the art of leading

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Why is it that time passes by so fast when we’re reading a great book? There’s something about it that just enthralls you into a hypnotic state of mind and sort of fall into a deep trance. When you wake up, you’re done with the book. Time was accelerated. You rode a spaceship through a black hole and ended up somewhere else, and someTIME else.

The same thing can be said about exceptional leaders. You are embedded within their ideas. You are invited to capture those ideas. A short time later you find yourself totally entranced by the shadow that they cast.

You feel what the leader feels, in the same way that a great author makes you feel what a character in the book is feeling. Or what the author himself is feeling. You let yourself go, and the leader, or the author, catches you in his or her arms to direct you. To direct you with your permission. To direct you with your complete willingness. Because you’re in their trance.

Just ask the following question to anyone who has followed such a unique leader, especially in the workplace: What was it like to work for him? I’m pretty sure a big chunk will automatically enter a trance-like state and start reminiscing of the time they spent under the leader’s wings.

They will smile and tell you, “Time passed so quickly. I would’ve loved to work for her for a longer time.”

Leaders are like books. The great ones will make time pass quickly. They will teach you life-changing lessons. They will leave you yearning for more. Poor ones will be a bore. You’ll find them tedious and insignificant. They will leave you in a state of exhaustion.

Readers will create very vivid images in their minds as the book develops. Authors created those images. Followers of a great leader will be full of creative ideas that solve problems for an organization. Leaders created those ideas.

The reason why so many authors have created revolutions, trends, and movements, I believe is due to their ability to create images in the minds of readers. They may be violent, or enjoyable, or sad, or happy, or peaceful, or calm, or quiet, or loud. But readers act out, sometimes in a subconscious way, these ideas and images. And as a result, revolutions happen. Or inventions are inspired. Or  controversies are sparked.

So to become a great leader, become a great author first. Create images in the minds of followers that will move them to act. Move people through ideas, as an author does. Make time pass by in the blink of an eye. Be an author of greatness.

Categories : Confidence, General Leadership, Goals, Personal Development, Relationships // Add Comment »

Generally, every great leader has one trait that stands out from the others. They have one characteristic that identifies them. It may be related to personality, or to leadership style, or to other areas. What many of these leaders understand that many don’t is that the way you naturally are can be used to your advantage. It is true that you should always strive for improvement and development of skills you don’t have. If you are so timid that you aren’t able to communicate, then you have a problem. You won’t be able to communicate your vision! But even if you improve that area of your life and find the courage to meet new people and have a healthy social life, you might still be a reserved person. There isn’t anything wrong with that. It took a while for me to accept that being a reserved person didn’t mean I was doomed to obscurity. Granted, I have learned how to better cope with my timidity. I realized it was holding me back in many areas. But that doesn’t mean I have to be insincere to myself as to who I really am! Learn how to embrace your true self and use your personality to your advantage as a leader. But before doing that, you need to identify what characteristic you naturally have, that may be used as your leadership ‘brand’. I recommend you ask yourself the following questions to accomplish that:

How do you solve problems?

The answer to this question may tell you a lot about your personality. When a problematic situation arises, do you prefer to go by your gut instincts to solve it? Or do you carefully gather the facts, analyze the situation and try to build consensus? Do you prefer that nobody gets hurt? Or are you totally oblivious to the consequences that your decision might have? There is no right or wrong question. Every style has its place, depending upon the situation. Neither are they exclusive of the other answer. Sometimes styles may be synergistic. But generally, most people lean toward one side more than the other. You should discover, if it’s not already obvious to you, which are your inclinations. Stay mindful of that, and trust your style.

What are you passionate about?

Your passions may communicate a lot about you. Obviously, nobody is defined by their interests or hobbies. But they’re pretty good signs. Perhaps your free time revolves around finding out the best way to jump out of an airplane in mid-flight. I might be inclined to think that you’re comfortable with taking significant risks. That attitude could definitely be an asset when acting as a leader!

