The Struggles of Parenting and Developing Parenting/Leadership Skills (5-4-22)

This will be the last in our series about lessons I’ve learned as a dad. This week is about the struggles of parenting and developing parenting/leadership skills.

I’ve spent a fair amount of time talking to my wife, friends, and therapists about the struggles of parenting. If I’m being honest, I’ve never consistently failed at something the way I do with parenting. Parenting is making constant mistakes. Parenting is consistently recognizing that the worldview that I was programmed isn’t always the right one. Parenting is a constant reminder that my current skillsets aren’t quite good enough, and I have SOOOOOOOOO much room to grow. Do any of you parents feel similarly?

When I talk about room to grow, I don’t just mean switching up parenting styles. I mean building parenting competencies and working on the fundamental skills that are required to be a good parent. If I had to oversimplify where I am, I have so much room to grow with regards to demonstrating empathy, understanding, and grace. I invest time in getting better at these things, so I can be a better dad. After all, my family deserves it.

You might be wondering what this has to do with anything. I’ve said before that parenting is the same thing as leadership. Look at the above paragraph and replace the word parenting with leadership.

If I’m being honest, I’ve never consistently failed at something the way I do with leadership. Leadership is making constant mistakes. Leadership is consistently recognizing that the worldview I was programmed with isn’t always the right one. Leadership is a constant reminder that my current skillsets aren’t quite good enough, and I have SOOOOOOOOO much room to grow. Does anyone else feel this way?

Similar to parenting, when it comes to developing as a leader it’s not just about changing the style. It’s about looking at the competencies of leadership and working to develop those. It’s investing time in learning and practicing how to set a clear vision, how to create an environment where people feel like they belong, how to prioritize work, how to make decisions, how to hold others accountable, how to help people develop, and more. Like being a parent, it’s important to invest in getting better, because that is what will bring out the best in your team.

The challenge: Where do you need to grow as a parent/leader? How are you growing as a parent/leader?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

I Hope We All Grow like the Grinch (12-15-21)

This week will be the last blog of 2021. If you’ve been on this distribution list for a while, you might recognize that I usually end the year with this entry. I feel it is just as relevant now as it was in years past. Besides, we watch the same holiday specials every year, so we can revisit the same holiday themed blogs, right? 😉 For our final blog of the year we will look at How the Grinch Stole Christmas!

During this holiday season I hope we are all like the Grinch. Pretty strange thing to say, right? Let me explain why I feel this way. You may know the story of the Grinch. He is a grumpy creature who decides he will try to steal Christmas from the Whos He concocts an elaborate scheme and then steals all of the presents, decorations, etc. in an effort to ruin their holiday. This negative attitude is what we often associate with the Grinch, but this isn’t the end of his story. The Grinch grows as a character, and life is all about growing, changing, and becoming better.

The Grinch has stolen the gifts, and then he hears the Whos singing. All of a sudden it hits him right as his sleigh full of gifts starts to go over the cliff. “And what happened, then? Well, in Whoville they say – that the Grinch’s small heart grew three sizes that day. And then – the true meaning of Christmas came through, and the Grinch found the strength of *ten* Grinches, plus two!” He saves the gifts from falling over the cliff, rides into Whoville, and serves the roast beast at the feast.

The reason I hope we are all like the Grinch this year is because he grows and becomes a better person. He begins filled with apathy, malice, and grumpiness, and then he allows love in and it fundamentally changes him. How have you changed and grown this year? Wherever you are right now, we have the chance to be better. Imagine how different the world be if all of our hearts grew like the Grinch’s.

Here is to all of us knowing what it feels like when our hearts grow three sizes in a day. As always, thanks so much for reading. Your reading and encouragement throughout the year is the best gift I could ever ask for. Happy holidays! I hope you find peace, love, and fulfillment.

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Dusting Off Shelves and Skills (9-6-17)

Last week was about taking out the trash and letting go. This week we will reflect on dusting, and taking the time to brush off your skills (and your shoulders if you are Jay-Z). By the way, this week is dedicated to Hannah Short, because she is the one who said we need to do something on dusting.

