Embracing Gravity and Friction, on and off the Slopes

An excerpt from Chad’s book “Thinking Aloud: Reflections on Ethical Leadership”. We hope you enjoy the essay – and perhaps introduce the questions below as a way to start conversations with your teammates. – ELA Team

Embracing Gravity and Friction, on and off the Slopes

A few weeks ago, I had a most enjoyable day skiing in northern Minnesota.  For those familiar with skiing in the Midwest, it typically involves very short runs into a river valley or, in this case, down from the bluffs surrounding Lake Superior.  Some of the runs have names like “Wendell’s Widowmaker,” but nobody really believes them.  It was a beautiful, sunny day, I was with a dear friend, and we had a great time.

During the many (many, many) trips up the chair lift, I got to thinking.  I began to reflect on the physics of skiing, a topic of pressing interest given my recent lapses in strength training.  In our daily lives, gravity and friction are physical forces that we usually view as slowing us down.  We use gasoline or jet fuel to overcome these forces in order to get where we want to go.  Our business metaphors imagine us “achieving lift-off” to overcome gravity or “streamlining” to reduce drag and friction.  We see these forces as the enemies of progress.  Without gravity and friction, however, skiing turns into, well, either standing or falling.

On the ski slope, gravity and friction are our friends, so long as we treat them as such.  Gravity gives us speed.  Friction, when channeled into the edges of our skis, gives us control.  We manage these forces to propel us down the hill and away from rocks, trees, and other skiers.  When those forces manage us, we find ourselves carving snow with our noses rather than our edges.

The connection to business seemed clear.  Do we manage the forces that drive our business, or do they manage us?  More accurately, do we manage our business in harmony with those forces, or in opposition to them?  Do we see vendors and customers as partners in efficient, mutually beneficial transactions, or do we seek the upper hand in these relationships at every opportunity?  Are competitors enemies to be crushed, or do we seek to benefit from them when we can?  Great competitors can help us expand markets, drive demand, and even promote innovation.

On the ski slope, the sensations of harmony and disharmony are unmistakable.  Skiing with the mountain is smooth, flowing, gentle.  We look downhill and flow from turn to turn, aware of our surroundings as a gestalt, making decisions and acting on them in a continuous process.  Skiing against the mountain is a different experience altogether.  It may begin with anxiety or inattention, and quickly devolve into a series of disconnected moves calculated, however desperately, to keep us upright.  We perceive a series of snapshots and try to react accordingly.  All too often, the result is both sudden and sodden.

In our work lives, disharmony may be harder to perceive, until we are dangerously in its cold embrace.  Many of our performance measures are actually following indicators.  The forces that ultimately result in reduced performance may have been operating for some time before the results show up in measurable performance indicators.  Mild employee discontent may go unnoticed until key people start to leave; customers’ needs or preferences change and they tolerate a mild mismatch with our services until…they don’t.  Key vendors experience problems that we are unaware of until we find ourselves without the products we need to do our jobs.

A great strategy for preventing these kinds of operational spills involves cultivating strong, trusting relationships with the people who touch our organizations.  That way we can perceive problems as they emerge and move smoothly toward their resolution before they become disruptive.  It’s another good reason for understanding those relationships while you are in the flow of successful work, and investing in maintaining that flow.

Conversation Starters

Sometimes weaknesses are also strengths, and challenges are primarily opportunities.  Learn to appreciate balance, and practice looking at situations from differing perspectives.

• Do you know what it feels like to be “in the flow?” Can you sense when your team or organization is skiing with the hill, and when it is beginning to ski against it?
• If you have many years of experience, how has your ability to perceive when you are out of balance changed over the course of your career?
• What are some of your tips for correcting course, and for finding and cultivating relationships that flow?

At Ethical Leaders in Action we believe that most, if not all people, can develop themselves to play leadership roles in many different spheres both large and small. The foundation of this development process is a short but powerful list of virtues which can be developed and improved through conscious effort. For more information feel free to take the Virtues of Ethical Leadership Self Inventory (VELSI) which breaks these virtues down into features that can be individually developed. The results of the VELSI come with a quick reference guide to help you understand how the virtues and their individual features fit together. https://ethinact.com/velsi/

See a list of other posts in this series at Blog Post Series

Subscribe to the ELA blog.  https://ethinact.com/blog/e-mail-subscribe/