We Listen and Take Swift Action

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One of our Leadership Standards at High Ground is "We listen and take swift action."

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There's a reason this matters so much to us. It's about team morale. It's about buy-in. It's about whether people actually want to show up and do their best work.

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Want to kill someone's momentum? Receive their feedback, nod politely, and let it collect dust. Nothing demoralizes a team member faster than feeling ignored when they've put themselves out there with an idea or observation.

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When someone cares enough to bring something to leadership, it deserves a real response.

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Maybe it's an improvement to a process. Maybe it's feedback about something that's not working. Maybe it's a completely new idea. Whatever it is, it warrants action - even if that action is an honest conversation about why we can't implement it.

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The Bad Idea Problem

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Here's where most leaders get this wrong: they treat bad ideas like landmines to step around.

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A bad idea is actually an opportunity. Someone on your team just told you they're thinking about the business. They're engaged enough to bring you something. That's already a win.

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Your job isn't to shoot it down. Your job is to provide context they might not have - the broader impact, the cost of implementation, the unintended consequences. Now you've got a team member who's better equipped to think critically next time. They're more informed. They're still engaged. That's how you build people up.

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But if you just smile and do nothing? You've missed the moment. That team member walks away feeling like their effort didn't matter. They're less likely to speak up next time. That's a loss for everyone.

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The Good Idea Standard

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Good ideas deserve swift action. If it's not prohibitively expensive and it makes sense, we move on it.

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This is how you build an ownership mentality. People think critically about the business when they see their ideas actually implemented. They feel like partners in what we're building, not just employees following orders.

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We're at a point now where we can look around High Ground and point to things we built together. That feels amazing. We want to be able to do the same thing years from now.

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Making It Real

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This is simple to understand but hard to execute consistently.

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One quick test: if a leader isn't taking notes, they're going to fail at this. You can have the best intentions in the world, but if you're not writing things down in the moment, you will drop the ball. Ideas get lost. Follow-through doesn't happen.

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I keep a Rite-in-the-Rain notebook in my back pocket and a pen on me at all times. So do my leaders. You might think you can just use your phone, but consider the message you're sending. When someone shares an idea and you pull out a notebook and start writing, that says something. It says this matters. It says I'm taking you seriously. Pulling out your phone doesn't communicate the same thing.

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The Bigger Picture

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Everyone wants to feel like they're a valued member of a winning team.

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Acting quickly on feedback from across the organization makes that real. It's not a poster on the wall or a nice-sounding value statement. It's how we actually operate. It's how we build trust. It's how we get better together.

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That's just one of the standards we hold ourselves to at High Ground.

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