did see some things that fit in this model, my personal experiences didn’t seem to fit this doctrine consistently enough to solidify it in my consciousness.

Do you ever wonder why you make certain choices?  Why you do what you do?  Why you like certain things?  In my last article, titled “YUR” which talked about how your talents and strengths determine why you do what you do, leads to the connection between strengths and the do everything scenario. Under the concept of “YUR” I have suggested that the core of why you do what you do is driven by using your strengths.   As I viewed the do everything statement through the strengths lens, I could see a more definitive pattern that gave credence to this premise.  As I developed the “YUR” concept, as it relates to StrengthsFinder, I began to see a pattern that provided more credibility to the notion that “how you do anything is how you do everything”.  By looking at this quote in this new context, I saw it’s meaning in an entirely new perspective.

There are obviously some things we don’t do well.  Strengths psychology pioneer Dr. Donald O. Clifton asked the question, “What will happen when we think about what is right with people instead of fixating on what is wrong?” This philosophy dictates that it is better to focus on the things that we do well.  Why are we better at some things than others?  There is a reason:  It’s our talents.  Our talents help us to understand why you are the way you are – ergo, your “YUR”.  Knowing your talents helps us to understand how we naturally think and feel and they can shed light into our behaviors. Talents are aptitudes, personality traits and interpersonal characteristics like empathy, strategic thinking and assertiveness.  These are things that you are born with.  Infused with knowledge and the development of skills, these talents will become our strengths.  These are enduring qualities in each of us because they are basically hardwired in our brains. In short, they affect our ability to reach our goals and desired outcomes.  So, when you are using your talents and working in your strengths you can feel confident that when you do anything that you will find consistency in how you do everything and you can achieve the results that you desire when you know your talents and use your strengths to succeed.

When we look at others, such as, mentors, role models, leaders, etc. we look to them for inspiration and guidance but we also look to them to see if they do anything/everything consistently.  Those that we admire for their accomplishments and are at the top of their game in what they do are using their strengths at the highest levels.  Whether they are athletes, entertainers or in leadership positions they have discovered their talents and honed them to gain the maximum affect.  It is their dedication, tenacity and work ethic that are driven and supported by their strengths.  They repeat what has been working for them while enhancing their skills to improve outcomes.  For example, a basketball player uses his or her skills as a 3-point shooter to have maximum impact on the game, entertainers use their talents to regale their audiences and leaders use their strengths to influence others to initiate change.

Therefore, I have determined that this notion of how you do anything is how you do everything can be a good thing.  If you harness your talents and nurture them and ultimately make them your strengths, you too can use them to achieve your desired results. I encourage you commit to growing your strengths and use them to do everything.  When you master the art of unlocking your strengths and step into the version of yourself that uses your strengths to do anything, then you will find that how you do everything will result in more positive results.

Management expert, Peter Drucker says, “everyone ought to know what their strengths are’.  How you do anything is how you do everything when guided by your strengths creates patterns of success. Your strengths are your means of making positive contributions in the world. Your strengths are your inborn, hard-wired resources for good works. If you’re not making the most of your strengths, everyone's missing out. Start maximizing your strengths.

Discover, Declare and Develop your Strengths:

“If you are not focusing on your strengths then what are you focusing on?”

Because there’s a 1 in 33 million chance of you having the same top 5 talents in the same order as someone else, YOU are unique.  Be inspired to live in your strengths zone. Join us in the world of strengths. Focus on Your Strengths.

If you have any questions about anything that you have read in this article, or you’d like to talk to us about helping your team to understand the power of Strengths then connect with us today to see if we might be a good fit to help your team or organization build a Strengths Based culture.

Larry Hammond, Sr.

Start your Strengths Journey with our Basic Introduction Course

Unlock Your Strengths for Success, A Basic Introduction.

$125.00

“Why You Are…” How Your Strengths Exemplify You

At one time or another we have all been on the quest to find out “Who you are” in work, business or life.  Who you are is generally determined by your beliefs, your character, and your values.  These qualities are forged over time; through the influences upon our lives; our upbringing; our education and reactions to things that life has presented to us.

While knowing who you are is important, knowing why you are the way you are can provide a higher level of understanding about yourself and deserve further exploration. 

Over your lifetime through experiences of trial and error, you consciously and subconsciously demonstrate your talents and subsequently when you use those talents they influence the outcomes in your life.  Using your talents is a process of discovery not invention.  When I was growing up, I played basketball with my friends and eventually found out that I was never really ever going to be that good at the game.  On the other hand, swimming came more naturally to me and I used that talent to become a lifeguard.  The same thing happens with our ability to communicate, to build relationships, to influence outcomes or to execute complex task.  Just as I worked to develop my swimming talents into strengths that ultimately allowed me to pass the lifeguard test, developing talents into strengths in these other areas will promote success in other facets of your life.

