Posts Tagged ‘personal leadership’

The 7 Lies of Limiting Leadership

Posted in Ian’s Articles, Leadership, Personal Development on 01/07/2010 03:40 pm by Kairology

This month, I’m looking at the common lies around leadership, and how they impact on people and business. Next month I’ll be publishing the related truths of good leadership.

The 7 Lies of Limiting Leadership by Ian A Williams

This article was published in NZ Business Magazine Jan/Feb 2010

Too many people fall short of their potential in the leadership game, and also fail to enable or enhance the leadership of others. Ian Williams provides an interesting insight into some of the barriers to great leadership. In this issue, Ian shares with us his belief about some of the common lies about leadership, and in the next issue we follow this up with his account of the seven truths.

My passion for good leadership often leads me to observe and reflect on what happens in the workplace for individuals and teams. I listen out for comments and frustrations, and have concluded that there are some common misunderstandings about leadership issues, which I have summarised as the seven lies of leadership.

1. I’m not a leader

The person who thinks they are not a leader is in denial, and has missed the point about leadership. Everyone is leading someone - whether or not they know it, recognise it or want it. Even if we are on the same level, we lead our colleagues in some respects. We may lead projects, team tasks, or even a staff outing! We also lead our children and others among our families and friends. At the very least, we leave ourselves - or at least we should! Our only limit on personal leadership is what we put in place for ourselves, or how we allow others to limit us.

2. They (or I) have been trained

The magic land of training is where organisations send people for a few days, and expect them to come back as leaders. A whole host of courses and events, or any kind of qualification, doesn’t make a leader. Training and development will inspire people, inform them, give them practice, provide experiential learning, build confidence, build competence and skills - but all of this will not produce a leader. Too often I go into organisations, and they struggle to understand why their trained leaders are not leading effectively, despite the huge investment made. No human being can be fully trained in leadership, because it comes from within, and needs to be drawn out by line managers and others who are willing to coach people and give them the space to lead. As part of one-to-one coaching, they build experience and confidence and nurture the leader.

3. There’s a personality clash

This is one of the most wonderful leadership cop outs. While personalities do clash to some extent, and ‘problem people’ do exist, the challenge is to deal with it, rather than use it as an excuse for effective leadership. Leaders are accountable for their own relationships, and the relationships around them. They need to rise to that challenge and find strategies for having people work together. Too much time and money is wasted in avoidance, and in living with the consequences of poor relationships. Get people focused back on the goals, find specific reasons to their difficulties, and facilitate finding and implementing the solutions. If necessary get some help, but making work, rather than listen to excuses.

4. They won’t step up

This is often the concern of senior managers who feel that either their people will not step up to lead, or that they fail to step up to strategic leadership from operational. The key to this one is identifying the blocks. Is it a question of won’t or can’t? Are they willing? Are they capable? Are they confident? In my experience the ‘won’t’ part of this question is the lie. If the block is about skills, abilities, and/or confidence, it falls back on the senior leader to coach. Sometimes, it’s a case of making clear to people what you see as strategic versus operational. Ironically, the most common cause for people not stepping up is senior people holding them down. They too often hold on to strategic issues for themselves, tell people what the decision is, and then wonder why everyone is frustrated! If you want to grow strategic leaders, involve them in strategic leadership.

5. Not a people person

How does anyone walk the earth and deny being a people person.  People are everywhere, and we can’t avoid them. And if we want to get anywhere with anyone, getting along with people isn’t a luxury but a necessity. So unless you’re a hermit, or you’re in denial of your leadership role, you have to get on with people. You have to employ others who do this too. If someone is described as not a people person, they need to be given the feedback and required to do something about it, in order to lead themselves and other people. The key here is identifying the specific behaviour that causes the person to think this of themselves, or for it to be attributed to them. Then they need to do some self coaching will be coached. There are three aspects to balanced leadership: task, team and individual. If the leader is not a people person, they are missing two-thirds of their job; so in fact, they are not a leader but a person who just does jobs.

