Humility Is a Core Quality Found In Great Leaders

We, of course, keep coming back to humility. It is, as Anthony Bell writes in Great Leadership, a core quality of a great leader.

Humility is often misunderstood. As Bell writes: It’s not about self-deprecating insecurity; it’s much more about honest recognition of both strengths and weaknesses, reinforced by an attractive lack of preoccupation with either one. It’s the antithesis of self-absorption—the recognition that ‘it’s not about me.’ It’s not as someone put it, thinking less of yourself; rather, it’s thinking less about yourself.

A selflessness is inherent in this kind of humility. It reflects a willingness to put the interests of the organization and of its people ahead of the leader’s own interests.

Humility is rare in leaders, but when it’s there, it’s powerful. It’s powerful because it’s disarming.

Humility rests firmly on the foundation of self-awareness. Humility generates two qualities: a thirst for personal growth and a healthy dose of self-discipline. [A thirst for personal growth because] it requires a certain measure of humility to recognize what you don’t know and an equal measure to want to keep on learning. [It also breeds a healthy dose of self-discipline because] humility recognizes that greatness requires work, and work requires self-discipline.

Posted by Michael McKinney at 12:02 AM
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Five Tests of Obviousness

WE’VE received a lot of interest over the last few days in a little book written 90 years ago, due to a Forbes commentary by Jack Trout entitled In Search Of The Obvious. The book is the business classic, Obvious Adams written by Robert Updegraff. Jack Trout calls it his favorite marketing book, although its application is far wider. Why does Jack like it so much?

Well, because the search for any marketing strategy is the search for the obvious. Consider the dictionary definition of the word "obvious": easy to see or understand, plain, evident. With that definition, you begin to see why an obvious strategy is so powerful. It's simple, easy to understand and evident. That's why it works so well.

Interestingly, when presented with a simple, obvious strategy, many clients are not impressed. They are often looking for some clever, not-so-obvious idea. What I often hear is something like, "That’s something we already know. Is the solution that simple?" I then have to go into my evident speech, which goes like this: "You’re right, it is evident. But if it's evident to you it will also be evident to your customers, which is why it will work."

The author warned of this reaction when he wrote, "The trouble is, the obvious is apt to be so simple and commonplace that it has no appeal to the imagination. We all like clever ideas and ingenious plans that make good lunch-table talk at the club. There is something about the obvious that is--well, so very obvious!"

In 1953 Updepgraff added a section where is laid out five tests of obviousness:

Test One: The problem, when solved will be simple. The obvious is nearly always simple--so simple that sometimes a whole generation of men and women have looked at it without even seeing it.

Test Two: Does it check with human nature? If you feel comfortable in explaining your idea or plan to your mother, wife, relative, neighbors, your barber and anyone else you know, it's obvious. If you don't feel comfortable, it probably is not obvious.

Test Three: Put it on paper. Write out your idea, plan or project in words of one or two syllables, as though you were explaining it to a child. If you can't do this in two or three short paragraphs and the explanation becomes long, involved or ingenious--then very likely it is not obvious.

Test Four: Does it explode in people's minds? If, when you have presented your plan, project or program, do people say, "Now why didn't we think of that before?" You can feel encouraged. Obvious ideas are very apt to produce this "explosive" mental reaction.

Test Five: Is the time ripe? Many ideas and plans are obvious in themselves, but just as obviously "out of time." Checking time lines is often just as important as checking the idea or plan itself.

Jack adds, “To me, those five principles are worth a thousand books on marketing, mine included.”

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Posted by Michael McKinney at 08:06 PM
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Charismatic Leadership and Social Change

In Pakistan’s The News – International, former principal of Gordon College of Rawalpindi, Prof Khwaja Masud wrote a piece on charismatic leadership and social change. Here are some of his observations:

The problem of leadership appears most urgently at defining moments of history. A sharp crisis in social, economic and political affairs, when something must be done and done quickly, naturally intensifies interest in the role of a leader in history making.

The society-shattering deed is possible only when the society is ripe for it. In the biblical phrase, things happen in the fullness of time. Delivery may be forced, but the child must be ready to enter the world. The leader acts only as a midwife who brings forth what is already mothered by the spirit of the age, or as the Germans say ‘zeitgeist’. We cannot sit back and wait for the event to happen. This is where commitment comes in. These who stand and wait are either cowards or traitors to the cause.

