Top Three

As a general rule, I think we like to overcomplicate things and create this illusion that to become an expert at any one thing requires mastery of a lot of things. I think a perfect example is around the concept of effective leadership. There have been thousands and thousands of books written on the topic, and it can be overwhelming to say the least.

Over the past year, I’ve been trying to distill leadership down to its simplest form so I can focus my energy toward improving in the areas that will yield the greatest return and strengthen my leadership muscle. I’ve broken leadership down to the following: communicating, making decisions, and getting shit done. Within each of these areas, I list three aspects that I’m focused on improving in.

Communicating:

1. Becoming a great listener: The first step in effective communication is to become a great listener so you can develop rapport, uncover needs, and position yourself to meet those needs.
2. Learning how to communicate effectively: This gets into the nuances of tone, cadence, word choice, understanding your audience, being concise, becoming comfortable speaking 1:1 and in front of a large audience, etc.
3. Learning how to demonstrate empathy: Effective communication is dependent on the ability to put yourself in the other person’s shoes and understand things from their vantage point. Empathy is the necessary foundation from which connections are made and relationships are built.

Making decisions:

1. Developing a clear decision-making framework: For decisions big and small, a decision-making framework to evaluate feedback (inputs) and arrive at a decision (output) with conviction is invaluable. We make hundreds of decisions each day — everything from deciding what I’m going to wear today to articulating the long-term vision of Panacea —and the more we can create a framework to execute these decisions, the better we’ll be at developing a process to make decisions with conviction and speed.
2. Learning how to remove emotions from the decision-making process: The biggest deterrent to effective decision-making is human emotion. If we’re not careful, our emotions can cloud sound, objective judgement and lead us down the wrong path. In order to keep our emotions in check, we need to understand and embrace our emotional capacity. It’s important to note, the goal is not to be void of emotion. Emotions are good. They are what make you, you. We just need to learn how to keep them from overwhelming and clouding our decision-making process. Also, removing emotions from the decision-making process shouldn’t be confused with not relying on our gut. In this day and age where we have unprecedented access to data (inputs), it’s critical we learn to balance this wealth of information with leaning on our gut. Two things concern me about relying wholly on data-driven decision-making: 1.) Confirmation bias: We can twist data to tell you what you want to hear. 2.) Perfect is the enemy of good: Data will rarely help us arrive at a decision with 100% certainty. There’s almost always some element of risk/uncertainty, where we have to rely on gut to make a decision and move forward. As a result, wholly relying on data to inform decision-making can lead to indecision, which is the worst decision of all. Ultimately, we should learn how to control our emotions, and balance data and gut to make decisions.
3. Learning how to make decisions with conviction: In any moment of decision, the best decision is the right decision, the next best decision is the wrong decision, and the worst decision is indecision.

Getting shit done:

1. Learning how to focus: Focus is one of the most challenging concepts to internalize and practice. Focus is discipline (asking ourselves what is the most important thing to dedicate our time, energy, and mind share toward). Focus is resilience (saying no to 99% of things so we can yes to the most important thing). Focus is humility (understanding that we are human, have a finite capacity, and therefore can only do one thing to the best of our ability).
2. Learning how to set myself up for success: This dives into how an intentional morning routine brings conscious momentum to the rest of our day. If we wake up and accomplish something tangible — can be as small as making our bed, meditating, working out — then that sense of accomplishment sets the tone and momentum to accomplish greater things throughout the rest of our day. We have agency (the capacity to exert power) to choose how to start our day, and that is an incredible gift. It’s on us to exercise that agency in an intentional manner.
3. Recharging: Some people like to call this “work-life” balance. Others have a visceral reaction to that term. The way I look at it is life is a marathon (the cliché of all clichés), and we can’t sprint our way to the finish line. We’ll lose steam and even worse, die. The concept of recharging is rooted in humility: the understanding that we are human, have a finite capacity, and therefore need proper recharging to keep moving forward. Recharging entails the obvious things like proper rest, nutrition, and fitness. It also encompasses recharging of our mind via things like meditation, reading, and creating head space. Our culture glorifies the 24/7 hustler who doesn’t have time, let alone doesn’t need, the rest. I bought into that narrative and wanted to embody that for so many years. Lately, I’ve become secure in the fact that I need a proper recharge to be at my best. And I’m ok admitting that now.

While the above was written in the framework of effective leadership, I think there are a lot of parallels in other aspects of life. For example, I think the lessons I’ve learned in the above areas have helped me to become a better son, brother, friend, and dater (? I think I just made up my own word here).