6. It’s not my style

We read about and experience all sorts of leadership styles. There is no right or wrong, they are just different. Any leadership style becomes inappropriate if it is used in the wrong way, in the wrong circumstances, or at the wrong time. That is of course the essence of situational leadership. An effective leader is able to use a range of styles appropriately. They fool themselves, and everyone else suffers, when they are attached to one favourite style, come what may. You will have met the constant bully, the habitual delegator, and the absentee. Adopting just one style is simply me centred, and the leader has to listen, learn and adjust if they are to motivate people and achieve tasks. They need to model a range of styles, so that others are learning from how they operate practically. After all, what is at stake if you have a leader who is not leading effectively?

7. Know it all, done it all

We’ve all met the magic leaders who have made it! We had better sit and listen to them, and sit back while they either do it themselves or give the orders! Who are they fooling with this lie? Individuals and teams are always different. Situations, resources, tasks and circumstances are always different. No season is the same; there is no constancy but there is always change. We all bring our experience and knowledge, we bring the benefit of wisdom, but we still need a refreshing quantity and quality of ideas, and the excitement of discovering something new together. It’s this sense of contribution to creativity and synergy that keeps people engaged. No one has the monopoly on knowledge, wisdom, ideas and solutions. The know-it-all leader is living a lie and fools no one but themselves. Don’t stand for their robbery.

I hope that some of these resonate with your own experience, and that you have found some ways to overcome the lies, and to stand up for the truths. Let’s stop kidding ourselves with all the hype about leadership, and get some of the simple things sorted out for ourselves and those we influence!

 

Personal Leadership Requires a Never Give Up Attitude

Posted in Leadership, Mind Management, Personal Development on 10/09/2009 08:35 am by Kairology

Introduction by Ian Williams

This article is from Dr Mario Barrett. It’s a great article to encourage us to draw on our resources of perseverance and resilience. The temptation is always to give up when things don’t work out first time, or even second or third! Most successful and innovative people are those who don’t give up easily, but have their effort and energy engaged with purposeful determination. Learning and moving on isn’t giving up either, it’s continuing the journey but perhaps using a slightly different route.

Ian

Personal Leadership Requires a Never Give Up Attitude by Dr. Mario Barrett, Ph.D.

As human beings, we tend to give up when things don’t seem to go our way or when times get tough. The belief that life will simply roll over, give in to our demands, and allow us to achieve our goals is unrealistic. The truth is that life is neither for nor against us. No, life is simply just the natural process of existence. What we have to understand is that the power to determine the direction that our life takes is not decided by life itself, but rather by us. We hold the power, regardless of the challenges we may face. Therefore, our power rests in how we handle our daily interactions within the context of life. These interactions are what determine our ability to overcome what we may perceive as insurmountable odds. Therefore, we must learn not to blame life itself for our successes or failures, but when faced with challenges, to simply stand our ground and work smarter with a never give up attitude firmly in place.

The following comparison may add more clarity to what I am speaking of. Life is like a blank piece of paper. As that paper exists, so do we. However, just like that paper is blank, so too is our life until we create something out of it. Until that piece of paper is written on, there is no story, no direction, no purpose, but there is endless possibility (positive or negative-you will determine that by the story you write). However, interesting things begin to happen as soon as we begin to write on that once blank piece of paper. A story starts to emerge, a direction begins to tug at us, a purpose starts to form, and meaning which gives life to passion begins to set in. The same occurs when we choose to engage life. However, this engagement does not come without pitfalls. You will find in many of America’s children classics such as Snow White, Pinocchio, and Cinderella that the main characters often have to overcome seemingly insurmountable pitfalls and challenges in order to achieve their dreams. I say this to say that we need to reinforce from young that never giving up in order to achieve our dreams is essential to our being able to live out our dreams, much like our childhood literary heroes.

Therefore, regardless of the pitfalls, or the challenges you may encounter in life, know that you get the final say in writing and living out your life’s story. With all of this in mind, I ask the question, what are you writing on your blank piece of paper called life? Are you utilizing the words and thought process of a quitter (one who buckles to the challenges of life that we all face)? Or, are you utilizing the words and thought process of a winner (one who never gives up in pursuit of his/her vision)?

I implore you to take on the role of the winner, and not to quit in the face of adversity. Do not succumb to life’s challenges, and never stop creating and working on making your life’s vision a reality. Remember, everyone has challenges to overcome. Life is full of them, but be passionate about your dreams, and continue to push, even when it seems most difficult.

Again, never give up! Never give up!

