Episode 36 - No, Thank You
Leadership Insight with Rising Sun
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Episode 35 – Allow Me
Leadership Insight with Rising Sun
When it comes to building a healthy culture, there is no greater or more impactful example of culture than that of leadership. Research continues to show that many of the world’s most profitable companies attribute a great deal of their success to their organizational culture. At the forefront of these organizations are leaders who actively, regularly, and genuinely display the type of behavior desired for all of its members. Some leaders equate their high visibility to constantly being put under the microscope. They describe the...
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Episode 34 - I'm Sorry I Asked
Leadership Insight with Rising Sun
Employee surveys can be a great source of information. They can provide an intimate perspective of certain facets of the organization which may go unseen or unexperienced by leadership. However, sometimes organizations are not prepared for the insight they receive. They may feel that certain initiatives or decisions should be met with affirmation and positive accolades, only to find out that part of the employee population feels differently. What do we do now? Some organizations view the insight as a humbling experience and use it...
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Episode 33 - Crawl Before You Walk
Leadership Insight with Rising Sun
John Maxwell said “A leader is great, not because of his or her power, but because of his or her ability to empower others.” All too often, organizations are held hostage by their own people. What does that mean? We’re so glad you asked. Being held hostage by your people is a dynamic that explains leaders who do more to withhold knowledge and experience than to share it with others. When these leaders leave for new opportunities, the organization is left scrambling to recreate that knowledge or...
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Episode 32 - The Bold and The Atypical
Leadership Insight with Rising Sun
We often hear that effective leadership requires bold decisions and behavior. However, servant leadership principles tend to illustrate a very different type of leader from what most people are accustomed to. While we don’t disagree with the premise that leaders need to be bold, we want to look at the term through a different lens in this episode. One definition illustrates the word “bold” as showing the ability to take risks; to be confident and courageous. Here, again, we wouldn’t disagree with that interpretation. However, it’s...
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Episode 31 - Getting Around to Dealing with Conflict
Leadership Insight with Rising Sun
Why are we still so afraid of conflict? Why do we assume the mere presence of conflict is always negative? When it comes to addressing conflict, there is an immediate assumption that the conversation/interaction will go poorly and possibly lead to something much worse. Years ago, we used to rate a successful marriage by how little a couple fought. It wasn’t uncommon to hear a story about a husband and wife who had been married for forty years and how they “never had a fight.” ...
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Episode 30 - The Air You Can Wear
Leadership Insight with Rising Sun
Nothing describes a late summer day in Central Pennsylvania better than the three H’s…hazy, hot and humid. But what do the three H’s have to do with leadership? While you can’t necessarily see the humidity outside simply by looking through your office window, you most certainly feel its presence the second you venture outdoors. When we think of those of who have influenced us over time, most likely it’s not their physical appearance or blatant actions we recall. As Maya Angelou once opined “I've learned that people will forget what you said,...
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Episode 29 - Talkin' 'Bout Your Generation
Leadership Insight with Rising Sun
Today’s workforce is one of the most diverse in history. Workers fall into one of five (yes five) different generations. While diversity and inclusion continue to garner a great deal of attention, organizations and leaders are struggling to address tension and conflict when it comes to many different people working together and interacting with one another. Perception is not always reality. We like to say that our perceptions may be our reality, but are they truly reality? One of the greatest...
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Episode 28 - Finding the Big Impact in the Little Things
Leadership Insight with Rising Sun
When is the last time you paused and gave thanks for the things in your life that you know to be true and good? There is growing research on the multitude of benefits associated with gratitude. From physical benefits such as the ability to lower stress and create better sleep habits, to psychological benefits like increased satisfaction and resilience; implementing a regular practice of gratitude can have a significant impact on our lives. Taking time each day to be grateful can actually play a role in how our brains are wired. A concept...
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Episode 27 - High Expectations or High Adherence
Leadership Insight with Rising Sun
“We have found that by reaching for what appears to be the impossible, we often actually do the impossible; and even when we don’t quite make it, we inevitably wind up doing much better than we would have done.” -Jack Welch Oftentimes, leaders set high expectations for their organizations and their employees in order to maintain relevance and maximize potential. However, many leaders wind up expressing disappointment and frustration when those expectations aren’t met. Why do so many well-intentioned leaders have employees who consistently fall short of or fail to...
info_outlineWould you like your compliment sandwich on white, wheat, or rye?
We’ll politely decline the sandwich overall and instead ask for a slow-cooked plate of relationship building, a side of trust, and we’ll finish it off with a tall glass of praise.
The premise for the compliment sandwich is not a bad one; build one’s confidence so that they can handle and overcome critical feedback. However, the problem with the ‘sandwich’ rests in its short-term, oftentimes disingenuous, and infrequent execution.
Rather than establish a tone of continual praise, feedback, and coaching; the compliment sandwich offers a quick, albeit ineffective, attempt to deliver criticism in a way which ideally is supposed to make both the supervisor and employee more comfortable in having the discussion. If I build them up first, they’ll feel good about themselves. I can then quickly offer the criticism and jump right back to another compliment so that they end the conversation on a high note.
The research shows that most recipients of the compliment sandwich immediately discard the initial compliment once the criticism appears. Worse still, there is a chance the criticism itself isn’t heard either because the employee is frustrated how quickly their supervisor moved away from the forced good to the supposed bad.
Critical feedback is more easily offered and received when there is deliberate and genuine relationship building taking place. When a supervisor makes specific and timely praise a part of their regimen, the employee knows they have taken a vested interest in their growth and development. This is where confidence is inspired.
Yet, what is growth without accountability? Effective supervisors deliver critical feedback from a position of care and learning, not to simply check a box in addressing an immediate performance issue. And instead of ending the conversation with another baseless compliment, the supervisor finishes the conversation by asking how he or she can support the employee moving forward. This is how trust is cultivated and the ability to communicate back and forth effectively is strengthened.
If you’ve made the compliment sandwich a fixture in your leadership style, we urge you to change your diet and load up on staples which truly inspire confidence and create the ability to provide tough feedback more effectively.