DADS ARE AN ENDANGERED SPECIES!

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Lesson 10…” Never let your ego get so close to your position that when your position goes, your ego goes with it.”

Too often, change is stifled by people who cling to familiar turfs and job descriptions. Effective leaders create a climate where people’s worth is determined by their willingness to learn new skills and grab new responsibilities, thus perpetually reinventing their jobs. The most important question in performance evaluation becomes not,” How well did you perform your job since the last time we met”? but,” How much did you change it?”

Lesson 11…” Fit no stereotypes. Don’t chase the latest management fads. The situation dictates which approach best accomplishes the team’s mission.”

Floating from fad to fad creates team confusion, reduces the leader’s credibility, and drains organizational coffers. Blindly following a particular fad generates rigidity in thought and action. Sometimes speed to market is more important than total quality. Colin Powell indicates that some situations require the leader to hover closely; others require long, loose leashes. Leaders honor their core values but they are flexible in how they execute them. They understand that management techniques are not magic mantras, but are simply tools to be reached for at the right times.

Lesson 12…” Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier.”

The ripple effect of a leader’s enthusiasm and optimism is awesome. So is the impact of cynicism and pessimism. Leaders who whine and blame engender those same behaviors among their colleagues. Spare me the grim litany of the” realist”; give me the unrealistic aspirations of the optimist any day.

Lesson 13…” Powell’s Rules For Picking People…”-Look for intelligence and judgment and, most critically, a capacity to anticipate, to see around corners. Also look for loyalty, integrity, a high-energy drive, a balanced ego, and the drive to get things done.

How often do a recruitment and hiring processes tap into these attributes? More often than not, we ignore them in favor of length of resume, degrees, prior experience, and job titles. A string of job descriptions a potential hire held yesterday seem to be more important than what the job might require today. Good leader stack the deck in their favor right in the recruitment phase.

Lesson 14…” Great leaders are almost always great simplifiers, one who can cut through an argument, debate and doubt to offer a solution everyone can understand.”

Effective leaders understand the KISS principle (Keep It Simple, Stupid). Their visions and priorities are lean and compelling, not cluttered or buzzword-laden, their decisions are crisp and clear, not tentative and ambiguous. The result is a clarity of purpose, credibility of leadership and integrity in organization.

Lesson 15… “Once the information is in this 40 to 70 range, go with your gut.”

Powell’s advice is don’t take action if you have only enough information to give you less than a 40% chance of being right, but don’t wait to have enough facts to be 100% sure, because by then it’s always too late. Today, excessive delays result in analysis paralysis. Procrastination in the name of a risk reduction actually increases risk.

Lesson 16…” the commander in the field is always right and the rear echelon is wrong, unless proved otherwise.”

Too often the reverse defines corporate culture.

Lesson 17…” Have fun in your command. Don’t always run at a breakneck pace. Take leave. When you’ve earned it, spend time with your families.”

Surround yourself with people who take their work seriously, but not themselves, those who play hard and work hard. Seek people who have some balance in their lives, who are fun to hang out with, who like to laugh and have some non-job and priorities, which they approach with the same passion that they do their work.

Lesson 18…” Command is lonely.”

Harry Truman was right. The buck stops here. You can encourage participative management, and bottom-up employee involvement, but ultimately, the essence of leadership is the willingness to make the tough, unambiguous choices that will have an impact on the fate of the organization. I’ve seen too many leaders flinch from this responsibility. Even as you create an informal, open, collaborative corporate culture, prepare to be lonely.

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Posted on March 5th, 2008 by Scott Hammond
Filed under: Relationship Development, Sales, Scott Hammond