Leadership
Leadership is...
Inspiring people to do great things.
(e.g. satisfy customers better than competitors).
How to be a great leader
1. Have a vision (a future ideal for everyone to work
for)
This vision should:
a) inspire people to dramatically change their situation
(for example, Martin Luther
King’s ,pictured right, dream of racial equality in
America).
b) be relevant to people’s needs
(or people won’t believe in the vision).
This is why Churchill’s (pictured right) vision of “victory at all costs” was so
successful in Britain in 1940.
c) be centred on satisfying customers and employees.
So leaders must also think about:
- the whole organization (sometimes called the helicopter view).
- how all its activities (like production, innovation and marketing) fit together to
achieve a customer driven vision.
2. Effectively communicate the vision
Everybody must clearly understand the vision, so that they can effectively carry it out.
Inspirational oratory can help (e.g. Abraham
Lincoln (pictured right), Martin Luther King and Winston Churchill).
3. Inspire (or empower) people to do great things
How?
a) corporate culture
A leader must make sure that everyone has the right values like customer satisfaction and lives by them.
b) be a servant leader
A servant leader serves the needs of followers (or employees) by:
- treating people equally well.
- listening patiently to their problems.
- giving them opportunities to succeed.
- seeing situations from their point of view (empathy).
c) trust people
(giving people autonomy and power).
d) integrity and intelligence
The best leaders lead by example. They are respected and trusted for their:
- ability, honesty and fairness,
- courage (to do what’s right),
- humility (not being arrogant).
- humanity (love of people) .
Trust is hard to win and easy to lose.
e) humour
A laugh can win people over.
4. Be tough and tender (or kind)
This mixture is sometimes called ‘tough love’.
In the Eastern religion, Taoism, toughness is the Yang of leadership and kindness the
Yin.
The best leaders are courageous and ruthless enough to make difficult decisions but sensitive to
people’s needs.
5. Make change work
Leaders should give people hope and persuade them to change, if necessary.
So people shouldn’t be exploited or manipulated but empowered to change.
6. Be creative and flexible
Leaders should:
- continually adapt to changing situations.
- think of new and better ways of satisfying the needs of their followers (or
employees) and customers.
- learn through constant curiosity and challenging the way things are done.
7. Make the most of their ability
Leaders should:
a) know themselves
(to make the most of their strengths and work on their weaknesses).
b) have challenging aims
(for themselves and the organization).
c) continually improve
(through lifelong learning).
d) have energy, stamina and support
Leaders must get enough sleep, keep fit, love their job but still have enough time for family and
friends (who can give support in times of trouble).
e) be pragmatic idealists
Have ideals but flexibly think of practical ways of achieving
them.
f) think
positively
- look for solutions not problems.
8. Keep in touch with stakeholders
Business leaders must build successful long-term relationships with stakeholders, particularly
customers, employees and suppliers (responding very quickly to their changing requirements).
9. Change your leadership style to suit the situation
The best leaders keep their values and principles but adapt their leadership style to different situations.
These different styles include:
a) autocratic
(do what I say)
For quick decisions.
b) assertive
(this is where we are going and why)
For vision and long-term objectives.
c) friendly
(getting on with people)
For teamwork, motivation and empowerment.
d) democratic
(asking people what they want and think)
For innovation, motivation and empowerment.
e) standard setting
(setting performance standards)
For excellence and quality.
f) coaching
(showing people how to do their jobs better)
For empowerment and learning.
10. Choosing future leaders
Leaders must groom a successor who will carry on their work successfully.
Key quotes explained
“A leader is best when people barely know he exists...when his work is
done and his aim fulfilled, they will all say ‘We did this ourselves’”
- Lao Tzu (Chinese philosopher, pictured right)
Great leaders are enablers i.e. they empower people and enable them to do great things.
To do this, Lao Tzu says, they must be:
- pragmatic – know how things work.
- sincere, modest and humble (they are willing to say ‘I don’t know’).
- desireless (not wanting anything for themselves).
- tough and tender (the Ying and Yang of leadership – see point 4
above) - a leader should be like water, Lao Tzu says, with strength from stiffness (as ice) but soft and
yielding when fluid.
This is why Lao Tzu says that “To lead walk behind them” - a view identical with
Nelson Mandela’s idea of ‘leadership from
behind’.
“The true leader takes humanity as his burden”
- Confucius ,Chinese
philosopher (pictured right)
Leaders should put people first and lead by example (moral leadership).Then “They will have a conscience
and will reform themselves”, Confucius also says.
So Confucius believes they must keep the good of the past (having a sense of history) and change what needs to
be changed with a kind heart (because they should love their people).
“Power based on love is a thousand times more effective than power derived from fear of
punishment”, said Gandhi, the Indian leader.
“My policy is to have no policy”
- Abraham Lincoln ,American
president (pictured right)
Like other great leaders, Lincoln was a pragmatic idealist (having ideals but never dogmatic). He was flexible
and continually changed his policies to suit changing situations.