What do you think you’re good at?

Your skills in various areas of life may be symbolic of characteristics you could use to develop yourself as a leader. For example, a person may be a brilliant robot-builder. Maybe that person is detail-oriented. Detail-oriented leaders definitely have a role to play in society. I understand this may be too broad of a generalization, but you should use this as a guideline.

What do others think about you?

Most times people overestimate themselves. Other times people may ignore a very positive characteristic they have. That is where family, friends, and perhaps even complete strangers come into play. Others may see things you don’t. Try to ask them about what they think you are good at. Ask them about your negative characteristics. If they’re honest and trustful, they should be of great help in assisting you in discovering potential leadership strengths.

Develop that strength

Warren Buffet, the great investor, was capable of using one very specific characteristic he had to build a multi-billion dollar business like Berkshire Hathaway, Inc., of which he is CEO, and becoming one of the richest men alive. In Buffet: The Making of an American Capitalist, author Roger Lowenstein describes how Buffet was always avert to venturing into unknown territory. Throughout his career, he has made it a central element of his philosophy to never invest in any company he doesn’t understand. That doesn’t mean he stands on the sidelines and doesn’t bother to learn, but he is careful to only invest in companies he fully understands. Another trait he is famous for is his Omaha hospitality. People are drawn to him when he talks because of that. In fact, he has a cult-like following that is characteristic of great leaders. So, once you have a pretty good idea of what are those one or two strong characteristics that are capable of catapulting you into mastering the Art of Leading, focus on them. ‘Brand’ yourself. Make it easy for others to identify you.

Categories : General Leadership, Personal Development // Add Comment »

Last week , in Why the First 100 Days Could Make or Break Leaders, I mentioned the importance of “the First 100 Days” of a leader in a new position. In today’s post I’ll map out one possible course of action that someone might take in those first 100 days, to make the most out of them. The list was thought of in a step-by-step approach, but each item can be seen as a separate idea.

1. Ask for suggestions from present employees on what are the things that must be done. This doesn’t mean you’re going to do whatever they tell you, but it will be useful information to know what are the perceived top priorities.
2. Meet with your executives, 1 or 2 per day depending on the size of your organization. Get to know who you’ll be working with.
3. Prepare a report where you gather and analyze the information that has been gathered.
4. Take your people on a get-away to collaborate on the design of a new strategy, based on the information that has been gathered. Come away with new goals and a new strategy to achieve them.
5. Focus on communicating the new strategy to your organization.
6. Ask employees if they’re willing to work and collaborate with you in reaching new goals and following a new strategy. You need only the most willing people.
7. Re-assign or fire those who aren’t compatible with your vision.
8. Hire those who need to be hired. Use this opportunity, if given, to fill in the gaps. Do you lack sales and marketing skills? Then hire people who excel at sales and marketing.
9. Take the first step in your new strategy. You were brought here for a reason, so get to work on what you have achieved in these 100 days. You have just begun.

Whatever you do in your first 100 days, my suggestion to you is to focus on gathering information and developing a plan to synthesize and utilize that information. Whichever method you choose, that should be the most important goal.

Categories : Action, Communication, General Leadership, Goals, Relationships, Success // 4 Comments »

1. Never value your journey as a success.
People who consider the achievement of the ultimate goal as the only possible way to achieve success are perfect prospects to never be good leaders. It is a perfect way to fail as a leader. Leaders, naturally, are driven and desire to accomplish the realization of a vision. That is one of the things that characterize them. But they also are set apart because they see each step in the way to realization as a small success. If you never value your journey as a success, then you’ll end up being a very unhappy person, since you’ll have to wait a long time before you can know what ’success’ feels like.

2. Never delegate.
Successful leaders know how to delegate. So it follows that if you want to suck at leadership, you can’t delegate anything. If that’s what you want, just hoard every little detail inside your circle of responsiblity and forget about the big picture. If you try to do everything by yourself, you’ll end up with so much unimportant details that you won’t have any time or energy to dedicate to the really significant stuff such as…being a leader instead of a task administrator.

