Don’t Stare!
What if the most dangerous thing in your organization isn’t the problem itself, but your obsession with it?
As leaders, we are trained to identify issues quickly.
Spot the bottleneck. Diagnose the dysfunction. Call out what’s broken. That’s good. It’s necessary.
But if we’re not careful, we can spend so much time staring at the problem that we begin to drift right toward it.
That’s not just a metaphor. It’s also Motorcycle Safety 101.
I’ve taken the Basic Motorcycle Course (BMC) four times – not because I had to, but because I wanted to.
It’s fun. It’s adventurous. And every time I take it, I am reminded of something essential.
In the world of motorcycle riding, you go where you look.
If a rider sees an obstacle in the road and fixates on it, the bike will naturally steer toward it. Instructors emphasize this critical behavior modification over and over again.
Look where you want to go.
Your eyes lead your body.
Your body leads the machine.
The same is true in leadership.
When we fixate on what's wrong, we inadvertently steer the team, the culture, even our personal energy toward more of what we don’t want.
We become problem-oriented instead of solution-driven.
Our conversations start circling the drain of what’s broken. Our people start getting demoralized, overwhelmed, or cynical.
I’m not suggesting we ignore issues. Quite the opposite. But we must discipline ourselves to see the obstacle without staring at it – to assess the challenge, then redirect our focus toward the path through it. The path around it. The path beyond it.
That’s where vision comes in.
Vision isn’t wishful thinking. It’s a directional choice that focuses on opportunity, hope, and possibility that seeks solutions and flows out of an abundance mindset.
It’s a leadership discipline that keeps our eyes on what could be, even while navigating what currently is.
Simon Sinek put it this way: “Leadership is not about being in charge. It is about taking care of those in your charge. That includes taking care of their focus.”
Here is a leader development invitation based in the BMC…
Train your eyes. Train your team.
Build the muscle of focusing on where you want to go rather than on what you are trying to avoid.
Keep the vision clear. Keep the conversations centered on progress. And keep riding forward.
If this leadership lesson hit home, I encourage you to forward it to someone who would benefit from its message.
This is what I do. I help leaders like you lead and build teams that ride through obstacles with clarity, focus, and impact. Shoot me a note if you would like to know more.
Blessings to you, my friends!
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This Week’s Resource Recommendation:
"Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values"
- Robert M Pirsig
From Amazon: Few books transform a generation and then establish themselves as touchstones for the generations that follow. Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance is one such book. This modern epic of a man’s search for meaning became an instant bestseller on publication in 1974, acclaimed as one of the most exciting books in the history of American letters. It continues to inspire millions.
A narration of a summer motorcycle trip undertaken by a father and his son, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance becomes a personal and philosophical odyssey into fundamental questions on how to live. The narrator's relationship with his son leads to a powerful self-reckoning; the craft of motorcycle maintenance leads to an austerely beautiful process for reconciling science, religion, and humanism. Resonant with the confusions of existence, this classic is a touching and transcendent book of life.
This new edition contains an interview with Pirsig and letters and documents detailing how this extraordinary book came to be.
MMS 25-30
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