Another American president, Theodore Roosevelt,
similarly described successful leadership as “a combination of idealism and practical
efficiency”.
“It is excellent to have a giant’s strength, but it is tyrannous to use it
like a giant”
-
Isabella (in Shakespeare’s ,pictured right, Measure for Measure)
Use power for other people’s advantage (not your own) and make decisions that people can carry out
effectively.
“What you cannot enforce, do not command”, the Greek playwright,
Sophocles said.
Best books
Warren
Bennis (pictured right) and Burt
Nanus (pictured right below), Leaders
(1985)
Successful leaders use their strengths to put their vision into action. They “do the right
thing” (i.e. create change by challenging the status quo).
Managers put the leaders' ideas into action and “do things right”.
Similar conclusions were made by
- Abraham Zaleznik’s The Managerial Mystique (1989)
(For more detail see Leaders in the Business Books
section)
James MacGregor
Burns (pictured right), Leadership
(1978)
There are two types of leadership:
- transactional – exchanging rewards between leaders and followers (e.g. more money for
working harder).
- transformational – better than transactional leadership because it gets people
working well together by satisfying their needs (particularly giving them something worthwhile to do and
believe in).
Robert
Greenleaf (pictured right), Servant
Leadership (1977)
The best leader is a servant leader who serves the needs of his (or her) people.
Niccolo
Machiavelli (pictured right), The
Prince (1513)
The means justify the ends (today called Machiavellian) i.e. leaders can do anything (even bad
things) to get what they want.
The best leaders have:
- the heart of a lion (courage), and
- the cunning of a fox (which might involve being a liar and a cheat).
It is far better for leaders to be feared than loved, if they cannot be both.
John
Harvey-Jones (pictured right) , Making It
Happen (1988)
The ex-boss of the British chemicals company, ICI, says the best leaders:
a) are customer driven, open to new ideas and pragmatic
(responding well to new situations).
b) embrace change
(and challenge the status quo).
c) encourage people to be the best
Through:
- involvement in decision making.
d) give people “headroom”
(freedom to achieve their aims).
e) use “judo management”
(changing negative attitudes into positive ones).
f) are catalysts
(making small changes that have big effects).
g) think and then act
(based on knowledge, experience and common sense).
Max De Pree (pictured right) , Leadership Is An Art (1989)
His Dad (the boss of the American office furniture maker, Herman Miller) discovered that a recently deceased
employee had been a great poet.
This taught Max De Pree that leaders should make the most of their people’s talents.
Dale
Carnegie (pictured right), How To
Win Friends and Influence People (1936)
(For more detail see
How To Win Friends and Influence People
in the Business Books section)
Leaders and managers should:
- humble themselves before criticizing anyone (e.g. talk about their mistakes
first).
- never humiliate employees.
- honour their dignity and self-respect.
- satisfy their needs and look at things from their point of view.
Jack
Welch (pictured right), Straight
from the Gut (2001)
(For more detail see Straight from the
Gut
in the Business Books section)
The highly successful ex-boss of General Electric says the best leaders have the 4 E’s:
- Energy - stamina to keep going.
- Energize (getting the best results from the best people).
- Edge (making difficult decisions based on reality).
- Execute (getting things done with passion, speed and fun) – Welch’s biggest regret is
that often he didn’t act quickly enough.
Tough love is vital i.e. kindness mixed with toughness to make difficult decisions like
making redundancies and firing incompetent employees.
Welch’s 20:70:10 rule says that in any group of managers 20% will be top performers, 70%
average and 10% not worth keeping.
John
Adair (pictured right), Effective
Leadership (1983)
A leader must:
- define and effectively communicate a common purpose.
- ensure everyone works together to achieve it (team building).
- satisfy the needs of each individual (giving people the maximum possible autonomy and
encouraging creativity).
So a leader’s most important word is ‘We’ and the least important is ‘I’.
Peter Senge (pictured right) , The Fifth Discipline (1990)
The best leaders have three roles:
- designer – defining vision and the organization’s objectives, values and
strategy.
- teacher (or coach and facilitator) – enabling all employees to learn, change their
assumptions and improve their knowledge.
- steward – serving customers and employees.
Jim Collins (pictured right) , Good to Great (2001)
(For more detail see Good to
Great
in the Business Books section)
The best leaders have:
- Humility – empathy, trust, self-restraint (keeping cool), no ego and willingness to
compromise.
- Fierce resolve – determination to succeed, decisiveness and toughness to make
difficult decisions.
Collins calls this “level 5” leadership which is supported by Joseph Badaracco’s
Leading Quietly (2002).
Badaracco concludes that the best leaders aren’t heroes but
quiet, modest and tenacious.
Ronald Heifetz (pictured
right) , Leadership Without Easy Answers (1994)
“Adaptive leadership” is vital - mobilizing people to solve difficult problems in times of
change.
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