Start | How To Raise More Leaders

17/05/2013 — Leave a comment

Every leader must aspire to lead well. No. Actually, every leader must lead well. The use of “aspiring” has been reason for too many leaders putting into the future what they should be practicing now.

It’s fairly common talk that great leaders make more leaders and not followers. It is not leadership when it doesn’t produce leaders. Leaders don’t only exist to lead people; they are there to raise leaders.

Leaders are leaders when they produce more than just followers, but more leaders.

The first step to raising more leaders is taking the “follower” label off those you lead. Those you lead are not likely to rise above the labels you place them. Treat those you lead as colleagues and not followers. Helping people realize they are more; that they can be more is the first step to uplifting them.

raise Start | How To Raise More Leaders

you’re not leading until you’re raising leaders

 

 

This doesn’t me you can’t assert your authority as leader, when necessary. It means you expect more from your team by expecting of them the leadership and thinking that your position requires. This threatens insecure leaders.

Insecure leaders are incapable of raising leaders. This is because they see any equipping as a conspiracy against themselves. To an extent, they are right.

Raising other leaders is about making yourself replaceable.

Instead of working against you this can actually work for you, in the sense that it sets you free to focus on other things. When you can grow other people to do what you do, it creates room for you, as a leader, to challenge yourself in other areas.

The reason why some leaders never grow is that they don’t intentionally grow out of their present responsibilities and positions. This starts by making sure that someone can do what you do.

Great leaders raise leaders that are, at least, able to do what they do. John Maxwell states talks about the Law of the Lid, where the leaders determines how high people he leads can rise. You haven’t led until you have, at least, brought people to your level.

Obliterate the word, “Followers” from your organization’s vocabulary. Epitomize the principle of following but stop calling those you lead your followers. They are your colleagues.

Related: What Giving Responsibility Can Do

This sets your team free from looking to you for answers. When you treat those you lead as leaders, they start taking ownership of decisions and strategies. They see themselves as responsible for thinking ahead. For innovation. For foresight. After all, these are some of the qualities expected in leaders.

Related: The Best Way To Train Leaders To Lead

You may want to stop having “team meetings” and start having “leadership meetings”. This makes your team bold in the face of decision-making…

You haven’t started raising leaders if, “Followers” still exists in your organisation… Start there.

[image by thisreidwrites | cc]

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The Grading Tango | Honest

10/05/2013 — 1 Comment

Everyone will have a perception about your abilities. Sometimes they’re unfounded. Some are accurate… you know the rest…

We have an idea of our capabilities and we’d like those around us to be as accurate as possible in their asses them. The truth is sometimes we really want people to see our capabilities as higher than they really are.

Leaders want their teams to admire them for how smart and great leaders they are. Team members want their leaders to overrate them so they seem a tad bit better than their colleagues. They want to be further acknowledged by having greater responsibility inferred on them.

weight The Grading Tango | Honest

be secure enough about yourself to be real. THAT is integrity and the basis of credibility

Who are we fooling? The sad truth is that when we portray ourselves to be better at something than we really are, we set our teams and ourselves up for failure. There is a fine line between stretching yourself and misrepresenting yourself. Misrepresenting yourself includes you not correcting people who rate your abilities as greater.

I don’t deny, being ‘graded’ better than you really are can present an opportunity for you to go up to ‘the next level’. There is a greater risk of failure. The stakes are higher and the reputation that you’ve worked for years to build could be destroyed in an instant.

Be honest about your abilities. Firstly, to yourself and to those who attempt to enlist you with a perception that you’re greater than you are. Be honest that you aspire to the quality they’ve graded you to and state exactly what you’re doing to get there.

Related: Wine | Why You Must Love Obscurity and Structure | Why You Must Love Obscurity

This will give you credibility with people. Integrity is when your words and your actions are one. This is a character we want everyone around us to have. The irony is we, ourselves, are willing to compromise this when it comes to us. We want everyone else to be truthful about his or her abilities while we want to seem greater than we really are.