Apart from the qualities enumerated by Iqbal— lofty vision, mellifluous discourse and a passionate heart—the leader must possess charisma. [W]hen a social order nears bankruptcy, there is actually felt a desire among the people for a charismatic leader who may symbolize their deeply felt needs and aspirations. The charismatic leader is born in a climate of uncertainty and unpredictability. He moves in to bridge the gap between the discredited past and uncertain future. When the two ages overlap, one dying and the other refusing to be born, the historic need for charismatic leader arises, who has his hand on the pulse of time, and, who, above all, is closely attached to the common people. He is fired by the passion, inspired by the vision and totally committed to extricate the distraught people from the agony of uncertainty so as to lead them to safe haven.

Tolstoy has correctly pinpointed the source of power of a charismatic leader. He says: “The power of a great leader lies neither in the physical nor moral qualities of him who possesses it. Power is the collective will of the people transferred by expressed or tacit consent to their chosen leader.”

The objective conditions may be ripe for the radical transformation of a society, but without a leader who can command the respect and love of the masses, the historic opportunity may be lost.

As former US president Woodrow Wilson once said: “When I look back on the process of history, I see this writing over every page that the nations are renewed from the bottom, not from the top, that the genius who springs from the ranks of the unknown men is the genius who renews the youth and energy of the people. The utility, the vitality and the fruitage of life does not come from the top to the bottom, it comes like the natural growth of a great tree from the soil, up through the trunk into the branches to the foliage and the fruit. The great struggling unknown masses that are the base of everything are the dynamic force that is lifting the levels of history. A nation is as great and only as great as her rank and file.”

It is the dialectical relation between the charismatic leader and the struggling masses that makes history.

Posted by Michael McKinney at 12:01 AM
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Sir John Harvey-Jones on Change

THE late John Harvey-Jones became the legendary Chairman of Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI) in 1982 and was knighted in 1985. His leadership has made him one of the most admired business leaders in the world. In his memoirs he wrote the following on change:

“The reality of change is inescapable. If we do not change the inexorable forces of economics [then] shifts in the external world will force a change upon us. One might say, under such circumstances, how much better to change before we are changed. But in real life this historical perspective is very difficult to appreciate, and we find most change uncomfortable. We cling to sets of values and conditions which we recognize and which are undemanding of our own commitment and effort. It is a fool’s paradise, just as much as the hope that somehow one can get away from civilization, or that one can put the clock back. One cannot, and indeed one should not, because while it is foolish to throw away the past, it is the future that we can affect. The ability to create and manage the future in the way that we wish is what differentiates the good manager from the bad.”

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Posted by Michael McKinney at 07:30 AM
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Gratitude: Is That a Stone On the Hill?

Jim Clemmer in his book Growing the Distance, relates the following story:

Arden Barker had planted a 50-acre field of wheat that was now golden-brown, very full, and ready for harvest. It was a sight to touch the heart of any farmer. When his Uncle Harry came to visit, Arden proudly took him out to look at the field of wheat. Harry looked around, put his hand over his eyes to peer into the distance, and fixed his gaze on a boulder that had been too large to move in the middle of the field. “Is that a stone on the hill?” he asked. He said nothing about the field of wheat. Arden was crushed by his lack of enthusiasm.

The Uncle Harry incident became the subject of discussion at many Barker family dinners thereafter. A few years later, their daughter, Brenda, had just finished cutting and trimming the family’s huge lawn. Arden came home and surveyed her work from the kitchen window. “You missed a patch under the trees,” he pointed out. Brenda came over to him, put one arm around his waist, and her other hand over her eyes to peer off into the distance and asked, “Is that a stone on the hill?”

Too often leaders, managers and parents think that it is crucial to their role to point out where people could improve—to be critical. Certainly, there is a time for that, but it happens all too often. Effective leaders will look for the positive and show gratitude and appreciation for it. People often look to others for direction and support and if it is not forthcoming it can kill the spirit and impede growth.

Posted by Michael McKinney at 07:52 AM
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Denzel Washington: A Hand to Guide Me

Thankful for what others have done to guide his life, Denzel Washington put together a valuable book that underscores the lesson: “If you want to change the world, start by changing the life of a child.”

