As is to be expected in the resolution-making season, recent weeks have seen an avalanche of sources providing advice to leaders. The avalanche isn’t a reaction to any previous shortage of such advice. Instead, it seems providing advice across many elements of life is our conditioned response to the coming end of the year.
That said, the reason people continue to seek advice is that there remains an unmet need. For whatever reason, leaders or would be leaders are still looking for something that works. These seekers may be frustrated again this year, because reviewing the proffered advice reminds the reviewer that everything old is new again. In 2020, do leaders need to be good communicators of a compelling vision, to be ethical and fair decision makers, to provide feedback and opportunities to followers, to be accountable, and so on? Yes, they do – just like they needed to be in 2019.
It isn’t just doing the right thing – a leader needs to do the right thing in the right way.
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A closer look at what has been shared reveals that the recommendations to leaders focus on two things: how leaders present themselves and how leaders behave. These are critical considerations because failure here will make the leader’s job more difficult. It doesn’t hurt to be reminded of them. That said, why does there need to be so much reminding of what leaders must do in order to be effective? Is the reason leaders still struggle because they forgot – or never realized – the importance of clear communication? It seems unlikely. If understanding the “what” is not the problem, what else might it be that leads leaders to struggle?
An alternative way to approach this dilemma, and to thereby improve your leadership, is to focus on enhancing situational awareness. There has been a great deal of interest in situational awareness in the military. In that context, situational awareness largely focuses on recognizing threat. Outside of the military, levels of situational awareness have been used as a way to quantify how much attention you devote to things coming at you – so again, it is essentially threat-focused.
This way of thinking about situational awareness is useful, but incomplete, and the neglected piece is a critical leader competency. The missing element in the way we understand situational awareness is how well you understand how your behavior impacts others. When leaders have a ready list of the right things to do – but fail to have the foresight to understand how each will impact others – executing effective leadership becomes a guessing game.
Recall the last time you were seated in an aisle seat for a flight. Imagine a fellow passenger boarding and making his way down the aisle towards you. You can see he has a carryon in one hand and a backpack slung over his shoulder. If you fly frequently, you know how this story ends. As he reaches the seat across the aisle from you, he pivots to toss his carryon in the overhead bin, and in doing so clobbers you with his backpack. This individual has demonstrated a lack of situational awareness. Nothing about what he says to you or does next dismisses the blow you suffered. Such is the outcome when a leader acts towards followers without situational awareness.
A lack of situational awareness could be, but should not be, confused with simple inconsideration. It may not have been that long since you tried to enjoy a restaurant meal with others only to have your conversation challenged by the audio coming out of a smartphone at a neighboring table. There, the parents are using the device (without headphones, of course), to entertain their child so that they can enjoy their meal uninterrupted. The young man who hit you with his backpack may well apologize profusely – it wasn’t his intent, he just “wasn’t thinking.” These parents were thinking quite strategically and deliberately chose to make their peace a priority over yours.
Without situational awareness, understanding important leader behaviors really isn’t that useful. The passenger above was fully aware of the proper way to store his carryon; what he wasn’t aware of was how the situation – an innocent passenger seated across the aisle – changed the way he needed to go about his task. Leaders need to understand not just what to do – but how situational constraints change the way they do it.
As one executive explained, “After a very short while as CEO, I realized I had to be extremely careful with my language. People were listening to me much more closely than they ever had before. My words had a different weight.” This is a great example of a leader demonstrating situational awareness. He understood that as CEO his word choice, tone, and mannerisms were more closely scrutinized then they had been before. It wouldn’t be enough to tell him he had be a great communicator. He needed to equally understand how his new situation changed the stakes each time he opened his mouth.
If you are one of the seekers out there looking for an intention for your own development in 2020, it might be the greatest return-on-investment would come from your effort to become more situationally aware – to become a great diagnostician. Paying careful attention to situational factors and follower characteristics should improve the way you demonstrate leadership throughout the year.
NEW YORK (AP) — Shares of Tesla soared Wednesday as investors bet that the electric vehicle maker and its CEO Elon Musk will benefit from Donald Trump’s return to the White House.
Tesla stands to make significant gains under a Trump administration with the threat of diminished subsidies for alternative energy and electric vehicles doing the most harm to smaller competitors. Trump’s plans for extensive tariffs on Chinese imports make it less likely that Chinese EVs will be sold in bulk in the U.S. anytime soon.
“Tesla has the scale and scope that is unmatched,” said Wedbush analyst Dan Ives, in a note to investors. “This dynamic could give Musk and Tesla a clear competitive advantage in a non-EV subsidy environment, coupled by likely higher China tariffs that would continue to push away cheaper Chinese EV players.”
Tesla shares jumped 14.8% Wednesday while shares of rival electric vehicle makers tumbled. Nio, based in Shanghai, fell 5.3%. Shares of electric truck maker Rivian dropped 8.3% and Lucid Group fell 5.3%.
Tesla dominates sales of electric vehicles in the U.S, with 48.9% in market share through the middle of 2024, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
Subsidies for clean energy are part of the Inflation Reduction Act, signed into law by President Joe Biden in 2022. It included tax credits for manufacturing, along with tax credits for consumers of electric vehicles.
Musk was one of Trump’s biggest donors, spending at least $119 million mobilizing Trump’s supporters to back the Republican nominee. He also pledged to give away $1 million a day to voters signing a petition for his political action committee.
In some ways, it has been a rocky year for Tesla, with sales and profit declining through the first half of the year. Profit did rise 17.3% in the third quarter.
The U.S. opened an investigation into the company’s “Full Self-Driving” system after reports of crashes in low-visibility conditions, including one that killed a pedestrian. The investigation covers roughly 2.4 million Teslas from the 2016 through 2024 model years.
And investors sent company shares tumbling last month after Tesla unveiled its long-awaited robotaxi at a Hollywood studio Thursday night, seeing not much progress at Tesla on autonomous vehicles while other companies have been making notable progress.
TORONTO – Canada’s main stock index was up more than 100 points in late-morning trading, helped by strength in base metal and utility stocks, while U.S. stock markets were mixed.
The S&P/TSX composite index was up 103.40 points at 24,542.48.
In New York, the Dow Jones industrial average was up 192.31 points at 42,932.73. The S&P 500 index was up 7.14 points at 5,822.40, while the Nasdaq composite was down 9.03 points at 18,306.56.
The Canadian dollar traded for 72.61 cents US compared with 72.44 cents US on Tuesday.
The November crude oil contract was down 71 cents at US$69.87 per barrel and the November natural gas contract was down eight cents at US$2.42 per mmBTU.
The December gold contract was up US$7.20 at US$2,686.10 an ounce and the December copper contract was up a penny at US$4.35 a pound.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 16, 2024.
TORONTO – Canada’s main stock index was up more than 200 points in late-morning trading, while U.S. stock markets were also headed higher.
The S&P/TSX composite index was up 205.86 points at 24,508.12.
In New York, the Dow Jones industrial average was up 336.62 points at 42,790.74. The S&P 500 index was up 34.19 points at 5,814.24, while the Nasdaq composite was up 60.27 points at 18.342.32.
The Canadian dollar traded for 72.61 cents US compared with 72.71 cents US on Thursday.
The November crude oil contract was down 15 cents at US$75.70 per barrel and the November natural gas contract was down two cents at US$2.65 per mmBTU.
The December gold contract was down US$29.60 at US$2,668.90 an ounce and the December copper contract was up four cents at US$4.47 a pound.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 11, 2024.
