People in the zone

Lately, I’ve been thinking (and ended up discussing) a lot about people management and leadership in this space. I’ve been exposed to multiple “schools of thought” if you will and thought it is time for me to put it down in words what I believe, mainly so I can work through my thoughts and get clarity. This is what personal blogging is all about, isn’t it?

First of all, the one school of thought around this I have been exposed to mostly is what I would call a “militaristic” attitude towards people management. Leaders who believe in this philosophy draw a lot of comparisons to the military: they are talking about “boots on the ground”, the “field”, “seal teams”, and so on and so forth. I do believe there are a great many lessons that can be drawn from military leadership, but I think it’s important to understand that these lessons were learned, formalized and implemented through and for combat and conquest, not business. Of course, there are parallels. But you don’t have to study the “Art of War” to learn how to lead people - it’s just one pathway to the subject. I think the mistake that’s often made here is that these philosophies get singled out as the ultimate approach to people management; when in fact, they are rooted in military leadership and supremacy. In addition, there are situations where these lessons fall short of what’s appropriate. There is no concept of “self sacrifice”, no “Purple Heart“ for account managers or engineers. What does that even mean. I’ve observed many leaders (some of which I reported to directly) misapply these lessons and even celebrate their application, when in fact it only demotivates and destabilizes the organization.

In stark contrast is the empathetic school of people management. This is about getting in touch with the organizations feelings and psychological needs, and cater to them in order to gently persuade them to do what’s right. However, as awesome as this is, it is not necessarily results-oriented. While a military has an objective (win the deal, deliver the product, etc.), this approach essentially treats this as a side-effect of people being highly motivated and therefore internally incentivized to deliver on time - fulfilling the roadmap or closing the deal. I have never worked for someone who applies this, but certainly my LinkedIn feed is full of videos explaining that this is the “better way”. I just fail to see how that would actually work in a resource constrained business scenario where funding runs out in 30 days. Do we really have time to talk about our feelings?

The Libra in me years to find balance between these two approaches. I will confess to over-rotating to the second approach, but that’s likely mainly because I’ve “suffered” through misapplication of the former. So how to find my path through these two ends of the spectrum? Certainly, I think work would be a lot more “fun” if folks felt good about their work and their mission. On the other hand, if all we do is feel good about ourselves, we will not achieve anything.

Quite a while ago, I was sequestered in a think tank in Aspen; one of the speakers we listened to (we alternated between discussions and lectures) were Olympic athletes. One had recently won the X games (snowboarding). Both of them talked about how, when they are working out, and moving towards their goals, they try to be “in the zone”. What is that? It is a state of mind where you forget time and place. Being in the zone means you are fully in the “now”, immersed and focused on your work, but relaxed so it doesn’t feel tiring. It is a state of optimal output and performance, and interestingly enough, it doesn’t tire you out at all - it motivates you, to the point that you react negatively to interruptions. It is obviously a state of mind all employers wish their employees were in most of the time. So what would people management and leadership look like if you optimized for creating that?

• you would have no imposed meetings, you would have spontaneous conversations.

Imagine: there’s no notification on your phone telling you that on the hour, for half an hour, you shall discuss a topic. A topic that may only require 10 minutes to discuss. A topic that you’d feel better discussing after having done a little more work. Now you’re stressing, and for what? Just so Bob hears the latest update? Gimme a break.

• you would work whenever and wherever you need to work in order to get into the zone.

Imagine: working in nature or in coffee shops. But rather than Zoom calls, be able to convene with others in person when necessary. Make spaces appear spontaneously for deep discussions and whiteboarding sessions, but have no logistics to take care of: “oh do you have the room now? I guess we’ll completely eliminate our train of thought and delete the whiteboard with our ideas because the calendar says so”.

• you would not ever be bothered on your personal time, whether that’s on vacation or after hours.

Imagine: project deadlines being met because all are in the zone and naturally deliver at max performance, in a relaxed manner. A deadline is just a day, with planning and flexibility, especially if (1.) and (2.) are realized, it’s easy. In fact, you could make every Friday be a deadline for the team or the company, simply remain prepared to present what has been done. Because folks are deeply engrossed and in the zone, talking about it becomes natural; this means leaders need to accept the various different communication styles people have. You like documents? Go send them. Like PowerPoint? Can’t say I relate, but you do you… go present! Draw? Speak? Gesticulate? Go for it!

Sounds like nirvana and it probably is. However, if you can’t describe the ideal state, you cannot express the gap between where you’re at and what that is, and you can’t be precise in your priorities to close it.

So I think that (1.) - (3.) could be approximated if one develops the right culture in the company, and it starts with onboarding. Carefully done, onboarding people ensures the right attitude to how work is getting done. Early stage startups have this energy naturally because people are excited about the vision and it’s easy to subscribe to the common energy around that. But this is like being smitten versus being in love. Building something that lasts beyond crisis of faiths, adversity, set backs, or wild success, starts with the right attitude towards work - I think if as leaders and people managers we can instill the wisdom of staying focused on making it easy to stay “in the zone”, a lot of the other corollary do’s and don’ts follow naturally.

How will I implement all of this? I have no idea, but I know that if it is to be implemented anywhere, the concept of “working manager” needs to be eliminated. You have to focus on this stuff full-time I think.