A Hand to Guide Me focuses on some important concepts for and value of laying a firm foundation for children by providing examples from the lives of over 70 people like Presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, Whoopi Goldberg, Phil Jackson, Hank Aaron, Muhammad Ali, John Antioco, Yogi Berra, Jimmy Carter, Wesley Clark, Jackie Joyner-Kersee, Fr. Monk Malloy, Joe Morgan, Toni Morrison, Colin Powell, Bonnie Raitt, Cal Ripken Jr., Bernard Shaw, George Streinbrenner, Ruben Studdard, John Wooden.

Here are a few thoughts by Denzel Washington from the book:

• “Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.” Powerful words don’t you think? It’s a simple sentiment too, and yet I’m amazed how many people lose site of it these days.

• Show me a successful individual and I’ll show you someone who didn’t want for positive influences in his or her life. I don’t care who you are or what you do for a living—if you do it well I’m betting there was someone cheering you on and showing you the way. I’ll lay even odds.

• This is book is about that certain push, that helping hand we’ve all had to reach for in order to get where we’re going. Train up a child in the way he should go, and he might get to where he’s meant to be headed all along.

• I didn’t always make the best choices or put myself in the best situations, and yet at they same time I have to think I made better choices because of the extra efforts of my parents and teachers and coaches, and I put myself in better situations that I might have if I’d been going about it on my own. I had a better chance to find my way because I was open to so many positive outside influences.

• The good people you’ve heard from here have all benefited from a guiding hand or two or three. They’ve been on the receiving end of some profound words of wisdom, or they’ve patterned their lives after men and women or principle. They’ve seen one good turn and helped it blossom into another. Or they’ve made a mistake and managed to learn from it and move on. And that’s the greatest lesson we can all take with us as we set this book aside and return to our lives. Keep open—to possibility, to opportunity, to wonder—or remain forever shut off to the encouraging outcomes that await us all. Change happens. The key is to keep reaching for that guiding hand and to keep extending our own.

An early influence in Denzel Washington's life was the Boys Club. Some of the proceeds from the sale of this book are earmarked for the 100 year old Boys & Girls Clubs of America. This book is a good reminder to honor those whose shoulders you stand on and redouble your efforts with others.

Posted by Michael McKinney at 08:32 AM
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Pamela Thomas-Graham: A Woman For All Seasons

IN a recent column by Harvey Mackay, author of Dig Your Well Before You're Thirsty, he shared his impressions of a New York Sun article written by Pranay Gupte. The article featured Pamela Thomas-Graham, the new head of Liz Claiborne. MacKay writes, “It fascinated me. I wondered how one woman could accomplish so many things and do all of them so well.” Here are some excerpts from that column:

There was a big clue. Throughout the article, Ms. Thomas-Graham praised her parents and their Presbyterian church for the values they instilled in her. "I was brought up to challenge myself, to try to be successful on my own terms. I was brought up to be focused. So I see myself as more fully engaged than ever before," Ms. Thomas-Graham responded when asked why she accepted the burden of revitalizing the flagship Liz Claiborne brand as well as nine others. The brands she oversees bring in annual revenues just shy of $1 billion.

Asked how she managed to transform CNBC.com [her last job] into one of the top ten financial Web sites in 18 months, she said, "I do not use brute force in my management style. I use my strategic abilities. I work hard to create a team environment. It’s extremely important for a leader to empower others in driving the success of the organization. I emphasize how essential it is to be nimble and always resourceful."

Her personality and conversational abilities helped her every step of the way. "Our parents expected us to know what was going on in the world," she said of herself and her older brother, who is the assistant dean of the University of St. Thomas Law School in Minneapolis. "My mother always emphasized that we should be able to hold a conversation on any topic for at least five minutes. This reinforced the value of knowledge and intellectual curiosity in us."

This ability is extolled as one of the essential qualities everyone must develop by no less a prestigious organization than Toastmasters. To succeed in life you generally have to be well rounded and well informed. You also must convert negatives to positives.

When I finally caught up to Thomas-Graham, she told me that some of her best advice is, "Don't get discouraged, and don't let other people define your potential. In high school, when I told my guidance counselor that I wanted to apply to Harvard, she said that was an unrealistic expectation. My parents and others encouraged me to apply anyway, and I became the first person from my high school to ever attend Harvard. So hold onto your dreams, even when others try to diminish them. And think big!"

