Tell Us About Yourself

As I was driving into the office this morning, I was thinking about the process of job interviewing and a common enough question that is asked. "Tell us a little about yourself." In order to have a clear understanding about "who I am" when it comes to the working world, I can illustrate my approach by telling you, briefly, about three formative experiences in my young work life that I have carried with me across the years and through all my other work experiences.

The first thing to understand is that I was raised on a small ranch in rural South Dakota and it was there that my work ethic was formed. When you are a small rancher everyone is a "utility hand". Yes, you may have your assigned chores - but you are expected to do two things - you're expected to pitch in where ever and whenever you can, to help other people with their chores, and second, your are expected to do things that need to be done when you see them, whether they "belong" to you or not. This develops a strong sense of practically - a very pragmatic approach to work. It also develops a strong sense of self-reliance - you learn not to wait for direction. If there is a task in front of you, you do it. If you don't know how to do it, you figure it out. Those early work lessons have profoundly shaped my approach to work.

The second thing to understand is that, culturally, I am Sicangu Lakota. I was raised on the Rosebud Reservation and I graduated from St. Francis Indian School. My world view is that of a perpetual outsider. Yes I am American, yes, I was raised in America - but it was about as far from mainstream America as you can get. It has had a very powerful effect on my work ethic and my work product - as a perpetual outsider, I am not intellectually tied to the structures, processes, methods and assumptions of the western business mindset, though I understand them well. When I entered the working world I was very much a blank slate and over the years I have observed and absorbed many different things, many approaches, many methods, many philosophies. The combination of being a utilitarian and pragmatic outsider means I adapt "what works". I am not vested in "it has to be done this way" or "this is the way it's always done". This gives me a tremendous amount of flexibility.

The third thing to understand is that what I have always considered to be my first career was with the Bureau of Indian Affairs police on my home agency. Though its a long time ago, it had a profound influence in two ways that are relevant. First, it powerfully reinforced my sense of self-reliance, that sense that was formed early on. I am confident to the point of being cocky. I am most often sure of what I think, sure of what I do. I make quick decisions and I follow them through. The second thing I learned and had repeated reinforced in that formative work experience was the important of detail. The devil is always in the details. Success and failure are twin treasures buried in there. You can powerfully influence the outcome of any encounter, any incident, or any event by paying attention to the details and getting the simple things right. All complex problems are a chain of interconnected simple problems. You solve the complex problems by solving the simple problems. You keep the complex problems at bay by not letting the simple problems spin out of control.

Now, you might be sitting there wondering how this influences my leadership style and my managerial style. I usually separate them because the challenge of leadership is actually two challenges - the challenge of management and the challenge of leadership. It is possible to be a great manager and a poor leader, and it is possible to be a great leader and a poor manager, so it is best to approach them separately.

When it comes to leadership, I follow what I call the rule of bright lines. Leadership is essentially a very simple task. You have to do two things successfully - you have to draw a bright line from where you are to where you want your organization to go. Then, you have to draw a pair of bright lines that mark the edges of your organization, so that everyone within the organization clearly understands - this is where we are going and this is our area of responsibility. Then, you continually repeat that message until every one of your employees knows, by heart, where they are going and what they are responsible for on that journey.

When it comes to management style, I am an advocate of the expectation integration theory of management, which says, boiled down to its essential core, that the closer the expectations of the organization are aligned with the expectations of the individual, the more likely it is that the relationship is going to be successful for both of them, the classic win-win scenario. There is only one way to integrate expectations successfully and is through communication. Effective communication requires clarity, it requires transparency, and it requires a fundamental honesty at all times, even when it's painful. My expectation of my employees is that they are adults and that they are professional at all times, in all their interactions with each other, with vendors, and with customers. No one comes to work because it's fun. We are all here because, for one reason or another, we have to be. Forced association always creates a level of dynamic tension. Professional conduct is what smoothes the rough edges and can take work from bearable to enjoyable. In every organization I've ever worked in, good, bad, and indifferent, there have been productive gains to be found by simply clarifying expectations and smoothing out the rough edges. Work-wise, that is pretty much me in a nutshell.