Have you ever thought about why you are in the position that you are in?  Why you are in the relationships that you are in?  Why you have the successes in your life?  My work has led me to propose that the answer to “why you are…” (YUR…) is determined by your talents and strengths.  With our talents being a natural way of thinking, feeling or behaving and our strengths being the ability to consistently provide near perfect performance, these elements are major determinants of why you are the person you are.  When we identify and apply our strengths, we act within our circle of competence. We use our strengths to navigate challenges, effectively.  When we act within our circle of competence, we become more efficient, productive and successful.  Your “YUR” is your collective talents and strengths that denote why you do what you do, react the way you react and respond the way you respond to life’s stimuli. 

The “YUR…” is the combination of the drivers that push you to take certain actions or to respond to certain situations.  These drivers are your strengths. As an illustration, Superman sees a person in a burning building with his x-ray vision then crashes through the wall and saves them.  Because Superman knows his strengths; he knows that he can spot the person in trouble through the wall, break it down without getting hurt and save the victim in the fire without getting burned is an example of his “YUR…” 

 If he didn’t know and have those strengths his choices of rescue options would be quite different, he would have to find another way to attempt the rescue.  While we don’t have super human abilities like Superman, we do have human abilities that we can make super. In Simon Sinek’s book, "Start with Why", Sinek talks about the importance of understanding why individuals and organizations do what they do and that by knowing the right question will drive them to the right purpose.  Understanding your strengths manifest in the understanding of why you do what you do and the choices we make.  This understanding is key to mapping out success strategies, making decisions, solving problems and enjoying life. When it comes to the question of “Why?” we may ask, why am I inclined to “go with the flow” in most situations? Why do I have a tendency to take control of a situation so easily?  Why am I so competitive? - Why do I have such a strong desire to learn new things?  Why do I love meeting and interacting with new people so readily?  These are all examples of themes that drive us to react and behave in the ways we do. 

Learning what your talents are is easy.  The Gallup Corporation developed the Clifton StrengthsFinder assessment that measures 34 distinct talents. When you take the assessment, you are shown how the 34 strengths themes line up for you.  Those of us in the StrengthsFinder community often focus on the top 5 themes which tend to be our most dominant and those that we go to most often.  These are the areas where you have the greatest potential to develop strengths. 

The Gallup Corporation indicates that there is a 1 in 33 million chance that someone else will have an identical top 5 theme sequence.  That means that your strength themes make you definitively unique. Your “YUR…” is equivalent to your DNA.  It is your thinking combined with your actions.  Just as your DNA determines your physical makeup, your abilities and attributes; in other words, “who you are”. Your talents and strengths makeup the “why you are” in life.   What determines this extraordinary uniqueness is how your strengths work together.  It is akin to a quantum theory explanation.  The quantum analogy depicts the idea that your combined strengths work independently and collectively to fulfill a purpose.  As an example, imagine two sports car drivers that are preparing to race each other.  One driver’s car has five gears and she is skillful at switching from one gear to another.  The second driver has five different cars, each equipped with only one gear.  For him, his potential outcome is limited in having to choose a car that is confined to only one gear. This illustrates how when we are not working in our strengths we are less likely to be consistently successful.

For example, my top 5 strengths are Maximizer, Arranger, Strategic, Analytical and Responsibility so whenever I go out to run errands, I analyze the situation then I strategically arrange my trips responsibly to maximize what I can accomplish.  Consequently, with all 5 of my strengths working in concert, I achieve the best outcome – this is my “YUR...". For those of you trying to find out who you are, I wish you the best of luck.  For those of you that would like to know why you are… we have an answer for you. 

If you are ready to find out what shapes your ability to achieve and you are ready to maximize your “YUR…” by discovering your talents, declaring your strengths and developing them into dynamic tools for success then V1H Consulting will help you to evolve your “YUR…”

The Strength to Lead!

Traits that define a good leader are numerous.  Even the definition of leadership has been debated for decades.  Successful leaders have been described as people that show confidence, that have a positive attitude, that are good listeners and insist on excellence.  Good leaders realize that accountability and responsibility are essential to success and developing others is as important as developing yourself. Making decisions is one of the most important functions performed by leaders.  Many of the activities of managers and administrators involve making and implementing decisions, including planning the work, solving technical and operational problems and creating job assignments. 

