15 May 2018 The Most Dangerous Career Derailers (Part 1) – Arrogance and Disrespect
I was sitting in front of the CEO of a well-known global company. “I need you to coach my Senior VP,” he said. “He is one of our most talented executives. He is bright, hard-working, and has lots of experience. But if he does not change his behavior, we will not be able to promote him to the next level, and in time he will probably leave our company.”
After hearing this type of comments from many executives over the years, I decided to compile a list of the most frequent Career Derailers that I witnessed in my work as an Executive Coach. In this series of posts, I will share my thoughts on these derailers and what you can do to address them.
Admittedly fixing them requires a healthy dose of self-awareness, focus, and persistent effort. But if the derailer is painful enough and you are determined to fix it, a demonstrable positive outcome can definitely be achieved.
In this post, I will talk about the derailer of arrogance and disrespect. In the next post, I will discuss the inability to influence your senior leaders in the merits of your opinion or your action plan.
1. Arrogance and Disrespect
This is the most common career derailer. I am amazed at how many leaders are told by their boss that if they do not fix this flaw, their career will not move forward. My observation is that the higher a leader moves up within the organization, the more he or she tends to abuse the authority vested in them by virtue of their position. I have noticed that often the ability of a leader to withstand even the slightest irritation is diminished as the pressure on him or her increases. These leaders are quick to “blow a fuse”, and demonstrate a range of unacceptable behaviors including interrupting their team members, not allowing them the space to express their opinion, shaming them in front of their colleagues, and showing very little empathy even in the most difficult situations.
The reason for this behavior is often rooted in the leader’s inability to handle the stress associated with his or her job, and their natural automatic response is to behave in arrogant, disrespectful, and aggressive ways.
Have you ever encountered a leader like this?
Fixing the Arrogance and Disrespect Derailer
Below is a five-step plan that will help address this derailer:
a. Get a 360 degrees review. If you suspect that you are facing this derailer, start by getting a 360 degrees review that will ask your boss, peers, and team members to provide their observations on your behaviors. This will give you an indication of how you are perceived and how critical is the challenge you are facing. The 360 reviews can be administered by the Human Resources group in your company, or even directly by yourself.
b. Determine your Goal and Achievement Plan. If the feedback you receive is painful and you are willing to commit to doing whatever it takes to fix this derailer, then you should define a SMART goal (Specific, Measurable, Agreed-upon, Realistic, and Time-bound), a detailed plan for how you will achieve it, and how much time and energy you are committing to spend on your goal. Write down your goal and plan and share them with your mentor or your coach.
c. Develop self-awareness. Every improvement plan has to start with developing an acute awareness of the behavior you want to change. This means your ability to say to yourself at the moment “Oops. Here I go again”. The purpose here is not to beat yourself over the head every time you do the undesired behavior, but rather to give yourself the opportunity to pause and switch to your new desired behavior.
d. Between the stimulus and the response. The psychologist Viktor E. Frankl once said “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lie our growth and our freedom”. Before you respond to a challenging situation, take a 10-second pause, take a deep breath, and disarm the negative emotions that are threatening to derail you. Then consider the rational and appropriate behavior that is most suitable for the situation at hand. At the end of the day, take 5 minutes to write in your Growth Journal the experience you went through, your response, and the outcome. If you consistently practice this approach for six months you will notice a demonstrable change in your behavior, which your 360 reviewers will attest to as well.
e. Report progress to your Accountability Partner (AP). Your AP is a person you trust and respect, who has your interest at heart, and who is willing and able to support you in achieving your goal. It can be a mentor, a coach, a trusted friend, or a spouse. Research shows that writing and sharing your goal, your plan, and your progress with your Accountability Partner increases the probability of achieving your goal by up to 95%.
****************************
If you are facing a career derailer challenge and you wish to explore ways to address it, please do not hesitate to contact me for a free consultation at Uri@thewilltochange.com
In the next post, I will discuss the derailer of frustration with the inability to influence your senior leadership in the correctness of your opinion or action plan.
Learn More:
To read our other leadership-related posts go to https://www.thewilltochange.com/blog-and-tools/execu-blog/
To subscribe to our Willpower Posts email us at Info@thewilltochange.com