3. Never point out anything positive about the people who surround you.
This is the perfect way to sink into leadership hell. So if your goal is to be a bad leader, then you absolutely need to put this principle into play. In fact, a faster way to destroying relationships is to not only withhold compliments, but express negative comments about those who surround you. This will create resentment toward you, which means that they won’t want to follow you, or do anything that you want them to do.

4. Never consider leadership as a means.
Those who most frequently fail at the game of leadership are those who see it as a material object to be attained, instead of a means to attain something that is meaningful to society or a part of it. Successful leaders, on the other hand, get to practice leadership because they want to express themselves and their vision. They aren’t leaders just for the sake of being leaders.

5. Never think of leadership as a way to serve others.
This is a very important message to those who want to fail as leaders: just serve yourself. Become a leader out of mere self-interest and you’ll be well on your way to being a perfect failure as a leader. Great leaders have a purpose that is greater than themselves. Just do the opposite if you want to be their opposite.

6. Stump whoever is beneath you.
This is another great way to destroy your chances of failure. When you get to the “top”, just start taking those “beneath” you for granted. When you come crashing down in the future, nobody will be there to help you up, since you destroyed all those meaningful relationships with people who are now on “top” of you.

7. Never read, just watch reality shows over and over again.
Great leaders don’t stop learning. They read every type of book they can get their hands on, and take a critical point of view toward them, which will help them when analyzing real-world situations. They focus on books and even art and music that expand their critical and analytical capabilities. So, if you want to fail as a leader, it’s simple: watch every reality show out there. Those are perfect to kill your brain cells, since they not only don’t require you to think, but encourage you to be dumber. There is nothing better that you can do to decrease your critical and analytical abilities than listening to Paris Hilton or Britney Spears or some random dude talk about their dog’s nails.

8. Never mold your own environment.
If you want to do everything in your power to suck at leadership, let circumstances and your environment mold you . Truly successful leaders are those who see something they don’t like and strive to change it. They aren’t bogged down by petty day-to-day events. They go out and create their own set of favorable circumstances instead of letting the likes and wants of others destroy their visions.

9. Never fail.
This may be the most important principle to follow in your quest to leadership insignificance. True leaders come to see failures and mistakes as learning vehicles. In fact, they come to look forward to these situations, because they know that in every failure, they will find an equally significant or greater success. If you want to stay stuck at where you are right now, then don’t do anything differently. Don’t risk failing, since it will only bring you unlimited opportunities, and someone who would never want to be a leader would never want that.

Categories : Communication, Failure, General Leadership, Goals, Personal Development, Recognition, Relationships // 2 Comments »

“Rules are made to be broken”

I can think of many interpretations and questions about that somewhat “cliched” phrase, but one stands out: Who makes the rules? You may know the answer already: Leaders. In every aspect of life, be it politics, religion, or business, leaders make the rules. Leaders are the ones who blaze the paths. And leaders are the ones who make the rules once they’re finished blazing the paths.

So where am I going with this?

You need to break some rules and create new ones. Leadership requires trailblazing, and the only way to do that is by believing in the “Rules are made to be broken” maxim. This way, you’ll be leading from a position of increased leverage. This will sometimes require that you knock down a few obstacles in the way. Facebook has had to do this in the social network field, with MySpace as the dominant player. But it has to be done if you want to be the leader and believe you have better solutions.

Sometimes you, as a leader, might navigate territories that have never been navigated before. In this case, there won’t be any rules in place, so you’ll have the opportunity to make them from scratch. Make everyone else follow your rules. That’s what, for example, Microsoft did with software. Everyone in the software field has had to follow Microsoft’s rules for the last couple of decades. Microsoft’s position as the pioneer has blocked entry to a great amount of potential competitors.

So go out and break the rules that need to be broken.