You may not know this about me, but I’m a cleaner. I’m not obsessive about cleaning, but I do enjoy keeping everything relatively clean, which means I am definitely someone who dusts. I dust in order to keep things clean, tidy, and functioning. Not only do I dust, but where I come from, there are two kinds of dusting (#dustingsnob). There is feather dusting, which is a relatively quick exercise, where you use the feather dusting to brush off things where they are. It takes minimal time and effort, and is best suited as something that is done between serious cleaning. Feather dusting keeps things from getting too dirty. Then, there is real dusting where you bust out some pledge, take EVERYTHING off the shelves, and go after dust bunnies like you were a fox. This is more labor intensive, but it also helps you achieve a deeper clean and isn’t that what everyone wants in life? It’s not that one kind of dusting is necessarily better than the other, but each one has different purposes and uses.

So what does this have to do with work? It’s really easy to avoid dusting. Then, all of a sudden when you do look at stuff you realize there are dust bunnies, gunk, and grime covering everything and messing stuff up. I feel the same can be said about work. It’s really easy to get so lost in the day to day stuff that we ignore the dirt and grime that find a way to bog down our skills and capabilities. When we ignore dusting, we ignore ourselves, and we take away our chance to get better. Seriously, how often do you stop and take a few moments to think about you and brushing off your skills? Just like at home, I feel that there are a couple of different ways of dusting things off at work. You can feather dust, which to me is taking a few minutes to stop and reflect on something you’ve recently experienced, read, watched, etc. You can also roll up your sleeves and do some deep cleaning, whether that is going to workshops, deep diving with a trusted mentor/coach/colleague, or some other activity that requires you to go to a deeper level.

The challenge: Are you taking the time to dust? Do you have a specific skill or competency you want to dust off?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Ironing, the Need for Heat, and Development (8-23-17)

This week I’d like to kick off a new series on lessons learned from doing things around the house. Sounds thrilling, right? This series is either going to be horrible or it will bring the heat. Speaking of bringing the heat, let’s kick this off by thinking about ironing and development. (In case you’re wondering, I’m always this smooth with my bad jokes).

About once a month I iron all my dress shirts, polos, dress pants, and anything else that needs to be ironed. Recently, I finished ironing a bunch of clothes, and had to take them upstairs so I momentarily unplugged the iron and took the shirts up to my closet. When I came back, I started using the iron and quickly realized it wasn’t working. At first I was confused, and then realized I never plugged the iron back in. No electricity meant no heat, which meant the iron couldn’t do its job. It was at this point I had a minor epiphany about how ironing is always a delicate balance. You need to have heat to smooth out wrinkles, but not too much heat or you’ll burn the garment.

You might be wondering what this has to do with work. Well, I think we could all use a little ironing sometimes. We could all use something to help us smooth out our wrinkles and make us a little sharper, a little better. Much like the iron, I think we need heat to do this. In this case, heat could be a challenge, positive tension, coaching, a difficult conversation, making mistakes, failing, etc. If you don’t have those things, you never have what you need to grow. The trick is to find the balance in the heat. Too little challenge/positive tension/coaching/mistakes and nothing gets smoothed out. Too much, and you get burned out, damaged, and worse off than you were before. It’s up to us to find the heat in our jobs that helps us go to the next level.

Embry example-> When I talk to people about what kind of work I like I say, “I like messy and muddy problems.” I don’t like those things because they are easy. I like those things because they force me to grow and smooth out some of my rough spots, and I know I have more than my fair share of rough spots. Over the past few months I’ve had a lot of things I’ve worked on for the first time. Whether it was running market research, learning about marketing processes, or adapting to a new team, I wasn’t immediately great at any of those things. In fact a week or two ago, I turned to a teammate and said something like, “These past few days have been a friendly reminder that I’m not great at my job yet and that I have a lot of room to grow.” It’s not that I think I’m an incompetent mess, well maybe I am depending on the day 😉 It’s just that I realize I can still be so much better. Over the past few months I’ve experienced some heat and as a result I’ve smoothed out some of my wrinkles and grown. I believe the Andrew Embry of today could run circles around the Andrew Embry of 7 months ago. My hope is that in a year that Andrew Embry will be so awesome that he will be running circles around my current self while doing backflips and yo-yo tricks.

The challenge: Are embracing the heat to iron out your wrinkles? How can you be a good iron for others to help them get the wrinkles out?

Bonus challenge: Think of someone who has grown in the past few months and give them a shout out and let them know you see their progress.

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry