-- Albert Einstein
This book will simplify this whole mystical leadership thing, by defining the common set of tasks and roles that the leader takes to be effective.
Most of what's written here will be easily identified as obvious in hindsight. That's how you can tell it's simple and true. I will begin with this premise: You learn before you do. You do before you lead.Sounds simple?
What is leadership? Leadership is the art of directing a group of people to perform effective tasks for the benefit of the organization.The the leader rallies the troops and get everyone moving in the same direction.
Leadership applies to any group, a company, a military unit, a family. Leaders often lead by communicating verbally or through writing, so that tasks are synchronized,aligned and effective.
What do good leaders do?
"The great leader coaches, directs, and inspires others to perform."
There are three distinct roles that the leader takes on:
- The leader as the coach ensures that the performer has the right skills. He needs to have domain expertise to command the respect of the performers. He needs to have the attitude of relentless improvement to keep the organization competitive.
- The leader as the director coordinates to make the team greater than the sum of the parts. A well-trained, well-coordinated force will outperform the untrained and uncoordinated. This is how 300 Spartans overcame thousands of Persians. The Strategic leader plans with creativity and executes with discipline.
- The leader as the motivator ensures that everyone on-board are performing together, willingly. The motivator has the empathetic maturity to know what drives people, and the inspirational creativity to send the right messages. He knows how to inspire the right attitudes, and how to remove the bad attitudes.
How do we know that these tasks constitute the complete list?
Based on the ground-breaking work Built to Last by Jim Collins, the Hedgehog Concept simply states that high performance occurs at the intersection of the three key components of performance: talent, passion, and alignment.
1. Talent: What you can be the best in the world
This discerning standard goes far beyond core competence. The gift, the
special talent you've been given, that's what you were meant to
do.
2. Alignment: What drives your economic engine
What others will pay for is in turn how you can contribute to others.
This is a measure of relevance of your activity to others.
3. Passion: What you deeply care about
Focused on what ignites your passion. If you love it, it won't even
feel like work.
Iterating through the possibilities we can confirm that none of the three leadership components is optional.
- Training and organizing without inspiration will result in people who just passionlessly goes through the motions of work.
- Training and inspiring without organizing will result in wasted individual efforts performing duplicated tasks, while roles go unfilled.
- Inspiring and organizing without training will result in people lacking the skills put in stressful positions.
Who is the leader? Can anyone be a leader?
A leader is anyone who improves the performance of others in an organization. There can be multiple leaders in an organization. A leader can explicitly communicate to improve help improve performance from others, but that's not necessary. A leader can also perform his task with such passion, intensity, and sacrifice that he inspires others to perform better.
Each of us has many opportunities to take on the role as the leader in our lifetimes. Examples are endless: as parent, coach, teacher, mentor, or boss. But only a few will be good leaders, and fewer will be willing leaders. Because leadership requires a special balance of skills in patience, negotiation, communication, authority,and many others. And taking on the role of a leader can be stressful and take a toll on any individual. while only great leaders can inspire sustainable performance.
Does the leader have to be the best performer?
The leader is often the best
performer in a group, because he is most able to get respect from
others and therefore affect change. But to ensure optimal contribution
from all team members, they should not look to the leader for all
ideas. In any organization, good ideas can come from anywhere, and the
best leader is capable of getting the best out of each
member.
In modern organizations, especially where followers know so much, a leader cannot be presumptuous in assuming that all will follow. The more capable your performers, especially the stars, the more need to communicate and listen as the normal process of inspiring. And the less capable performers will need your teaching and coaching. The great leader knows what to do in each situation.
What if there are disagreements among leaders?
Disagreements among leaders result in dysfunctional organizations. To ensure optimal uninterrupted performance, disagreements among leaders should be resolved in private, away from other members of the team. Or else the team can take that negativity and distrust the future of the organization.
People disagree for many reasons. Differences can be settled through either through civilized debate or power struggles. In extreme cases, you have mutiny and war. In a family, wed hope that the parents prevail as the leaders. In the military the assignment of explicit ranks helps resolve disagreements very quickly, as in the chaos of battle, any direction is better than no direction at all.