How to Gain Team Buy-In for Leadership Choices

When I started leading a high-powered recruiting team, I had the traits of the TYRANT leaders I now call out. Here's why: Despite my degrees, certificates, and ongoing professional development, nothing prepared me to transition into leading. I still had an individual contributor (IC) mindset, which unintentionally led me to compete with my very capable team. At the time, I engaged in behaviors like: Taking over projects instead of developing my team. Working long hours, thinking it showed commitment. Making unilateral decisions vs collaborating. Giving orders instead of providing clarity and context. Hoarding information instead of communicating transparently. Prioritizing my metrics over team goals. A month in, my boss at the time sat down with me and told me to own my transition and to stop taking over work when someone asked for help. (she's one of the best Leader's I've ever had) To transform my mindset, I sought out a few internal sponsors and observed how they managed their teams. I also asked my team for feedback on where I could do better. Once I made the changes: mindset and action, I began demonstrating new leadership behaviors: Coaching my team and developing their problem-solving skills. ↳Created an authorization matrix to empower them to make decisions. Promoting work-life balance through prioritization and delegation. ↳I stopped working on vacation to set a better example. Making collaborative decisions to increase buy-in. ↳They worked on the reqs, so I asked for their ideas and where I could implement them. Painting a vision and equipping the team to get there themselves. ↳I translated the organization's vision down to how it affected our team goals. Openly communicating to build trust and transparency. ↳I promoted democratic decision-making and explained when it needed to be autocratic. Aligning on and championing team goals over my individual metrics. ↳I held weekly reviews where I celebrated their success because it was OUR success. Here's what I want you to take from this: 1. Develop your team's skills rather than trying to be the expert. 2. Delegate decisions to increase buy-in and leverage diverse perspectives. 3. Openly share information rather than hoarding knowledge and insight. 4. Recognize and elevate your team's contributions rather than taking individual credit. #aLITTLEadvice #leadership

I was Wrong about Influence. Early in my career, I believed influence in a decision-making meeting was the direct outcome of a strong artifact presented and the ensuing discussion. However, with more leadership experience, I have come to realize that while these are important, there is something far more important at play. Influence, for a given decision, largely happens outside of and before decision-making meetings. Here's my 3 step approach you can follow to maximize your influence: (#3 is often missed yet most important) 1. Obsess over Knowing your Audience Why: Understanding your audience in-depth allows you to tailor your communication, approach and positioning. How: ↳ Research their backgrounds, how they think, what their goals are etc. ↳ Attend other meetings where they are present to learn about their priorities, how they think and what questions they ask. Take note of the topics that energize them or cause concern. ↳ Engage with others who frequently interact with them to gain additional insights. Ask about their preferences, hot buttons, and any subtle cues that could be useful in understanding their perspective. 2. Tailor your Communication Why: This ensures that your message is not just heard but also understood and valued. How: ↳ Seek inspiration from existing artifacts and pickup queues on terminologies, context and background on the give topic. ↳ Reflect on their goals and priorities, and integrate these elements into your communication. For instance, if they prioritize efficiency, highlight how your proposal enhances productivity. ↳Ask yourself "So what?" or "Why should they care" as a litmus test for relatability of your proposal. 3. Pre-socialize for support Why: It allows you to refine your approach, address potential objections, and build a coalition of support (ahead of and during the meeting). How: ↳ Schedule informal discussions or small group meetings with key stakeholders or their team members to discuss your idea(s). A casual coffee or a brief virtual call can be effective. Lead with curiosity vs. an intent to respond. ↳ Ask targeted questions to gather feedback and gauge reactions to your ideas. Examples: What are your initial thoughts on this draft proposal? What challenges do you foresee with this approach? How does this align with our current priorities? ↳ Acknowledge, incorporate and highlight the insights from these pre-meetings into the main meeting, treating them as an integral part of the decision-making process. What would you add? PS: BONUS - Following these steps also expands your understanding of the business and your internal network - both of which make you more effective. --- Follow me, tap the (🔔) Omar Halabieh for daily Leadership and Career posts.

Struggling to get everyone on board? Some clients complain that they feel like they are hearding cats. I remember leading projects like this and was frustrated until I learned a better way. Here's a step-by-step guide to achieve stakeholder buy-in: 1. Gather Perspectives → Why it works: Provides a complete view of stakeholder positions. ↳ Action: Ask each stakeholder about their understanding of project goals, benefits, and concerns. 2. Identify Misalignments → Why it works: Pinpoints areas needing attention. ↳ Action: List key differences in a shared document, analyzing root causes and impacts. 3. Plan Actions → Why it works: Creates a roadmap for resolution. ↳ Action: Develop specific steps to improve alignment, assigning owners and deadlines. 4. Implement Strategies → Why it works: Addresses concerns systematically. ↳ Action: Adjust project elements as needed and enhance communication to meet stakeholder needs. By following these steps, you'll turn potential roadblocks into a path to project success. — P.S. Unlock 20 years' worth of leadership lessons sent straight to your inbox. Every Wednesday, I share exclusive insights and actionable tips on my newsletter. (Link in my bio to sign up). Remember, leaders succeed together.

