Every year in observance of the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday, I read Dr. King’s I Have a Dream speech. It always moves me and forces me to think about life and leadership in a new way. Earlier today as I finished reading it, I began to contemplate my dreams for my life and career. Things have changed so much for me in the past five years, and so have my dreams. Having transformed myself from a corporate executive to an entrepreneur, I dream about how to better serve my clients and grow my business. As an executive coach, writer and speaker, I dream about changing the way people think about leadership. As the father of teenagers, I have begun to dream about my children as adults. These are some of my dreams. They are tightly coupled with my values and principles, and they serve me well. They help me keep my eye on the ball, but how well do they serve those I lead?
Much of my work as an executive coach focuses on helping my clients deal with things that are broken, flawed, or just don’t work. This may be relationships, business processes, behaviors, etc. As human beings, we like it when things work, and we find ourselves unsettled when they don’t. Our natural reaction to things that don’t work is to fix them as quickly as possible. Now that I have stated the obvious, so what?
“Words Matter.” Those words were scrawled across the commentary section my local paper, The Richmond Times-Dispatch. This article was about the tendency of government entities to use confusing language and the danger this tendency carries. While I appreciated the article, the headline got me thinking about other language-related problems. Language is particularly important in the field of executive leadership. In my coaching practice, many of the biggest challenges my clients face stem from imprecise language, yet most of us rarely think about the words we use.