Peace On Earth, Good Will To All
Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays
Peace on Earth, Good Will To All
Want to Make A Difference? Treat Leadership as a Calling
The most effective leaders that I’ve observed, worked for, mentored and studied all have one thing in common. They have a deep regard for the impact of their role on others and they treat this responsibility like a precious gift, holding it in trust and preparing to pass it along to the next generation.
These leaders view their profession as a calling, not a job. They view themselves as teachers and mentors and coaches and they practice these disciplines relentlessly.
Alternatively, those individuals that I’ve observed struggling in their roles tend to focus on the transactional components of daily business while preoccupying on the trappings of leadership, including false perceptions of power and prestige.
These less effective and less satisfied leaders have yet to accept their role as something greater than a job with a title, a salary and maybe an office with a door. Often, these are the leaders that we don’t hear from in the form of feedback, or if we do, it is destructive and critical instead of constructive and developmental.
Are Servant Leaders Weak Leaders?
While some might bristle or take issue with the characterization of leadership as a calling, viewing this description as representing a style as soft or weak, I vehemently disagree.
Some of the best servant leaders that I know set expectations high and are consistently rewarded with performance that exceeds those expectations. They’ve nailed the leadership challenges all the way from talent selection and development to the effective use of feedback, coaching and mentoring.
Part and parcel of getting the elements of leading right includes dealing fairly with poor performers, reinforcing consistent application of core values and making timely, tough decisions every single day. No weak leaders here.
Depending upon your circumstances while you are reading this…current leader or aspiring leader, know that you have a choice to make every day that you walk in the door. You can model your behavior and performance after one that views the honor of leading as a calling, or you can ignore this deeper issue around leading to your own disadvantage.
Make the right choice. You’ve got lives to positively impact and organizations to grow.
Leadership Caffeine-An Effective Leader’s Resolutions are Calendar Blind
Filed under: Career, Leadership, Leadership Caffeine, Leadership Skills, Management Education, Performance, Professional Growth, Your Professional Development "To Do" List
I’m as guilty as the next person of finding the impending resetting of the calendar a cathartic cleansing, where the failures of the past year are suddenly washed away and replaced by the empty and unknown space filled with promise and time stretching out in front of us.
There is something remarkably powerful and alluring about the chance to start-over, right wrongs and vow to do things right the next time around.
Resolutions start out as good intentions early in a new year and often end up as regrets later. At some point during the year, we cross a threshold where we mentally give up on the resolutions for now and resolve to succeed next year.
Full disclosure, I live in Chicago, where the saying “wait until next year” (Cubs) is slightly more commonplace than, “vote early and vote often.” Waiting until next year is a part of the genetic make-up for anyone born north of Adams.
Real Time Resolutions are Fuel for Effective Leaders:
As a leader, you cannot afford to fall victim to the boom and bust cycle of annual resolutions. Rather, your challenge is a daily one, requiring you to manage your practices and habits in a program of perpetual self-improvement. Of course, identifying the right improvements requires you to have a real-time feedback system and the ability to keep your ego in check while as objectively as possible processing the daily evidence on your own performance.
While the simple act of even contemplating the need to improve requires a great degree of self-awareness and emotional intelligence on the part of the leader, remember, we are talking about effective leaders. Ineffective leaders are blind, deaf and dumb to these issues.
Effective leaders teach themselves to think and observe with the following questions in mind:
- How am I positively and negatively impacting the performance of my team members?
- What are people telling me (directly and indirectly) about my performance?
- Are people comfortable offering suggestions on how I can help?
- How do people respond to me? Do they shrink or grow in my presence?
- What is the quality of my various interactions? Are we tackling or skirting the tough issues?
- Do people treat me with deference or respect?
- Do my practices stimulate creativity or drive compliance?
- Are there new ideas and suggestions for improvements flowing from the team?
Armed with insights and feedback, the effective leader strives to improve his/her performance daily, creating a kind of Leader’s Muscle Memory where good habits become ingrained and second nature and bad habits are constantly exercised away.
Rather than annual resolutions to improve, the time for reflection is during the drive or plane trip home, at night before going to sleep or in the morning armed with that fresh promise of a new day…not dissimilar from the promise of the new year.
Effective leaders operate with a constant sense of renewal, driven by an intense desire to succeed and to help others succeed. While not every effective leader thinks in the exact language and terms of the questions above, they do think in terms of the same issues: What’s working? What’s not? What can I do better?
The great news about being a leader is that you alone control the ability to do the right things and every day….and every encounter provides the opportunity to improve.
No more “wait until next year” for you. Your next year is right now and every minute thereafter. Resolve to use those minutes wisely and leave no regrets in your leadership wake.
An Irreverent but Pointed Look at Feedback & An Update on the Newsletter Promotion
Filed under: Career, Leadership, Leadership Skills, Talent Management, Your Professional Development "To Do" List
Thanks to everyone that joined the Management Excellence Newsletter list during the past view days!
We succeeded in growing the already substantial list by a whopping 25% and I’m honored that so many of you joined. Now of course the burden is on me to live up to my commitment of fresh, compelling and useful content in the spirit of the blog. I welcome the opportunity and challenge!
I will be recruiting one of my sons to help me with the name drawing for the free books (Practical Lessons in Leadership) and will reach out to the winners via e-mail over the next day or so for shipping information.
Thanks again for your enthusiastic response! For those that missed joining, but don’t want to miss out, the sign up is found in the right column on both the Management Excellence and Building Better Leaders sites.
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Today’s post is at my Building Better Leaders site/blog and features a slightly irreverent look at the value and need for feedback. It is entirely possible that in the course of making a point on why feedback is such a critical skill to master, I compared it to Viagra, dissed the Chicago Bears QB Jay Cutler and encouraged incompetent leaders to volunteer to stand next to a wall with a blindfold on and smoke a cigarette. And yes, there is a message and at least a few ideas for you once you get beyond my slightly off-center suggestions. Since the post is R-rated, if you are easily upset by references to performance enhancement and firing squads, you may want to skip the post.
If you are courageous, here’s the link to:“Feedback-Performance Enhancement for Leaders Without the Pill”
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