Authenticity

Just got back from a ballet, produced by the dance school my daughters attend. The performance is always first-rate and of course it’s a treat to see my kids looking so poised and lovely, but this year it wasn’t the same. My favorite dancer graduated from high school last year and a tiny bit of the life went out of it as a result.

Carmen was essentially a train wreck as a dancer. A little too stocky, a little too busty. She usually looked as though she’d wandered onto the stage by accident, mouthed the choreography to herself as she danced, occasionally bumped into her fellow dancers (and apologized profusely for it), and once, actually stopped and rolled her eyes before gamely picking up where she left off. She had gorgeous brown eyes and a dazzling, over-sized smile, and her curly, curly hair was so vibrant that she scattered hair pins with every pirouette – and I watched in fascination as her bun came completely undone in the middle of a Tarantella. Props in her hands were shredded or lost before the number was over, and heaven forbid her costume included any kind of headpiece: it was usually obscuring her vision a moment or two after the music started.

I adored Carmen, and according to my daughters, everyone at the school thought she was the nicest person they ever met. When she was focused, her dancing conveyed pure joy, and I was just . . . . happier . . . . each time she was on stage. I’d scan the program, looking for her name, and get a little giddy when she was due on stage.

Years of attending dance recitals will teach you a few things. First and foremost, stage presence is a rare commodity. Carmen had stage presence in spades. Whether she was in danger of knocking someone over or whether she was conveying pure emotion with one gesture of her hand, you couldn’t take your eyes off her. Second, authenticity is even more rare than stage presence. It requires so much bravery and character to shine authentically through the perfectly made-up face, the perfectly gelled and styled bun, and the exhaustively rehearsed dance combinations that not many young girls can manage it. Carmen did – no one was more authentic on that stage than she was, and that’s what made her riveting.

Carmen showed me the value of authenticity. Being what you authentically are gives people a reason to respond to you, root for you, connect with you. And in a cookie-cutter workplace, it shows you have both the bravery and courage to shine.

I Agree With you

When I was twenty-five, I fell into the one of my favorite jobs ever, working in the conference division of a hugely-respected think tank in Washington, DC. I had literally come from a waitressing stint at TGI Fridays, so it was a wee bit of an understatement to say I felt very out of my league among the Ph.Ds and People You See On Sunday Morning Talk Shows. I don’t know why, but my boss liked my work, and championed me through several promotions. In our ten years of working together, he taught me a ton about the kind of leader I wanted to be.

Shortly after being promoted, I sat in on a meeting with the Senior Staff – don’t remember what the topic was about, but they were having a hard time reaching agreement. My boss listened without comment to one person make his case, then another, until everyone had a chance to speak their mind. Finally, he turned to me, and asked what I thought.

It was the first time I had to give an opinion in front of this rather intimidating group, but I took a breath and spoke as honestly – and as diplomatically – as I could. When I was finished, my boss paused a moment, then said, “I agree with you.”

The meeting went on for another twenty minutes, but I have no clue what else was discussed. I floated the rest of the day on those four words, words that did more to make me feel I belonged than anything else up to then.

I’ve thought an awful lot about the power of words, and how the right ones can do more to make someone feel like a contributing part of the team than all the platitudes about teamwork and people first we usually yodel about in the workplace. I sincerely doubt that my boss carefully considered what would be a prime moment to insert a motivational phrase, but as motivators go, “I agree with you” is just fine, and in that instance, it was perfect. Anything more effusive, and he would have been patronizing the junior member at the table. Instead, he treated me as a colleague, sending a clear signal to the rest of the Senior Staff that they could, too.

The Take-Away: If you can say something along the lines of “I agree with you,” “that was well-said,” “I hadn’t thought of it from that angle before,” “you handled that well,” to someone, and you’re confident that you mean it sincerely, please say it. You never know who could use a little positive affirmation, or where it will take them.

The Question Behind The Question

I was recently laid off from my job when a government contract dissolved unexpectedly. The lay-off was a huge shock, because I’d only started with the company four months earlier, and I was looking forward to a long, productive relationship with my new colleagues.

I cried, I freaked out, I drove around for weeks with the contents of my office in the trunk of my car. I did pull myself together enough, however, to file a claim with the Employment Commission, who promptly sent me a letter denying me unemployment benefits because according to my employer’s records, I didn’t earn income for two consecutive quarters.

Sure enough, the paperwork showed that I while I earned money in the 3^rd quarter of 2010, I earned zero dollars in the 4^th quarter of 2010. So I sent a friendly, “what gives?” e-mail to my former boss. Her reply was equally friendly: yeah, she couldn’t report 4^th quarter information yet because the payroll company always works one quarter behind.

Now most people instantly grasp that I didn’t contact my boss to learn about the intricacies of payroll reporting. Her answer left me as much in the dark as before.

By responding only to the immediate issue, she missed the Question behind the question, and that’s where you often get to the heart of a person’s true need. Imagine how different her response would have felt if my boss got to the root of my question by adding, “I’ll call them tomorrow to expedite a form to Employment Services and let you know when it’s OK to re-file your claim,” or even “So sorry, but there’s nothing I can do until next quarter.”

The Take-Away: Don’t assume that people will ask the right questions – for tons of reasons, they may not be able to. When you take on some of the responsibility for understanding the underlying need, you demonstrate respect and the clear a path for better results in the future.

I’m sitting here with a knot in my stomach, wondering what to write, hating the fact that I’ve become that most cliché of clichés, a person frozen at the keyboard. Even more cliché is the reason why I’m here in the first place: because one colleague/friend/innocent bystander too many said, “honestly, you should write this stuff down.”

Well, perhaps.

In my too-many-to-want-to-count years of employment, I’ve worked with some amazing people – many in an “I’d give you my kidney in a heartbeat” kind of way, others in a “how on earth do you make it through the day?” kind of way. Each kind taught me a boatload about how I wanted to be, as a colleague, as a supervisor, and ultimately as a person. What if I used this space to tell some stories, share a take-away message that might help someone else tweak their collegiality, their supervisory ability? Yes? Maybe?

I’ll give it a try. I commit to you that I am not out to mock anyone – if I do, let me know. Also tell me your experiences (and tell me if I can shape them into little stories with take-away messages, too). Give me some time to find my sea legs – this is all very weird to me – and let’s see where we go.

Tomorrow: Answering the question behind the question.