Mackay’s Moral: You never know when a little word or something you may do may open up the windows of a mind that seeks the light.

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Posted by Michael McKinney at 12:03 AM
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Management & Leadership

Kenneth D. Lewis, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer at Bank of America made this distinction between management and leadership to the graduates at Chapel Hill, North Carolina earlier this year:

The distinction between management and leadership is, in my view, crucial. Leadership is about how you use the influence and trust that people grant you to define necessary change and chart the future direction of the organization. Management is about how you earn that influence and trust in the first place.

Management is how we demonstrate our competence, business acumen and organizational ability. Management is how we show that we will be fair, inclusive and trustworthy in the way we use power. Most important, the way we manage establishes the standards of ethical conduct to which we hold ourselves and our teammates.

In day-to-day operations, people will do what a manager tells them to do because he controls their paycheck. But that doesn’t mean they’ll go above and beyond to accomplish a shared goal. Without trust and loyalty, they won’t put in the long hours. They won’t take career risk. They won’t follow where the manager wants to lead.

Ultimately, people grant a manager the opportunity to lead because they have found that person to be effective and trustworthy. Over time, by managing effectively, the manager begins to earn what we sometimes call “followership.” And that’s when you begin to have the opportunity to lead. Leadership is not granted by virtue of a title. It’s granted by the people who have agreed to follow you. And it can be taken away by those same people very quickly if their trust is violated.

Posted by Michael McKinney at 08:41 AM
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How To Enhance Your Potential While Working Your Current Job

MENTORS, seminars, multimedia, and books (and this site, of course) are great ways to learn about leadership and areas that you need to think about to round out your leadership capabilities. But nothing takes the place of application and practice. Leadership is not developed in the classroom. The problem (sorry, I meant challenge) we often run into is the opportunity to practice leadership. According to Cindy McCauley from the Center for Creative Leadership, “Seeking out new challenges while remaining in your current job is a practical, effective strategy to pursue.” Taking on new or different assignments allows leaders to intentionally develop new skills, practice new behaviors and improve on weaknesses. She suggests three ways to do this in her book, Developmental Assignments: Creating Learning Experiences without Changing Jobs:

• Reshape your current job. Adding new responsibilities or reshaping your job may be more realistic than you think. Changes may be permanent or temporary. Consider moving a responsibility from someone else's plate to your own, trading tasks with another or taking on a role or task that needs to be done but that no one currently "owns." Also re-examine responsibilities that are already a legitimate part of your job, but have received little attention.
• Take on temporary assignments. Look outside your job description or department for projects, task forces, one-time events and activities that you can participate in for a short period of time.
• Seek challenges outside the workplace. Other areas of your life often provide the same challenges found in job settings. You'll find plenty of leadership responsibilities in nonprofit, religious, social and professional organizations, schools, sport teams and family life. There are many opportunities to learn lessons of leadership through personal experiences.

Not every challenge is a prime opportunity to learn, says McCauley. Research shows that certain kinds of challenges stimulate learning more than others. "To adapt and grow, leaders need to be constantly seeking out new experiences and challenges that, by their very nature, foster learning.”

Ten key challenges are listed below, along with a few suggestions for ways to seek such challenges.

Type of Challenge	Ideas for Assignment
Unfamiliar responsibilities: Handling responsibilities that are new or very different from previous ones you've handled.	Ask your boss to delegate one of his/her job responsibilities to you Volunteer for a task that would normally go to a more experienced person Take up a new hobby Work with colleagues to redesign a work process
New directions: Starting something new or making strategic changes.	Participate in the start-up of a new team Work on a strategic plan for a community or professional organization
Inherited problems: Fixing problems created by someone else or existing before you took the assignment.	Take over a troubled project Serve on a task force to solve a major organizational problem Join the board of a struggling nonprofit organization
Problems with employees: Dealing with employees who lack adequate experience, are incompetent or are resistant to change.	Coach an employee with performance problems Resolve a conflict with a subordinate Coach a sports team
High stakes: Managing work with tight deadlines, pressure from above, high visibility and responsibility for critical decisions.	Manage high-profile customers or business partners Do a tight-deadline assignment for your boss's boss Manage a community event with high visibility
Scope and scale: Managing work that is broad in scope or large in size.	Broaden the services or products offered by your unit Serve on a team managing a large-scale project Serve as an officer in a regional or national professional association
External pressure: Managing the interface with important groups outside the organization, such as customers, vendors, partners, unions and regulatory agencies.	Train customers how to use a new product Take calls on a customer hotline Take on public relations or other boundary-spanning role for a community organization
Influence without authority: Influencing peers, higher management or other key people over whom you have no authority.	Manage projects that require coordination across the organization Represent concerns of employees to higher management Teach a course
Work across cultures: Working with people from different cultures or with institutions in other countries.	Manage a multi-country project Host visitors from other countries Travel abroad
Work group diversity: Being responsible for the work of people of both genders and different racial and ethnic backgrounds.	Hire and develop people of different genders, ethnic groups and races Lead a project team or task force with a diverse group of members Join a community group that attracts a diverse group of people

McCauley counsels to select a challenge that will broaden your experience base. Ask yourself: Which of the challenges have I had the least exposure to? Are there some that I haven't experienced in a number of years? Are there any that my current job never provides? Then choose a specific activity or assignment from the list or make up your own.

You can find many more specific ideas in Developmental Assignments: Creating Learning Experiences without Changing Jobs

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Posted by Michael McKinney at 05:13 AM
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Anwar el-Sadat on Life and Leadership

Anwar el-Sadat was a remarkable leader. He became president of Egypt after Nasser’s untimely death in October 1970. For his efforts to bring about peace with Israel, he shared the 1978 Nobel Peace Prize with Israel’s Menachem Begin. Just over 25 years ago, on October 6, 1981, Sadat was assassinated by terrorists. Here are some thoughts from his 1978 autobiography, In Search of Identity:

• Most people seek after what they do not possess and thus are enslaved by the very things they want to acquire. They become prisoners of their desires even though they appear to be free.
• Nothing is more important than self-knowledge. My wide-ranging reading not only broadened my mind and enriched my emotions, it also helped me to know myself better. It is self-knowledge that makes a man’s actions proceed from objective, rather than puny subjective considerations.
• Suffering crystallizes a soul’s intrinsic strength; for it is through suffering that a man of mettle can come into his own, and fathom his own depths.
• If human values were relative, all laws—whether those based on revealed religions or those devised by man—would become meaningless. Most people today live in power-based communities, and the world has lost the lofty ideals which man has established down the centuries. Mankind has, I believe, no way out of its current predicament except the restoration of these ideals and the vindication of them in all walks of life.
• An Arab aphorism says that a ruler is naturally opposed by half of his subjects if he happens to be just, which, I believe, is true. A ruler is a solo performer on the stage, as it were, and, with the spotlight on him, people can see him very clearly but hardly notice anybody else. Any citizen with troubles, problems, or even trivial daily complaints will naturally blame them on the ruler.
• To be gripped by fear is, I believe, the most degrading of all emotions for a human being. In fear personality disintegrates, the human will is paralyzed, and man acts as an automaton.
• He who cannot change the very fabric of his thought will never be able to change reality, and will never, therefore, make any progress.

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Posted by Michael McKinney at 06:58 AM
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Before You Accuse, Ask

LEADERS not only ask smart questions, but are smart about asking questions. And listening. A good question can change everything. Gordon MacDonald maintains that a key to effective leadership is the ability to ask the right questions at the appropriate time that will elicit insight and clarity. Of course, that's not always an easy thing to do. It takes thoughtful practice. He writes in the Fall 2006 issue of the Leadership Journal, “That’s the power of the interrogative sentence. A good one, a real good one, alters things. It ignites thought; it can demand commitment, reveal depth or shallowness in a person’s soul, disclose hidden agendas.”

He writes about all kinds of questions, but there was a section that was especially helpful. He referred to times when we should be asking questions when we desperately want to be talking—like when we feel we have been wronged or run into conflict with another person or organization. The temptation is to launch an attack, lay down the law, or simply explain our point of view and let the pieces fall where they may. MacDonald wisely advises that instead, this is the time to proceed first with a few questions. He writes:

Over and over this principle—ask before accusing—has rescued me from making a fool of myself. So in conflicting moments I’ve learned to use questions like these:

I need to tell you about an impression I have and ask you if it’s accurate.

I want to play back to you what I thought you said the other day and ask if my perception is correct.

