ADL’s – Actions of Daily Leadership
I recently had the opportunity to host a remote meeting with a group of industry leaders. The topic was about tools that front-line leaders should have in their managerial toolbox. It was also about how to deploy them in order to positively impact morale and productivity.
As our dialogue unfolded, three main points emerged as universal to all successful leaders. They were about: creating strategic time, limiting distraction, and building trust. If these are applied well they will go a long way to help reduce workplace anxiety and keep things moving forward.
1. Create Time for ADL’s (Actions of Daily Leadership)
Successful leaders create strategic time to perform their non-tactical functions. This means that they re-purpose a portion of their time to specifically engage in non-transactional work. This would be diagnosing and building up their people. Nothing replaces recurring interaction with the leader at predictable intervals.
Since we all get 168 hours per week, it is incumbent on the leader to understand where the time goes. Over the years I’ve recommended that leaders do a time study. This means is that they take a grid and monitor how their allotment of 168 hours per week were used.
Then they re-purpose some amount of time for nothing but big picture things such as an important initiative that seems to get side tracked due to the ‘crisis du jour’ or investing time in managing up star performers.
It can also mean managing up or out habitual underperformers. Removing barriers to spend more time with star performers is a critical ADL. This re-purposed time may be as little as two hours per month and must be set apart diligently if its to have any impact.
2. Successful Leaders Remove Distractions
The second element that successful leaders follow is to reduce or eliminate distraction. Productivity equals our potential (if we did everything 100% correct with zero mistakes), times our intention (what we focus on), minus counterproductive distraction. The formula for doing this is below.
Productivity = potential x intention – distraction
P = (p) x i – (d)
Of course, this is more easily said than done and requires discipline and repetition. It also requires in the ADL that leaders create time to do this. The irony is not lost because we see leaders that are so distracted they never take the time to engage in the strategic activity needed to set up their teams for success. It’s the job of the leader to run interference and to intercept counterproductive distraction.
So the question then becomes, “How do we identify the things that cause distraction?” What are the top 2-3 things you can identify, that if reduced or eliminated, would increase your focus on things that matter?
For some, it might be the person in the office that says “Hey do you have a minute,” that turns into an hour. For others it may be sports or politics or religion or something that causes their energy to spill out over into the workplace.
3. Successful Leaders Meet 1:1 to Build Trust
The third element that successful leaders engaged in is taking time to create office hours to meet individually with subordinates and colleagues to build trust. Trust may be defined as confidence in a leader’s future actions. I have heard it said that trust is the currency by which we transact business and that relationships or the conduit through which that business flows.
Remember, nothing replaces recurring interaction with the leader at predictable intervals. It instills confidence. Leaders must be secure enough in their own skin to navigate potential obstacles without overreacting to them. The formula for building trust is below. This means leaders must take the focus off themselves and place it externally on others.
Trustworthiness = Credibility + Reliability + Intimacy / Self-Orientation
When trust is built incrementally over time, with subordinates and colleagues, discretionary effort is captured. Overall results and the quality of results will likely increase. Bad turn over tends to be minimized as star performers are more likely to be retained and less likely to look elsewhere.
Leadership is not for the faint of heart. You will likely encounter circumstances beyond your control. However, when these three principles are applied, the leader will have a better shot navigating challenging circumstances.
