It took me a lotta years to learn a lesson that everyone else knew but me. And I wasted a lot of time and energy on fool’s errands fighting my way forward or dragging my heels kicking and screaming to prove everyone else wrong.
Once I tell you what it is, you’re likely to chuckle to yourself and think: Duh! I could’ve told him that!
Here it is: I’m not in control of everything.
In fact, I’m only able to control a very few things, and I’m not particularly good at those.
At work, that can be a problem, because our and our company’s success depends on other people doing what we ask them to do. And we don’t control what anyone else thinks, feels, says, or does.
Worse yet, no one wants to work for a controlling boss.
We intuitively know there is a host of outside influences to our company’s success that we can’t control: natural (and man-made) disasters, the weather, global pandemics, government regulations, the past and future, etc. While knowing it doesn’t keep us from being concerned about it, that’s why we make contingency plans for when things go wrong. It’s what keeps a crisis from turning into chaos.
But worrying about things we don’t control is a waste of time and energy.
People, on the other hand…
Ultimately, what other people say and do is out of our control. So, what should we do, throw up our hands in defeat when someone’s behavior blocks the road to success?
Of course not. That’s where influence plays a key role in our leadership. Yes, manipulators influence others, too – to their own advantage or to serve their own purpose; leaders use their influence for the good of the organization.
Think of influence – like emotional intelligence – as a superpower that you can use for good or evil. Leaders use it for good.
If you’ve been a reader of At C-Level for any length of time, you know that people don’t do what we ask for three reasons: they don’t know how, we won’t let them, and/or they don’t want to. We may control the institutional roadblocks that keep them from being able, but we can only influence what they know and what they want to do.
And only we can control how we exert that influence.
As leaders, when we leave others feeling cared about and that their efforts contribute to success – both theirs and the organization’s – there’s a better chance than not we’ll see a positive change in behavior.
On the other hand, if what we say and do feels like manipulation to others, well… I don’t know about you, but I don’t respond well to manipulation.
And then there’s the big, bad world. If we rail about The Man about something we have no control or influence over, we’re wasting our breath. It doesn’t even really make us feel better.
And how we feel is something only we have control over.
Trust me; I know it’s hard to let go. Especially for us control freaks (you know who you are). It takes effort and has to be intentional. To this day I keep a reminder on my desk to separate what I can control from what I can’t.
Bottom line: control what you can, influence what you need to (to benefit the organization), and stop fretting over the other stuff. Don’t spend needless energy or resources when you’re actually out of control.
But that’s up to you, leaders.
