Welcome to the seventh instalment of our new interview series Leadership Insights: 3 questions with… where we ask the same three questions to each of the exceptional leaders we interview, revealing some very unique and insightful answers.
This month we spoke to Tony Lamb, who now runs his own Data Strategy consultancy, is a Business Coach and a Director at Nua Training. Tony has over 30 years experience launching and growing high performing data businesses and teams
And here’s what Tony had to say…
If you could rewind the clock to when you started on your leadership journey, what advice would you give yourself?
In my roles, I’ve often been tasked with starting new initiatives from scratch. Quite daunting when you look at a blank sheet of paper, knowing that unless you come up with a good business case, your job, and your team’s jobs are at stake.
Looking back on how ideas have been formed, then developed into pilots, then rolled out, the start and the end point are rarely as originally anticipated.
As “the ideas” often have not been done before, you’re going to often be learning as you progress, so you’ll have set-backs, and many things are going to fail the first time. You need that healthy balance between optimism and cynicism. I have this visual image of spinning plates; you always always need a few on the go, in case Plan A and B don’t work. So they key thing I’d tell my younger self is
“The more you do, the more you get”
The more viable options you have, the more likely you are to ultimately succeed. Growing your resilience is crucial to keeping going, to cope with the set-backs, but also making sure you are learning as you progress.
What is the best advice you have been given about creating a positive team culture / being a leader?
I attended a conference recently, where a very successful and highly regarded CEO was asked about what she felt her “super-powers” are that have allowed her to get to where she is today. Her first answer was that she was good at making decisions, even when she didn’t have all the information at her fingertips.
This reminded me of a time when I was leading a delivery programme to launch a new business. The programme team had a real buzz and enthusiasm to it, and one very experienced member commented on how different this project felt versus others he’d worked on. When I asked him why, he responded that we make decisions and own them.
They weren’t necessarily always the right decisions, but they were the best we could make with the information at that time, which then allowed other things to progress and move forward.
What is the one book that has most influenced your approach to leadership?
A couple of years ago, I undertook my business coaching diploma. I’d always led teams, and as part of that process tried to support and develop team members, and get them to really take ownership for their roles. Sometimes this was more successful than others, and on reflection, where it wasn’t succeeding, I’d found myself selling, then maybe telling, rather than really understanding how the other person could get to where they needed to.
The whole coaching process was a revelation to me, for example using silence to get a person to go deeper into their thinking and start to unpick why they think what they do.
The book that I wished I’d had when I was a manager is The Coach’s Casebook by Watts and Morgan. It identifies twelve traits that people can feel trapped by, with detailed explanations of the situation, and ways to help the person understand their challenge. It’s a great read, with well known successful figures such as Greg Dyke explaining the issues they’d had, and how they’d overcome, or managed them.
As a reference source to help develop individuals, it’s gold-dust, and as testimony to that, it’s still sitting on my desk today.