Categories : General Leadership // Add Comment »

Although this article uses the lawyer as an example, “Thought Leadership” is a very useful leadership resource in many areas. Thought leadership could be very effective to persuade others, especially due to the low barriers of entry into the internet, which can be used to distribute information more effectively than ever. Enjoy!

Thought Leadership - A Long-Term Investment by Steven Matthews

Categories : General Leadership, Links // Add Comment »

Previously I wrote a post called Self Confidence to be a Leader. This article, Leadership by Hypothesis, by Pete Pande of Forbes.com, summarizes that importance of self confidence in a leader. Here is an excerpt:

“Why “leadership by hypothesis?” Two simple answers: 

–Every decision a leader makes–every goal set, target defined, strategy developed–is fundamentally a hypothesis, a more or less educated guess about the future and the correct path to success.

–The more conscious you are of your hypotheses, the better you can manage the inherent uncertainties and risks every leader and organization faces—and in many cases, use those uncertainties to your advantage.

The best leaders are comfortable with hypotheses.”     Keep reading!

Categories : Action, Confidence, Courage, General Leadership // Add Comment »

I came across this article. It contains basic information about leadership abilities in general. Take a look: Building Your Leadership Skills on BNET.

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I keep hearing and reading that there is a tendency towards leaders having to be “technically proficient”, against being merely “charismatic”. I partly disagree with that, and I’ll try to explain myself in this post.

Charisma isn’t the cure-all anymore

A “charismatic” leader will not be automatically successful just for being “charismatic”. That, I think, is a given. What I don’t necessarily agree with is the “technically proficient” part. The CEO of a car manufacturing company doesn’t have to know how to work the assembly line. Granted, she should know about the car industry. She should know about the tendencies, disruptors, external and internal factors, and other highly relevant information.

That’s NOT called technical proficiency… it’s called benchmarking proficiency

But here’s the thing: knowing those things does not make you technically proficient. In fact, those are things that a true leader could learn during the job. Knowing those things make you benchmarking proficient. Technical proficiency, in my mind, refers to nitty-gritty details. Benchmarking proficiency, on the other hand, refers to knowing how to measure success.

So what does measuring success mean?

The true modern leader should be a master at interpreting data about past, present, and future tendencies. He should be a master at reasonably predicting trends in the industry, and developing action plans to participate in those future trends. He should be a master at establishing trends and becoming a pioneer of those trends.

So, today’s leader doesn’t have to be a technical genius, although that may sometimes be a boon. But today’s leader should know how to create benchmarks. He should know how to compare, contrast, and predict. He should know how to place his organization in relation to competitors and the environment. He should know how to benchmark.

Categories : Benchmarking, Environment, General Leadership, Goals, Success, Systems // Add Comment »

Marcel Marceau died on Saturday. He inspired awe and admiration in millions as a mime artist. Artistic savants as well as ordinary people followed him.

Why did a mime artist achieve such leadership status?

Because Marceau captured the essence of the human condition. He used only physical gestures to communicate feelings and entire dialogues. He made what he said simple to decode. In his performances he talked very clearly, without ever having to talk. He inspired millions to join his crusade.

Isn’t that what true leaders are supposed to do anyway?

Leaders don’t need positions of power. They don’t need to be elected by the people. They don’t need to be called CEO or President or Chairman or Prime Minister. They just are. Great leaders normally don’t set out to be leaders per se. They set out to achieve a mission. In Marceau’s case, he set out to bring an art form to life. It turns out that to do so, he had to become a leader along the way.

So what can you learn from Marceau? Well, I’m sure there are plenty of lessons to learn from such a man. But chew on these two for the time being:

1. Find and use the communication method that you’re most good at. It doesn’t have to be the spoken word, as you can see. But whatever method you choose, you must talk clearly.
2. You don’t need a special title to achieve leadership status.Look at Marcel Marceau.

P.S. Seth Godin wrote a post called Marcel Marceau died. It talks about another of his traits that might be very useful for leaders.

Categories : Communication, General Leadership, Goals, Relationships // 2 Comments »