Here’s the email I sent out to leaders in Reno County:
It seems like every time I’m engaging in conversation with a casual acquaintance these days in Reno County, our dialogue turns to the weather. Something like, “Will this winter ever end?” is offered as a talking point. This caused my mind to jog to leadership competencies. Most of us pay much closer attention to the physical weather than we do to the temperature of the leadership opportunities in which we are found. When the weather is chilly, we’ll grab a jacket or sweatshirt to raise the heat. When our situations seem to be cool, we wouldn’t think of raising the heat, because that might offend someone (or at the very least, we’re not willing to think of ways to skillfully intervene). Today, I have a simple reminder: Take The Temperature. This is part of diagnosing the situation. Taking the temperature might help us understand what’s happening and, in the end, help us make progress.
You can see that there are all kinds of ways of moving around this scale. As we take the temperature, we get information that helps us step in to engage in an act of leadership (we’ll talk more about raising the heat next time).
So, yes, the weather outside may be frightful. But use it as a reminder to diagnose the situation by taking the temperature of your leadership opportunities and see if we aren’t able to make progress on the issues we care about deeply.
With you in this amazing journey…