As we move through this recession, leaders must be constantly aware of the emotional swings in the morale of those they lead. They need to constantly be engaged in the process of successful conversations. Essentially, leaders need to focus on small immediate successes that will drive employee confidence and momentum. We were reminded of this many years ago from the writings of Katzenbach and Smith in their book, The Wisdom of Teams. Teams that are successful create their own sense of forward momentum. They build towards a future that is focused on the positive and they meet obstacles head on. So, too, leaders who build on success will create this same momentum throughout the organization and success will breed success across the culture.
What are the ways to build a success culture?

Attack Fear With A Vengeance
Fear is the number killer of positive momentum. It is so graphically clear when watching a sporting event, how the momentum seems to change throughout the game. This change in momentum is often caused by a lack of self-confidence on the part of one team to successfully carry out a play, move the ball forward, etc. The losing team becomes fearful they will fail, which often times results in more failure. Leaders need to recognize the power of fear and how it affects the dynamics of success. Fear erodes self-confidence and in turn creates a momentum of doom and gloom. These emotional fears can become the way of doing business and this cycle can slowly destroy the underpinnings of the organization.

Tune Into What People Talk About
It is very interesting when you pay attention to what people are talking about. It tells you a great deal about them, how they think and what they believe. Leaders must be very in tuned with the organizational conversation. Listening to these day-to-day dialogues is a barometer of organizational success for the leader. As we all know, conversations of success as compared to failure sound very different. Success conversations are filled with stories of accomplishment and profitability. Deficit conversations are filled with stories of gloom and defeat. Leaders need to intentionally dialogue in the positive and avoid deficit conversations at all cost.

Leaders need to engage staff positively so they feel comfortable and self-reliant. They need to foster patterns and dialogues that are present-future and avoid the wallowing in the past. History can teach us many lessons; however remaining in the past stops the productivity machine dead. Deficit conversations breed anxiety and fear resulting in a lack of personal accountability on the part of staff. In this kind of environment, the blame game takes over, errors increase and personal productivity suffers. Susan Scott reinforces many of these notions in her book Fierce Conversations where she explained in great detail the importance of dialogue in organizations and how these discussions led to personal and organization success.

Reinforce What You Want to See
People learn through repetition. This simple truth seems easy enough. However, it is very important to be conscious of what is being repeated. As we have heard many times, poor practice reaps poor results. Individuals who are repeating a pattern of fear and negative dialogue will deepen their fear and negativity towards others. Leaders who understand this use a simple approach in changing the dominance of fear and negativity in others.

1.    Recognize first what the person is saying and validate it.
2.    Show respect for their perspective and recognize its importance.
3.    Suggest a different more positive perspective on the same issue.
4.    Show them that this perspective is real with evidence in the actual work environment.
5.    Get them to try this new approach for the next week; to try it on.
6.    Review with them at the end of the week to register any change in their perspective.

Naturally, the suggestion in step three injects a degree of positivity into the dialogue and an attitude of confidence and self-reliance to attack the feelings of fear. The real key is in step four where the leader provides evidence of a different way of feeling and talking through others. This is a great opportunity for the leader to reference people that the individual respects and cares for. In this way, the individual begins to trust and the process for change has begun.

Leaders must lead in all types of circumstances. They need the courage and fortitude to create a climate of positive thought and dialogue, which leads to productive behavior and positive change. Especially during these trying times of recession and upheaval, these leadership characteristics are essential.