Let's start with people. It's all about people...

Welcome to Counterparts Coaching and Consulting. We offer a different approach to leadership coaching and development because my leadership story did not take place in a typical business setting. I’m a retired police officer, retired emergency medical technician and former director of public safety. I’ve followed, I’ve led, and I’ve been thrown into the middle of many a sh*t show. If you are the type of leader that focuses on where the rubber meets the road, has strong values to do what’s right and to treat others ethically, and are passionate about personal growth and self-exploration, keep reading, things are about to get interesting. (Or, as I’ve said many times when people jumped into the cruiser or ambulance I was driving, buckle up!)

Let’s get to brass tacks. You’re only going to read this if it is interesting and relevant. The first question you may ask is, “How does being a cop relate to me as a business leader?” Plenty. The street is a laboratory, arguably a petri dish, for developing as a leader and seeing how different things work or don’t. There, we often receive immediate feedback about how we are doing, either by what people say (“thank you” or “f*ck you”) or what people do (comply, fight or run).

I’ll jump right into one of my favorite topics with an example. I pulled a car over one afternoon for a minor infraction. It was missing a license plate, or the inspection was slightly out of date, something like that. While I was talking with the driver in the small parking lot that he had pulled into, he stated he and his 13-year-old son were on their way home to Burlington, about 10 miles away. When I ran his license through the state system the record showed his license had expired four months ago. It wasn’t under suspension or have any tickets, he just didn’t renew it on his birthday. The state gives drivers a 14-day grace period after their birthday, but that was long expired as well. By the statute, he’s not allowed to drive until he has a valid license. Of course, neither can his 13-year-old son. This also meant I had the authority to tow his vehicle, since he didn’t have a valid operator for it.

Police officers are given broad discretion in their roles for reasons just like this. Here was a driver who was operating in a safe manner, with no history of bad driving, with a child in the car (properly seatbelted), who was not legal to drive. I can tow the car, but should I? Does that serve my mission?

To answer that, you have to know my mission. “To serve and protect” is the slogan on the side of many police cruisers. But that’s not my mission. Our department has a mission statement. It was too long to put on the side of the cruiser, or to remember verbatim. My mission though? That’s easy to remember. My mission is public safety. So, does towing the car in this circumstance forward my mission?

No.

I didn’t tow the car. I even went two steps further. First, as I explained the ticket to him, I made a standard offer that I made anytime I stopped someone with an expired license. “Come to the police department within a week with a valid license and I’ll dismiss the ticket.”

And then, because he and his son were part of the public, which means their safety is important to me, I told him one other thing. “Your license is expired and technically you’re not allowed to drive. I know you were heading towards Burlington,” I pointed ahead of us, the direction he was facing, “and maybe you can call someone. But when I leave, I’m driving that way,” pointing behind us, “to go back to my station.” I bid him a safe day, got back in my car and drove away, toward my station.

I don’t know if he called anyone or just drove home as I alluded to, but I do know he was back at my office in a couple of days with a valid license and I dismissed the ticket.

Cute story. Happy ending. What does it have to do with leadership at your business?

In The Arbinger Institute’s book Leadership and Self Deception they introduce the idea of “way of being” and teach that we should see others as people and not objects, even when we have to take a hard line on an issue. I could have viewed this man as another statistic, another mutt with no license or another chance to exercise my authority. I could have seen the 13-year-old as his problem, not mine. All of those things are, at some very basic level, true.

But those views don’t align with my mission, public safety. Seeing each person as a person, and not an object, statistic, or not my problem, means I look at the whole situation, the human beings in full context, and treat them accordingly. To do this well, consistently, you need to know your mission and your values. Your mission, personal or corporate, is what you aspire to accomplish. Your values dictate how and why.

I named the company Counterparts to recognize that we need others to function at our best. A bolt needs a nut, the moon needs the sun and the earth needs both. The masculine part of us needs the feminine, logic needs emotion.

We’re going to come back to logic needing emotion another day, several days, as a matter of fact. Emotion drives most of our actions, as well as most of our biases and automatic behaviors. Too much of the time though, we aren’t really connected to the underlying emotion, and we often don’t understand all of the real influences going on. With a good Counterpart, you can learn to connect with those underlying factors, understand more, and live a more intentional, resonant life. More on that later as well.

And, yes, if you know me, you know that Counterparts is also reference to Rush.