What message were you hoping I’d get when you…

Would you be open to some thoughts from someone who really cares about you?

Have you reflected at all how you’re coming across in this situation?

What if the choices you’ve been making are not only going to hurt you but some other people you say you care about?

The ability to ask smart questions requires that you take the time to think beyond the issue on the table and see often times what are the real underlying issues.

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Posted by Michael McKinney at 07:20 AM
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7 Ways Leaders Handicap Themselves

IN A BOOK that captures the essence of leadership—Great Leadership—author Anthony Bell writes, "For all the importance of great leadership, it doesn’t happen by itself. Without a framework, leaders often handicap themselves in a number of significant ways." He outlines these issues:

	Leaders tend to operate from intuition and experience. While both can serve a leader well, neither is infallible: intuition cannot compensate for the blind spots every person has, and experience is a tutor with a limited perspective.
	Leaders tend to become leaders because they are technically competent. Being good at something singles them out for promotion. But what makes people effective at one level can make them ineffective at another.
	Leaders tend to operate with the skills that were most useful two levels below their current level. In part because of the way they were chosen for the leadership track, they tend to maintain the mind-set of the level where they last felt real mastery.
	Few leaders are taught to lead. Because most leaders learn intuitively from experience, that experience is seldom analyzed with any depth, consistency, or systematic feedback. A few leaders have the good fortune of being taught informally by a particularly effective boss or mentor, but such teachers are rare. Even fewer leaders are taught formally; academic institutions focus on the organization of work more than on the application of leadership. MBA programs don’t teach leadership, or, at best, they teach only a narrow portion of it. Many corporations offer inhouse programs, but few combine strong teaching with the kind of in-depth coaching that guarantees its application.
	Leaders tend to stop learning in midlife. By the time people hit their forties, many rely on their previous knowledge and have only a shallow commitment to ongoing self-education and self development.
	Few leaders lead from a clear sense of purpose. Even fewer lead from a clear sense of noble purpose.
	Few leaders know how to pass on what they know. Not having been taught, they have little idea how to help others develop their leadership skills.

Bell writes, "To overcome these obstacles, leaders need some guidelines; they need a framework for understanding and exercising great leadership. Leaders stand or fall not so much by their talent or lack of it as by their understanding or misunderstanding of what great leadership is." In his book he discusses a well presented framework that consists of three dimensions of leadership—organizational, operational, and people leadership. He demonstrates how these three dimensions, when properly integrated and applied, will greatly enhance the quality of your leadership.

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Posted by Michael McKinney at 12:12 AM
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Can’t Think For Yourself?

ARE CONSULTANTS making us insecure? Are we afraid to make decisions for ourselves?

According to a recent article in the Guardian even consultants are saying enough is enough. Guy Clapperton reports: Alastair Clifford-Jones, chief executive of management consultancy Leadent, has identified what he calls "consultancy addiction" - the process by which clients get so hung up on having consultants around that they won't let them go. "You just see that people are using consultants and work alongside them - you go to a meeting and next to them is a consultant," he says. "It's like losing the ability to make a decision."

Indeed, some consultants actually create this dependency by not giving the client the decision making responsibility. Clapperton continues: Simon Rawling, head of project management consultancy PIPC, puts a lot of the onus on the client's stated requirements. "The consultant should help with the business and not run it," he says. "They can put a new IT platform in, put a required change in, but not run the day to day business." People have to recognize the roles of consultants before commissioning them, he says.

Consultants can be of immense value to an organization—and often quite wise—by bringing awareness of another viewpoint or approach. In the end, for successful change to occur, the change needs to become a part of the organization's culture and that only happens by implementing it yourself. You can’t outsource out change. Consultants influence, guide, facilitate and structure change, but the goal is ownership by the organization and not the partnership.

Capperton offers the following five questions as an Addicted to Consultancy Self-Check:

Ask yourself the following questions to find out whether you're over-using consultants:

1. Can you say for certain, or even roughly, when your consultant will be leaving the premises permanently?

2. Do you have a good reason for not taking someone on as staff to fulfill the consultant's role?

3. Do you have a defined objective for the consultancy you've employed?

4. Do you ask your consultant for advice on matters other than the task for which you hired them?

5. Do your employees refer to the consultant as the "owner" of an initiative, as distinct from the internal sponsor?

Answer "yes" to the first three questions and "no" to the last two and you're likely to be using consultants sensibly. "No" to the first three and "yes" to the last two means you're using consultants as a crutch rather than a defined part of your business. Ask them about it - if they're any good they'll probably be pleased to hear it from you rather than having to raise it themselves.