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Over the years and through my experience I have come to believe that at its core, true leadership is doing the right thing and making the right decision at the right time.  Earlier this year, the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history occurred at an Orlando nightclub.  During this catastrophic event, Chief Medical Examiner Joshua Stephany had been filling in as medical examiner for Orange and Osceola counties in Florida for about a year, when he was faced with addressing the aftermath.  Dr. Stephany made the decision to separate the bodies of the 49 victims from the body of their executioner.  “There was no legal reason, no protocol” for separating the gunman, Stephany said in an interview.  “It’s just what I felt was right”. 

While everyone may not desire to take on a leadership role in an organization, it is now becoming more imperative that people within organizations be able to step up and adopt a more hands on approach to problem solving.  Twentyfirst century organizations need to be nimble and respond to challenges quickly and effectively to be successful.  In order to do so, they will need their team members to take on leadership roles to be responsive to the challenges presented. 

 In today’s work world, it is more important than ever to develop leaders within your organizations.  The increasing rate of change in the external environment of organizations and the many challenges facing leaders suggest that successful leaders will require a higher level of skill and some new competencies as well. As the need for leadership competencies increases, new techniques for developing them are being invented and old techniques are being refined.  A systems approach to leadership development will become more common as more organizations realized that this activity is strategically important for longterm organizational effectiveness. 

There has been extensive research on the effects of professional development training in organizations.  The research suggest that this usually increases job satisfaction and performance.   After decades of studying some of the most successful employees, leaders and enterprises in the world, Gallup Inc. has found that organizations achieve the highest levels of success by investing in their strongest asset – their people. 

Developing leaders in an organization offers a variety of potential benefits for the manager, the subordinate and the organization.  One benefit is to foster mutually cooperative relationships.  Potential benefits for subordinates include better job adjustment, more skill learning, greater self-confidence and faster career advancement.  The leader can gain a sense of satisfaction from helping others grow and develop.  Potential benefits for the organization include higher employee commitment, higher performance employees who are better prepared to fill positions of greater responsibility in the organization as openings occur. 

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Successful organizations beyond the 21st century will be defined by how well they develop leaders within their ranks.  Employees need to collaborate across the organization to achieve organizational goals and objectives.  This often requires people to step into leadership positions to head teams and coordinate projects.  Developing leaders provides for successful succession planning, highly performing teams and successful project implementation. Organizations that develop internal leaders are better able to adapt and implement changes in the organization. 

When developing leaders, in any organization I have worked with, my successes and most effective outcomes have been when the focus is placed on employee’s strengths.  Using a strengths based approach to leadership development is the best way to instill confidence, develop leadership skills and to build a collaborative culture that supports emerging leaders in an organization. Many organizations are under using the strengths of their employees partially because they have not identified what strengths they have individually or collectively. Bringing these out in your team will be a tremendous benefit to the organization. 

Gallup’s research has shown that organizations that develop their teams around strengths see increases in employee engagement and results including 14.9% lower turnover and 12.5% greater productivity.  A strengths-based approach incorporates identifying the ways in which employees most naturally think, feel and behave and building on those talents to create strengths – the ability to consistently provide near perfect performance in a specific task. A strengths-based approach combines the requirements of the job and performance capabilities (or competencies) demanded by the organization with individuals’ strengths to optimize performance. 

Using a strengths-based approach to develop leaders in the organization is key to maximizing the potential for successful integration and the embodiment of a leadership culture.  It capitalizes on the positive outcomes that a strengths-based approach provides, such as, making progress, employees enjoying what they do and them having a high interest in their work.  By positioning employees in ways that allow them to use their strengths every day and integrating strengths into key processes and systems organizationwide will yield a multitude of benefits for the organization, including increased engagement and retention.  A strengths-based approach aligns an organizations’ policies and practices and anchors them in a common philosophy. 

As we talk about developing leaders, what it really comes down to is outcomes.  When the circumstances arise or as in the crisis in Orlando, will the people in your organization stand up in leadership roles to do the right thing and make a positive difference?  Will they use their strengths to act with confidence and resolve to advance the organization’s goals and vision?  When Dr. Stephany made the decision that he did he didn’t do it for notoriety; he didn’t do it because he had to; he did it because it was the right thing to do and he was truly serving the people that he was hired to serve.  Dr. Stephany used his strengths to lead with dignity and conviction.  

Larry Hammond, Sr. – Certified StrengthsFinder Coach and Principal with V1H Consulting.