Blood sucking vampires lurk in the shadows of your organization. If you don’t stop them, they’ll drain you.
Any fool can drain energy. Real leaders create it.
Fires, left to themselves, go out. Environments spiral down. Energy drains.
Energized environments are never an accident.
10 ways to defeat vampires:
- Practice one thing. At the end of a meeting ask the team, “What’s one simple thing we can do today that will help us create an energizing environment.” Do that one thing. Smile when you meet someone, make “I like statements” before asking for something, or, pat five people on the back, literally.
- Stop into a teammate’s office and say, “I’ve been thinking about you and the three qualities you have that will take you far in your career are ….”
- Call the team into the conference room for a surprise “What’s Working” meeting. If all you talk about are problems, you have a dark environment.
- Ask people what they’re working on.
- Go to a high performer and ask them to share something they do that others don’t.
- Address an energy draining situation.
- Tell people what’s important now.
- Eliminate an unnecessary policy or procedure. Policies are always added. What about eliminating some?
- Post pictures of teammates doing their work on the company intranet.
- Call your favorite customer and ask, “What can I do for you?”
Bonus: Break a routine.
You don’t need position or status to be an energizer.
27 “E” words for leaders:
This is the “E” installment of the Dictionary for Leaders. Tomorrow is “F.” Other leadership “E” words:
- Eat
- Edge
- Elastic
- Elevate
- Empathy
- Empower
- Enable
- End
- Encounter
- Encourage
- Endeavor
- Endure
- Engage
- Energy
- Enthusiasm
- Enough
- Equilibrium
- Equity
- Establish
- Evaluate
- Evolve
- Exact
- Examine
- Example
- Excellence
- Express
- Extreme
Thanks to Facebook fans for a great list of leadership “E’s.”
How can you create energy rather than drain it?
Feel free to develop any other “E” word for leaders.