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Posted by Michael McKinney at 08:54 AM
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Crunch Point: Test Your Excuses

Brian Tracy explains in his new book that when you are at a crunch point—that point where problems, difficulties, unexpected reversals, and crises knock you off balance—it is important that you identify your constraints. You need to identify those things that are restricting your progress. To do this you must be (absolutely) clear of your goals. If you aren’t you won’t know what is standing between you and where you want to be. At this point you must avoid the tendency to start making excuses. Most of them are not valid. How can you know? He writes:

There is a way that you can test your excuses to see if they are valid. It is simply to ask yourself, ”Is there anyone else who has my same excuse but who is moving ahead and succeeding nonetheless?”

If you are honest with yourself, you will immediately realize that there are hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people who have it worse than you could ever imagine and are succeeding anyway. If this is the case, your excuse is invalid. Don’t let it hold you back anymore.

He suggests once you have identified your main constraint, focus on it until it is eliminated. Don’t let minor issues sidetrack you from alleviating that one constraint.

Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed is more important than any other one thing. —Abraham Lincoln

Related Post: Challenge Assumed Constraints

Posted by Michael McKinney at 12:17 AM
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Five Hardships Leaders Face and the Lessons They Teach

Hardship	Lessons Learned
Career Setbacks	Self-awareness Organizational Politics What One Really Wants to Do
Personal Trauma	Sensitivity to Others Coping With Events Beyond One's Control Perseverance Recognition of limits
Business Mistakes and Failures	Handling Relationships Humility How to Handle Mistakes
Problem Employees	How to Stand Firm Confrontational Skills
Downsizing	Coping Skills Recognition of What's Important Organizational Politics

Adapted from The Center for Creative Leadership Handbook of Leadership Development.

Posted by Michael McKinney at 08:58 AM
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Peter Drucker on What a President Needs to be Effective

In the August 1960 Harper’s Magazine, Peter Drucker wrote, “What a President needs is an active mind—a mind interested in other people and their ideas; able to find the kernel of sense in a farrago of abstract theorizing; quick to see where imagination turns into riot, but also where logic turns into absurdity. Such a mind needs constant nourishment and stimulation through the ideas of others.” He is suggesting that a president needs people with ideas; people that can fire the imagination with hope that new things can be done.

Drucker felt that the contemporary leader that made the most use of such people was General Douglas MacArthur as Supreme Commander in occupied Japan. MacArthur wrote in his 1964 book Reminiscences, "I carefully abstained from any interferences by edict with the cultural traditions or the personal Japanese way of life. In frequent public statements I advised the Japanese people to seek a healthy blend between the best of theirs and the best of ours, and I was careful to tell them that no people or country was sufficient unto itself in these matters. I encouraged delegations of Japanese from every walk of life to travel in the West, and where it was possible, I paved the way for such visits. I have always felt that one of the things that made the occupation a success was my insistence that we wanted to learn from the Japanese as well as teach them. It had a great deal to do with restoring a sense of dignity and purpose in their people, and as they regained self-respect and pride, they approached an exchange of ideas with avidity and goodwill. This mutual respect became the foundation of the basic esteem our two peoples came to have for one another—and enabled the occupation to write a unique and warmly human chapter of world history.”

Posted by Michael McKinney at 08:21 AM
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Leadership Books: November 2006

Here's a look at some of the best leadership books being released in November. For a look a little further out see the Winter 2006 releases.

The Leader's Guide to Lateral Thinking Skills: Unlocking the Creativity and Innovation in Yourself and Your Team by Paul Sloane
Andy Grove: The Life and Times of an American by Richard Tedlow
Jeffrey Gitomer's Little Gold Book of YES! Attitude: How to Find, Build and Keep a YES! Attitude for a Lifetime of Success by Jeffrey Gitomer
Leadership Lessons from West Point: Building Stronger Leaders edited by Major Doug Crandall
The Truth About Being a Leader ...and Nothing But the Truth by Karen Otazo

Posted by Michael McKinney at 12:01 AM
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