Sometimes in life you meet people who impact your life at just the right moment to change your trajectory. In my sophomore year of college, I met one of those people. James "Butter Allen" was the person and the life lesson he taught me helped to shape my approach to leadership at the very beginning of my career.
First, let's look at how I met Butter. He was a campus leader at my college and oversaw people involved in campus life roles, floor leaders in residence halls, campus security and housing assistants, etc. He worked with many students and interacted as a key student liaison between the students and faculty. We connected as my sophomore year was evolving and I was working to balance life and school. The burdens and stress of trying to grow up, develop social norms and balance financial needs were pretty intense and he caught me (think angel with wings here) at a point where I could use some catching. He helped me find balance and introduced me into the campus life work world where I would hold a succession of leader and manager positions around campus for the next 3 years to balance the financial load of college better. He also took the time to mentor me and provided a good outlet for support when the challenges of college piled up.
Across my college years Butter was a constant source of support, an amazing friend and mentor. So, as we found each other on the quad after graduation and shared a hug, I asked him what I could do to repay the friendship he had shown me for so many years. Thank you simply didn't feel like it was enough. In his own special way, he smiled at me and shared his life mantra. He said if I truly wanted to show appreciation, I should play it forward following his credo on making thing better. His simple guiding philosophy was this; Each One, Teach One.
Today, I continue to carry this guiding principle with me in all I do. It has great simplicity to it which makes it easy to remember and easy to share. But it also comes with great responsibility when you truly embrace it and put it into practice. It works across just about every facet of your life; work, family, friends, teams and associations. It doesn't really matter what you are doing or where you are doing it. Simply put, when you are participating in an activity with others and you have something that can make an individual or the group better, you would take the time to share what you know. You should pass along knowledge, encourage and empower people, and you should be willing to invest the time it takes to teach someone.
Let's take that last sentence apart a little and look at each piece of it. It says a lot about the Each One Teach One philosophy.
Pass along knowledge. This one is pretty important and forces you to determine what knowledge is valuable and what knowledge is trivial. You have to be able to self-assess whether or not what you know is value-added or simple personal opinion. This is harder than it seems. What our parents always taught us may not always be the right answer and what we have tried and succeeded with may not always be the only path. Being able to determine when what we have to offer will be helpful and then being able to pass it along in the right context and with a positive spirit attached to it actually requires practice and patience. Trainers and mentors are skilled at positioning ideas in the right way, but they are not the only ones who should share insights. We all have special skills, abilities and knowledge we can and should share. While we might not always be perfect in our delivery, if your efforts are heart-felt the message will come through.
Encourage and empower. How you share is just as important as what you share. The difference between narcissist and mentor can be a fine line some days. Sincerity is the key to walking on the right side of this line. When you truly care and are sincere in your effort to help and share you will be viewed as a mentor and leader. People will want to hear what you have to offer when the message is positive and re-enforces your desire to help them or the group succeed. Supportive ideas and feedback that help people learn and grow will empower them to succeed and will encourage them to do the same thing for others.
Invest the time to teach. Nothing good ever seems to happen quickly. If you want to teach, train or share important learnings you need to be ready to invest the time to do it right. Finding the time to show people you value the experience will increase the positive impact you can make. Not having enough time to share a thought or doing a "drive by" type of effort will not likely result in a positive outcome as it doesn't show people that what you are sharing is important to you. If it's not important to you, it probably won't be to them either. Often times, the moment for feedback is when the current situation is over and there is time to reflect. As a sales leader I always liked to do curbside check-ins. What this meant is that feedback came after meetings were over, but before we left a sales visit location, so the experience was still fresh in everyone's memory. If topics needed further explanation I could then follow-up with additional mentoring later but the basis for that training was then set in place.
As is frequently the case in business, team meetings and group training sessions are the right place where appropriate time can be set aside to invest in people properly. With well scripted agendas, examples of work and success and enough time to dive into the learning opportunities, planned training sessions are ideal. in many companies these sessions get tacked on to other planned meetings as fewer companies have full-time training departments these days. Regardless of the reason for the gathering, properly planned enrichment opportunities are always a good idea. When employees feel you are investing in their growth, they are more likely to want to stay on the team and will take a similar posture when they work together, helping each other along.
A Few Other Thoughts
While many of these ideas may be self-evident, it doesn't hurt to share a few other best practices in mentoring.
Q & L. That's correct, Q&L, not Q&A. Question and Listen. A simple but often unused approach to giving feedback is to ask questions about how the other person perceived the situation and then to listen to what they say. In some case they will walk themselves to a better idea or alternate approach. In many cases you will learn their goal or idea was spot on but maybe their approach or positioning of ideas didn't deliver the message well. In a lot of cases, I have found that maybe I didn't fully understand something in the process or that they had a great approach that I hadn't thought through. When you ask the right questions and listen you do two key things; 1. you can better assess that your planned feedback is proper, 2. you begin to engage the person from a positive standpoint where they are speaking, and feeling heard. You are creating a more receptive audience.
Ask for Permission. It is often good to ask the person if you can provide them some thoughts on the situation or results. When you do this, you enable them to invite your comments and to know what is coming in advance, so they are in the right frame of mind. While you may not "have to" do this, it almost always helps. While rank, title or position may give the responsibility for providing feedback, it still helps to check in to make sure the person is in the right place and frame of mind to receive your thoughts. An example of how you might do this would be "I think you did a great job in today's sales call. I had the chance to observe your work and wanted to see if I could share some thoughts on what I saw."
Be Prepared. One thing that many managers fail at is not being properly prepared for the teaching moment. Having just witnessed something and seeing a chance to encourage additional thinking some folks will launch right into a conversation. Being prepared means a few things. Having a planned outcome from the interaction clear in your mind. Having actual examples ready to be shared so people can understand. Having enough time to work through the conversation that may evolve. Being able to reflect on and share how the shared learning might have changed the end result. If you haven't prepared for these things, you may not be prepared to create a good dialogue for you or the person you are trying to help.
Application
These principles and thoughts are a starter for those who want to bring their A game to the teaching process. As many people are learning these days, the teaching and training process can be tougher than we think. With students being home schooled, parents are thrust into the role of teacher (often on a long-forgotten subjects) where they need to practice many new skills. As we all find new appreciation for those who educate our children, we are also all getting a daily practice session for our professional lives. If I can get my 10-year-old daughter to actually hear what I am saying and can help her direct her efforts in a better direction, I would like to believe doing so with an adult when I am at work should be easier. Since it is not optional, we might as well make the most of the homeschooling experience and try to turn it into a quasi-practice field for work too.
A word of caution here too given the times we currently live in. Tougher feedback is always best face to face. People need to see your non-verbal's and you need to see theirs to ensure the conversation is positive. I am a strong believer that an employee should never be surprised by their performance review. If you are coaching and mentoring well, people should have a sense of where they stand all the time. However, if the feedback is not critical to avoiding an imminent disaster, I might recommend holding tougher conversations until you can comfortably be 6 feet apart again. Make good notes and save the harder conversations for time here people are less stressed, and you can deliver them in person. It falls under the be prepared concept above, video chats and phone calls may not be the best platforms for feedback and teaching on tougher subjects. Think about the options and be conscious of your approach.
No matter what social or professional opportunity you should come up to, when you can help someone grow, I hope you will embrace the opportunity. Each One, Teach One. Try to pay it forward to make those around you better and be open to learning when others try to help you. This philosophy will help you leave a positive impression on the world around. Good luck in your journey.
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