Dr. Barrett has an earned PhD in applied management and decision sciences, with a specialization in leadership and organizational change. He also holds a MS in organizational leadership and a BS in organizational management. In addition to these degrees, Dr. Barrett has completed several executive certificates focusing on various areas of management and leadership development.

Dr. Barrett is proud of his academic accomplishments, as they are the product of his long and sometimes difficult journey out of poverty. Along his journey, Dr. Barrett served honorably in the U.S. Air Force, participating in several vital overseas operations in the Middle East and Europe. He has also taught organizational leadership courses at the graduate degree level at Mercy College. This desire to develop leadership whether it be in myself or others is what drives Dr. Barrett. Dr. Barrett currently lives in NYC, where he runs The Barrett Center for Leadership Development, LLC and produces The Barrett Leadership Blog

 

Play Your Leadership Cards

Posted in Activities, Ian’s Articles, Leadership, Products on 07/20/2009 06:08 pm by Kairology

Marianne Williamson’s famous quotation (from A Return to Love) goes like this:

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, ‘who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?‘ Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”

I can understand why they have been mistakenly attributed to Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King – you could almost hear them saying this! I love these inspirational words because they apply to everyone in every situation. What stands out is the encouragement they bring, in a tough world everyone needs encouragement to use their inner and material resources to create abundant life for themselves and others. These words are an important part of my inspiration for developing leaders, and for the tools and approaches I create and use.

No great leader ever achieved great things by playing small. We all need to extend and enhance our game if we expect to make progress, as any athlete will confirm. Leadership itself, though, is huge topic. Google the word and you get 159 million possibilities! The approaches and teachings on leadership from past and present are mind-boggling, and they continue to develop and multiply. A huge industry revolves around the need for leadership skills and development, and that’s hardly surprising for two main reasons.

First, there is such a need for good leadership, and in all areas of life it seems to be shrinking in application and growing in rhetoric. Many talk the talk but fewer live out leadership in a way that does what it’s supposed to – simply take people on a journey for a purpose. And there’s a huge amount packed into that statement. How many friends, family and colleagues do you have who suffer under a ‘leader’ who treats people badly, and has a poor sense of direction and purpose? I meet them everywhere I go. It’s a tragic scene that is easily overcome with a little thought and care. We are desperate for leaders in every area of life, but rarely find them. When an outstanding business, social or political leader emerges, they are very conspicuous. The rest are in a questionable crowd.

Secondly, leadership is such a complex idea to the world. There are so many aspects and facets to it, and so many academics, authors and speakers bring their own principles, approach and checklist. So in dabbling in this area myself, and being a simple soul, I needed a model of leadership that is pure and simple, something I can carry around in my head. The best for that in my book (literally) is Professor John Adair and the Action-centred Leadership Model. I can now be an effective leader by just understand something about the balance between 3 things – Task, Team and Individual. What could be as simple and profound? The problem with making it any more complex is that leaders always feel there’s so much more to learn, and feel constantly defeated by that challenge. They are constantly caught in the blinding headlights of what they are perhaps not doing, rather than bringing simple focus to a task with the right people.

So what has this to do with Kairology? The word Kairos means the right time for intervention or change. So I have simply used the playing cards framework to create 52 simple tools and approaches that I feel are important for good leadership. That doesn’t mean using all 52 cards at once – otherwise it wouldn’t be simple. It means looking at the cards and selecting what you need to work on in order to improve your personal leadership. It means being selective and purposeful, guided by your own instincts and by feedback from others. I also encourage people to select cards at random, and see what happens when they work through it.

The Kairology Cards are intended to challenge, guide and inspire – rather than be yet another text book or checklist. I believe there is no checklist for leadership. There is you, there is a job to do, and there are people to help you. That’s it! So I have attempted to provide a framework for thinking to help leaders do just that. The simple challenge is to play your cards right – to select and use them creatively for your own development and growth.

Have a ball with this, but also take it seriously. Your achievements and the people around you depend on it. Find your passion for people and challenges that bring diamond results. It may be cards-based but you don’t need to gamble with your leadership skills. However, leadership does involve courage and risk-taking, and building a deck that will stand or fall based on a heap of variables. Get yourself a good deal, a good partner or team for the game, clear strategies and tactics, and go for the win. Leadership is not a game of chance, but a game of skill in which you bring the courage to shine your light powerfully.

Order the Kairology Leadership bundle today.