The Leader Lab. Tania Luna

dynamics. Surprisingly, many said yes. (And to them, we are eternally grateful.) As a result, we got to sit in on one-on-ones and team meetings, as well as solo working sessions where we asked managers to “think out loud” as they made complex decisions. With the black box open, we were able to observe their behaviors in action.

      When we began our research on what makes great managers different, we started with the implicit premise that it is the big behaviors that count. Without realizing it, we were waiting for something cinematic to happen. We wanted to get goosebumps and imagine an orchestral crescendo while hearing an inspiring speech. What we found instead were behaviors so small we barely noticed them. But there they were, distinctly standing out again and again in the “black boxes” of the great managers. Even though these leaders came from different industries, professions, and cultures, they had a small set of small behaviors in common.

      Discovering Behavioral Units

We've come to call each small behavior we observed a Behavioral Unit (or BU for short). No, they are not dramatic, but they are so elegant in their simplicity that they do give us goosebumps. We began to spot them in casual conversations, in times of conflict, and in every meeting. Even in the midst of our own debates about what makes great managers different, we'd stop one another and say, “Hey, nice BU!” Now that these BUs were visible to us, they were impossible to unsee. Once you learn them, you too will start to spot them everywhere.

      The Manager Core: Your Leadership Swiss Army Knife

      Once we learned how important BUs are, we thought we had our research breakthrough. Then, we realized something even more exciting: not all BUs are created equal. While great managers exhibit dozens of BUs, there is a foundational set of seven that come up in more contexts than any other. We call these the Core BUs. They are the small but mighty behaviors we will focus on in Part I of this book. What are these tiny champions of the leadership world? We are proud to present each one, chapter by chapter:

       Chapter 1: Q-step

       Chapter 2: Playback

       Chapter 3: Deblur

       Chapter 4: Validate

       Chapter 5: Linkup

       Chapter 6: Pause

       Chapter 7: Extract

      Once you are familiar with the Core BUs, you will be ready to graduate to Part II of this book, which is based on our most popular workshops at LifeLabs Learning. In each chapter, we will show you how to string various BUs together to form the eight Core Skills of great managers.

While BUs are micro-behaviors, skills are packages of different BUs and tools mixed together to help you handle an even broader range of obstacles and opportunities. As an analogy, think of knowing the alphabet as a BU and of writing as a skill. Based on our manager research, we found that, just as not all BUs are created equal, not all skills are equally versatile. So, in Part II, we'll bring you only the skills we refer to as the “tipping point skills.” These are the skills that “tip” over into the widest number of domains, making the biggest impact in the shortest time. What are these famed Core Skills? Drum roll please … the skills you will be learning throughout Part II of this book are:

       Chapter 8: Coaching Skills

       Chapter 9: Feedback Skills

       Chapter 10: Productivity Skills

       Chapter 11: Effective One-on-Ones

       Chapter 12: Strategic Thinking

       Chapter 13: Meetings Mastery

       Chapter 14: Leading Change

       Chapter 15: People Development

      Think of the Core BUs as your leadership Swiss Army knife. A single Swiss Army knife has a small set of tools, and yet this finite set alone will let you open canned foods, start a fire, make repairs, defend yourself, trim your nails, remove splinters, and infinite other things. In the same way, the Core BUs will get you through just about any leadership challenge and fit neatly into the pocket of your memory. Each time you learn how to use different Swiss Army knife tools to achieve a result, you learn a new skill. That's what the Core Skills throughout this book will help you do: rapidly combine different BUs and tools to become a great manager faster.

Your Leader Lab

So, let's get into it. We'll now move away from our telescopic view of managers and saunter over to the microscope. We'll zoom in on the specific behaviors of great managers, sharing behavioral science research along the way. But this deep dive into research is not the only reason this book is called The Leader Lab. Yes, we will bring you lessons from our laboratory and from leadership labs across the world, but the most important lab we will focus on is yours.

      The very best managers we studied were all wildly different, but one thing they had in common was a practice of constantly experimenting. Rarely did they mention that their leadership skills came naturally to them. On the contrary, most confessed that they made countless mistakes on a regular basis. They just weren't content to leave their mistakes in the past. Instead, much like world-class chess masters, they “replayed” their days, noticing what they did well, where they went wrong, and what new leadership experiments they can try out in future. In this way, they became the directors of their own leader labs. They turned every interaction into a learning opportunity and became great managers faster. And so, we now invite you to put on your lab coat and enter your personal leader lab. Don't just read this book. Use it as your guide to experiment, reflect, and accelerate your manager mastery.

      Not only will the Manager Core help you become a better catalyst of progress for your team, but it will also make your life easier. We began this chapter by pointing out how hard it is to have a bad manager, but actually being a manager is even harder. Feeling responsible for that combination of company results and people's needs, hopes, fears, and dreams can be a heavy weight to carry – especially when there is never enough time and no one to help you figure things out. As a manager, you will face some of the toughest challenges of your life. While the BUs and skills we share with you will make your ride to manager mastery no less wild, we promise to make it more fun, rewarding, and a lot faster.

How to Use This Book

      As You Read

      The first time you read this book, we recommend you move through it from beginning to end, since lessons in each chapter carry through to all chapters that follow. Don't read passively like you're sitting in on a lecture. After all, this is a lab. Actively reflect on your own behaviors along