Don McMinn

Great teams are led by people confident enough to recruit people better than themselves.—Warren Bennis

A favorite toy among Russian children, the matryoshka doll is a series of wooden dolls that nest inside each other and get progressively smaller and smaller. Open up the largest doll and you’ll find a smaller, identical doll. Open up that doll and there is yet a smaller one. There may be as many as 15 dolls inside the largest one.

The matryoshka doll can teach us some important lessons on how good leaders build a great team and how insecure or uninformed leaders can inhibit the growth and health of their organization by choosing weak team members.

Recruit people who are “bigger” than you are.

If the person at the top of the organization intentionally hires someone who is “smaller” (less qualified with less potential), and that person recruits someone who is “smaller” and this selection criterion continues to cascade down through the entire organization, eventually it will produce a weak, dumbed-down organization.

Recruit people who are “different” than you are.

Except for their size, all of the dolls inside a matryoshka doll are identical. If a leader only recruits people who are similar to himself—same personality, gifts, age range, perspective—his team will not benefit from the critical element of diversity.

Choosing quality team members is the leaders most important job.

For a leader, important decisions fall into two categories: strategy and people. I think the people decisions are the most important because if you get the right people on your team, they will help you set the right strategy.

When I was a kid, we often played an impromptu game of softball or basketball after school. Everyone who wanted to play gathered, two captains were chosen, a coin toss determined which captain chose first, and then teammates were selected one at a time. The captain who chose the best players, won. Sometimes a captain would choose a less-skilled player early in the selection process so as not to hurt the person’s feelings (no one wanted to be chosen last). While that might have been the kind thing to do, it wasn’t the smart thing to do if you wanted to win.

Leaders, choose the best and the brightest to serve on your team and your organization will prosper.

This suggestion is not for the insecure and paranoid; it takes a lot of emotional fortitude and self-confidence to recruit and empower people who are smarter, more competent, edgier, and more connected than you. But if you don’t, you and your organization will suffer from the diminishing-expertise syndrome.

You may wonder, “Won’t that make me look bad?” No, it will make you look like a competent leader. Remember, leaders get work done through other people. Also, surrounding yourself with top-flight people will motivate you to continue to grow and become better yourself.

In her book Team of Rivals, Doris Goodwin reminds us that when Abraham Lincoln was elected president and began compiling his cabinet, he not only chose strong and competent men, he actually chose men who had run against him in the primaries, men who had hoped to have his job—essentially, he chose a cabinet of opponents. Lincoln reasoned, “I have looked the party over and concluded that these men were the very strongest men. I had no right to deprive the country of their services.”

Surround yourself with great people.

Ron Goss is an author and celebrated professor at Columbia University. He also cofounded an organization called Conversations New York (CNY) which organizes free group conversations among strangers. In a typical meeting, 40-80 people will commit to an evening of protracted conversation with people they’ve never met. There’s diversity among the group—different ages, genders, races, ethnicities, personalities, and political persuasions. The large group is randomly divided into groups of five or six people, topics are suggested, and people talk for hours.

Goss also teaches people how to have productive conversations. One technique he teaches is triple consciousness in conversations. He describes it like this, “What I want is for people to begin to learn that to be in a conversation they need to maintain a kind of double consciousness, even a triple consciousness. The consciousness of what the conversation is, the consciousness of what they want to say, and then the kind of meta-consciousness of Am I contributing to the process of this conversation in a good way? Or am I being overbearing? Am I being irrelevant? Am I talking too much or not enough?

We’ve all been in conversations in which someone has absolutely no clue that he is sullying the conversation. He’s talking too much, stays too long on an unimportant topic, gets into too much detail, emotionally dominates and even intimidates, makes it difficult for others to speak, is unaware of how his comments are affecting others, talks exclusively about himself, is undiscerning as to what topics are appropriate for the moment.  

Being a good conversationalist requires that we constantly monitor our conversations. In the midst of a conversation, think about the structure of the conversation; “track” conversations in real time. What is the topic? Is it trivial or important? Is one person speaking too much? Have we talked too long about a single subject? Is it time to change the topic? Am I contributing to or messing up the conversation?

When you’re skilled at tracking conversations, you can then help steer them in a good direction.  If you sense that one person is dominating the conversation, you can ask someone else, “What do you think about this topic?” If you sense that a conversation has gone on too long about one particular topic, change the topic. If you realize that your contribution to the conversation is unproductive, change accordingly. Don’t be manipulative for self-serving reasons, just shape conversations for everyone’s benefit.

 

The mother asked, “Where have you been?” Her little girl replied, “On my way home I met a friend who was crying because she had broken her doll.”
“Oh,” said her mother, “then you stopped to help her fix the doll?”
“No,” replied the little girl, “I stopped to help her cry.”

This story illumines the best way to respond to someone who is hurting: offer comfort.

Hurt and pain are inevitable. It’s not a matter of if we’re going to be hurt, but rather when and how we will deal with the pain.

Pain takes many forms. It can be physical (a sprained ankle), social (exclusion from a group), or emotional (embarrassment, disappointment). Some hurts may be perceived as relatively minor—“I was embarrassed at lunch today when I spilled ketchup on my shirt.” Others are major—“My father abandoned me.”

There’s only one antidote for hurt—comfort.

Here are some practical suggestions on how to comfort other people.

Learn to sense when someone is hurting and be willing and available to help her.

