Solve for being respected, not for being liked.

I always wanted to be liked. I think most people do. It’s only natural, right? It can’t be fun to not be liked… I have always thought that being liked was a sign of respect. Joel really changed this for me. When he said “Solve for being respected, not being liked. Being liked just makes you a pleaser, because you aren’t trusted, it doesn’t mean you are respected”.

Woah. I had to think about that for a second. Deep stuff huh? Let’s take a breather and talk a bit about Joel’s view on leadership and reputation to help understand that powerful statement a bit more.

Joel started out our talk by telling us the three things you need during a crisis for leadership:

1) Authority 2) Warmth 3) Energy

This makes a lot of sense. An authoritative, warm, and energetic leader will surely save the day in crisis time. So far so good.

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But, more importantly, he talked about how none of these traits matter unless you are trusted. We dove into the 10 laws of trust: 1) Start with personal integrity 2) Invest in respect 3) Empower others 4) Measure what you want to achieve 5) Create a common dream 6) Keep everyone informed 7) Embrace respectful conflict 8) Show humility 9) Strive for win-win negotiations 10) Fix breaches immediately.

You could probably write a 10-page blog post on each of these, but two really resonated with me. First, invest in respect (which relates to my opening comment). When I think about what investing in respect really means to me, it opens up some deeper questions. Have I invested in respect, or just worked really hard and put a ton of energy into seeming “likable”? I know I work hard and I bring positive energy to my relationships, but does that make me liked or respected?

The second one that really hit me was fix breaches immediately. This one really resonated and I agree with this 1000000%. I hate to leave mistakes or bad situations unfixed for even a nanosecond. I love to jump in and fix problems (which unfortunately can lead to trying to fix problems when there aren’t any, but that is for another blog post).

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I was reading this slide and trying to digest each point and then boom:

“Pure entrepreneurs light fires, but never get wildfires, only campfires that just go out.” Joel was dropping knowledge left and right. This really sunk in, I don’t want to just light fires, I want wildfires. How do I get there was the next thought in my head…

Joel delivered again, by jumping into the 10 key skills a successful leader needs. I figured I’d put myself out there and rank myself during class really quickly so I didn’t have a chance to fake it on each one (out of 10 points).

1. Making decisions (6) — I’m so-so at this.

2. Selling (10) — I could sell you horse poop, selling is my bread and butter.

3. Negotiate — (9) — I love a good negotiation.

4. Raise capital — (3) — This is something I thought I’d be good at, but it's so frickin’ hard!

5. Communicate — (5) — I’m good with good news, not so good with bad news.

6. Run meetings (7) — I think this depends on what type of meeting it is.

7. Use a board effectively (6) — I think my board likes me? I guess I have to ask them…

8. Overcome adversity (2) — I don’t think I’ve overcome enough adversity for a high score here.

9. Survive growth (5) — Tough one, not sure.

10. Drive change (8) — I am not afraid to be passionate and drive change when needed.

61/100…. OOF! That is like a D-, ouch! If you had asked me what I would have scored before going through this, I would have bet at least 85/100. This was really eye-opening for me and showed me there are lots of things I need to work on, which I guess is why I wanted to come back to business school.

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After listening to all this and writing it all down, I went back to my first question: am I liked, or am I respected? I think the answer is a bit of both. If it is a spectrum, how do I move closer to respect without losing my likeability? Joel definitively seemed to not care if he was liked, only that he was respected. I am not sure I’m ok with not being liked by my peers — but If I had to choose, I guess I’d choose to be respected more. My head is spinning…

I plan to take this quiz again in a year and see how I score. Will my score go up or down? I guess we’ll see.