Several companies have asked me how do you get an organization to buy into community-led growth. Here’s how I do it👇🏼 1) It starts at the top - Before anything else, the executive team must buy in - For that to happen, they need to see how they’ll get ROI from the investment - They also want to know how it’ll impact their personal brand. Most executives have multiple fractional/advisor positions. 2) Once the top buys in, create a community intake form for your employees to fill out. - Purpose of this form is to figure out who in your organization has been proactively networking and who isn’t 5 simple questions to ask in the form: 🧠 Do you post weekly on LinkedIn? 🚀 Do you engage with others on LinkedIn daily? 🥂What events did you go to last year? 👫 What communities are you currently a part of? 🍹What events do you plan on going to this year and why? 3) Once you understand how involved the members of your team are in networking/community, you can then begin creating an employee advocacy program. - This program explains to the readers why as a team we need to be posting on LinkedIn, joining slack communities, and going to events. - It also needs to explain why it’s good for their personal brand and how it’ll help them move up in their careers much faster. - You can’t stop there… in the program you must teach them best practices for engaging with others on LinkedIn, in slack communties, and at events. - You should also provide them community resources so they don’t have to do research on their own to find communities they are interested in 4) Once you complete the advocacy program, meet with the VPs & Directors of each vertical within your company to explain the value of the initiative. - Once you get buy in from the VPs/Directors, ask them to roll out the intiative to their teams. Why? They are the leaders in their verticals and therefore have to most comradely with their team. Having the message come from them and not you is really important. Their team will take the initiative much more seriously. 5) Rewards & Incentives - When everything has been laid out and employees at the company start posting, you need to recognize their efforts. - Host a quarterly meeting with the entire team letting them know you’ve seen their efforts by calling out specific individuals whose posts have gone viral and or have joined different communities resulting in revenue opportunities 6) Send a monthly intake form to each team member asking them for updates on the questions they were asked previously - Create a chart showing the progress of the company as a whole - Compare that progress with revenue from the year - I promise there will be a positive correlation, which will prove to the excutive team the intiative was well worth it. 7) Once theirs proof, your executives will want to double down on community #community #communitydevelopment #saas #gtm #branding #awareness

THE POWER OF FACILITATION – PART II WHY DOES FACILITATION WORK AND WHY DON’T MORE LEADERS WORK IT? In an earlier post I described how, as a big-8 consultant, we found that when WE created a solution, a year later maybe the client would have implemented 15%. But when we facilitated a client team in creating the solutions, when we would come back a year later 80% would be implemented! The big question is why? Dr. Robert Zawacki from the University of Colorado put it this way:   ED = RD × CD The D throughout the equation is the same word: decision. He said that an Effective Decision = the Right Decision times Commitment to the Decision. What does this mean? This means that you may know the right decision for your client, but if your client has zero commitment to it, how effective is it? Zero. Anything times zero is zero. Likewise, if as a leader you know the right decision for your team, but your team has zero commitment to it, how effective is it? Zero. Unfortunately, when it comes to solving a problem, or setting a direction, or making a decision, many leaders go behind closed doors to figure out what the right decision is and then try to build commitment to it after they come out. Wrong answer. The key is to do these two things (right decision and commitment to the decision) at the same time. How? You get the people impacted by the decision in the room helping to create the decision, this automatically builds buy-in and commitment to it. This is called facilitation. And facilitation works. If you work it. Why does it work? Because through facilitation you can get better decisions, often faster, and here’s the kicker, with higher levels of buy-in and commitment. So, you may be wondering why don’t most leaders do this? Why don’t most leaders use facilitation? Because most of them don’t know how. They don’t know how to be a facilitative leader. News Flash: There’s a book on how to do it! The 8 Core Practices of Facilitative Leaders. The book talks about the eight key things facilitative leaders do that help them achieve higher performance by inspiring their people to greatness and engaging them in in problem solving and decision making. The eight core practices make up what is called the SUCCEEDS model. ·      Start with the why; engage with the how ·      Understand and empower; don’t command and control ·      Communicate in their language, not yours ·      Connect first; correct second ·      Equip for success, monitor for results ·      Engage conflict; encourage disagreement ·      Drive strategic thinking throughout the organization ·      Start, execute, and close every meeting masterfully So, I believe more leaders don’t use facilitation because they don’t know how. What about you? From your experience, IF FACILITATION WORKS, WHY DON’T MORE LEADERS WORK IT? #Facilitation