The Leading Question Article Series

Top 10 Mistakes Executives Make
Do Any of These Sound Familiar?

As an executive, how you handle your fear and stress sends ripple effects throughout your organization. Look at this list of 10 common mistakes that executives frequently make.

1. Micromanage and over-steer – this alienates employees and heightens their anxiety.
2. Reduce communication – this fuels the rumor mill and exacerbates negative story telling among employees about the leadership of the organization.
3. Isolate themselves – the cycles of fear repeat and increase in speed.
4. Replace strategic thinking with tactical thinking that’s centered on smaller and smaller things. This leaves people without good direction and without hope that things will turn around.
5. Cut too much infrastructure to appease short-term bottom line. People don’t have the tools and capacity to serve their customers – and lose business as a result.
6. Take everything personally – this triggers offensive and defensive cycles and causes people to place blame instead of take action.
7. Blame others – this faultfinding exercise generates more blame, paranoia and political gamesmanship.
8. Lose hope – this leads to general hopelessness throughout the organization.
9. Make Worrying a habit – this causes fear to spread even more.
10. Don’t take care of themselves – improper diet, lack of sleep and exercise can literally make you sick.

Do any of these sound familiar right now? If so, name and claim what it is you’re afraid of, review the underlying script, and begin to write a new story. Here are two “mini-case studies” that illustrate the value of this process.

Fred was micromanaging because he was afraid he’d over-tasked his managers' abilities by giving them bigger goals/tasks than they could handle. He was afraid they would fail, so he followed behind them, supervising their every move. When he realized that his fear was internal and ungrounded, he could begin to address his managers’ competence in a forthright manner. He began to work with them to plan and organize the new project instead of telling them what to do.

Mary found herself blaming her coworkers for the problems and breakdowns they were experiencing in her department. Upon reflection, she realized she was afraid of being blamed by her boss, and she unwittingly spread her fear, thereby causing more problems and breakdowns. She realized that, instead, by making clear requests of her people and helping them organize their work projects, she could let go of worrying about failure and spend time supporting her team.

Your ability to create "grace under fire" is key to your leadership success. Hope this is useful "food for thought."

Dr. Michael O'Brien
Founder & CEO
O'Brien Group