Thoughts on the Art of Leadership
This section is a collection of random thoughts I’ve developed (and blatantly stolen) over the years on the topic of “leadership”…
Some of the things I have come to believe about leadership include:
* Leadership is the art of engaging the followership
* Leaders are professional Decision Makers by trade: they are paid to make decisons
* Leaders have the confidence to make decisions with no more than 80% of the available data (the remaining 20% of the data will take 80% of the time)
* Leaders know when to hunt and when to farm
* Leaders work hard at catching someone doing something right
* Leaders have the courage to realize when they are “coaching for height” and take decisive action
* There’s often quite a big difference between “management” and “leadership”.
* Leaders reward
- performance not attendance,
- achievements not proposals,
- risk-taking not risk-aversion,
- initiative not arrogance
* Leaders seek alignment on the “what” and then allow their team to be the expert of the “how”
* Leaders sustainable weigh the “what” with the “how” as opposed to “the what at all costs”
* “first who, then what” can be a very powerful leadership tool
* Leaders are paid to operate in the gray zone of seeking a balance between the needs of a company’s employees, customers, and shareholders
* As a leader I believe that I am often the dumbest guy on my team
* Leaders deliver all of the above within a context of integrity, respect, and above all humility, at all times