We’re often unaware when people are hurting. Sometimes circumstances will give us a clue (physical illness, death of a loved one, divorce or separation, loss of a job), but often it’s not so apparent. So be discerning and learn to recognize when people need comforting

When you do sense that someone is hurting, are you willing to slow down and take the time to minister comfort or do you choose not to “go there”? You must be discerning, willing, and available.

When someone is hurting, if possible, enter her physical world.

While it is possible to comfort someone over the phone or in an email, it’s best done in person and preferably in the hurting person’s space. If your friend is hurting, instead of suggesting, “Susan, it sounds like we need to talk. Can you drop by my office this afternoon?” it’s better to offer, “Susan, it sounds like we need to talk. Can I come by your office this afternoon?”

Enter her mental and emotional world.

Humans live in at least three “worlds” simultaneously: physical, mental, and emotional. While it’s easy to determine where someone is physically, it’s more difficult to determine where she is mentally and emotionally. But to comfort effectively it helps to understand what a person is thinking and feeling. Often, just asking directly – “How are you feeling? What are you thinking?” – is sufficient. At other times it takes more effort, particularly if the person is guarded and reluctant to share.

Listen.

A good comforter must be a good listener. Let the one who is hurting do most of the talking; if you talk too much you’ll inevitably engage in unproductive responses.

When someone needs comfort, avoid these unproductive responses.

• • • Advice/instruction – “Let me give you some steps of action to solve the problem.” Or, “Maybe next time that happens you should…”
    • Logic/reasoning – “Let me analyze the situation and tell you why it happened.” Or, “I think the reason this happened was because…”
    • Pep talk – “You’re a winner! You’ll make it through these tough times!” Or, “I’m sure tomorrow will be a better day.”
    • Minimize – “Sure it hurts, but get it in perspective, there’s a lot going on that’s good.” Or, “Aren’t you being overly sensitive?”
    • Anger – “That makes me so mad! They shouldn’t get away with that!” Or, “I’m so upset that you keep getting yourself hurt.”
    • Martyr’s complex – “I had something similar happen to me.” Or, “After the kind of day I had, let me tell you what hurt really feels like.”
    • Personal fear/anxiety – “I’m afraid that what has happened to you is going to affect my life too.”
    • Silence/neglect – Not saying anything.
    • Fix it – “I can’t believe that salesman talked to you like that. I’m calling the store right now and talking to his boss.” Or, “Sorry you had a flat tire on that lonely road. Tomorrow I’ll get a set of new tires.”
    • Spiritualize – “Well, you know that God will work all of this out for your good.”

While some of these responses may be appropriate to share after the hurting person has been comforted, they don’t work as the initial response.

Learn the “vocabulary of comfort.”

Often, we don’t know what to say to someone who is hurting because we’ve never developed an appropriate vocabulary. We don’t need to say a lot, a few choice sentences are sufficient. Here are some suggestions.

• • • I’m so sorry that you are hurting.
    • It saddens me that you’re hurting. I love you and care for you.
    • I’m committed to help you through this difficult time.
    • It saddens me that you felt _________ (embarrassed, rejected, belittled). I know that must have hurt.
    • I know that you’re hurting. I just wanted to come be with you.

When speaking words of comfort, it’s also important that our tone of voice complement what is being said. Our speech should be warm, sincere and gentle.

Use appropriate non-verbal gestures.

A warm embrace or gentle touch can express comfort. Tears shed for someone else can convey love beyond words.

Pastor Jess Moody said this about comfort: “Have you ever taken a real trip down inside the broken heart of a friend? To feel the sob of the soul – the raw, red crucible of emotional agony? To have this become almost as much yours as that of your soul-crushed neighbor? Then, to sit down with him – and silently weep? This is the beginning of compassion.”

We continually come in contact with people who are hurting. Let’s minister grace and healing to them through the simple but effective gift of comfort.

In Joe Keohane’s book The Power of Strangers, he makes a compelling argument for talking to strangers. All 306 pages are worth reading, but the essence of the book is summed up in its title. Keohane writes:

“Talking to strangers makes us happier, healthier, and a little smarter, and helps us feel like we belong in a world that can be chaotic and alienating. Listening to strangers can have a powerful effect on us, and on them, alleviating loneliness, enhancing belonging, and paving the way for understanding. Talking to strangers is far easier than we think, other people are more receptive to it than we might expect, and that when we talk to them, we are often pleasantly surprised.” 

I’m the quintessential introvert, so I usually avoid talking to strangers. It’s not that I’m nervous about it or lack the skills to do so, I just enjoy thinking my own thoughts and reading the thoughts of people I respect. But having read Keohane’s book, I’m going to change. I’m going to proactively talk to strangers. I can learn something from every person. I can help mitigate feelings of loneliness—something we all struggle with. I’m going to ask open-ended questions that prompt deeper conversations.

It’s wise to teach our children—stranger danger—but as adults, we can loosen our approach and be more engaging. This week, start a conversation with a stranger. Then respond to this post and tell us what happened.

Greek Isles Cruise – only one cabin is available

In three months a group of travelers and I will be visiting some of the great cities of the world: Rome, Athens, Ephesus, Istanbul, Naples; and some of the most beautiful geography on planet Earth: Santorini, Mykonos, Sicily.

There’s room for two more people.

Here’s a brochure with all the details.  Travel with Friends – 2022-Brochure

Questions? Email me at [email protected]