Stop trying to get ahead through the image and be the real deal. Leaders, teams respect and will follow a leader that is real. Leaders love team members that are honest about their capabilities.

The danger of being dishonest cannot be overstated. It will be obvious that you’re incompetent when it matters most. And those are the defining moments. Those critical moments when you’re required to deliver at the level you’re not are the times people are either catapulted further up or taken down to even lower depths.

Don’t be smug; be real. Don’t undermine yourself; say exactly where you’re at. There is nothing wrong with being on a lower rung on the ladder as long as you’re working on getting better. Be honest.

[image by: pasukaru76 | cc]

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Structure | Why You Must Love Obscurity

09/05/2013 — Leave a comment

An earlier post I did on loving obscurity, focused on obscurity as a place to get better. Check out “Wine | Why You Must Love Obscurity” here

Not taking advantage of your season of obscurity in pursuing dreams or vision robs you of greater opportunities when the break you hope for comes. Obscurity can be used to enable you and your vision. Don’t moan about what you don’t have. Don’t worry about not having the attention of the world. At least not for now…

One of the reasons there are many “one hit wonders” is because they never thought and planned beyond their possible success. Some things just go viral. They take off at an astronomical pace and they quickly overrun the dreamers and visionaries.

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when you’re out of sight you must be just as driven in building the future for your dream / vision

 

 

There are things I wish would ‘just take off’. Unfortunately, it doesn’t always work that way. Unfortunately there are seasons of obscurity. Think about the Facebook phenomenon. This social network has taken over the world. When you look at such success remember: Facebook was once a college dorm project.

Apple was once a garage project. Nelson Mandela was once a little boy chasing cattle in an obscure Xhosa village, in South Africa. The list goes on… Why is it that some of the huge successes today are still standing. You guessed it: Obscurity.

Obscurity at different stages of the growth of some of the great organizations and dreams we admire, gave them time to get ready for success. Obscurity can help you build a dream and enterprise that will stand strong when success comes. It will guarantee that you don’t become another “one hit wonder”.

Obscurity gives you time to clarify who you are before the world starts asking.

Obscurity gives you time to build structure into your dream or vision. It is a great opportunity to work through how you will manage success. It may be completely different when the break actually does come, but it means that you some sort of structure. A little structure is what separates the one hit wonders from sustained success.

“Slow” allows you build structure to support your success. The pace of success and the excitement of the big break can be so demanding you overlook structure.

Leaders, artists and other dreamers spend a lot of time getting their product right. They focus heavily on perfecting the offering. While this is great, it is incomplete if there is no plan for dealing with success in the development of your “product”.

What structures will you have in place to deliver greater demands for your product when it succeeds? What change will you need to keep out in front for your product or offerings to be scalable? How will you handle your profits or gains? What are you going to do with a greater platform and influence?

Love obscurity, it gives you the opportunity to build structure to sustain your success. It guarantees that you will not be a “one hit wonder”… only if you love and use it before success hits.

 [ image by: MyNameMattersNot | cc ]

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How Predictable Leaders Empower Teams

06/05/2013 — Leave a comment

One of the best gifts leaders can give their teams is predictability. Being predictable has connotations of being bland and boring for some. This is because they don’t understand it and the contexts it should apply.

Predictability is a way of giving responsibility to your team. When there are recurring situations and you make the same decision each time, you empower your team. In your absence, or without your consultation they can take the actions you would’ve taken. Thus, the quality of the steps and their results they take are not compromised from the standard; i.e. the leader.

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predictable things help create capacity and reserve energy for the unpredictable ones

Being predictable is the basis of creating self-sustaining systems. There are routine decisions that leaders must make or approve. However, they must be careful to always assess these decisions.

Do they have any bearing on strategic issues? What would be the impact on the organization if someone else beside, me as the leader made this decision?

Being predictable makes you more approachable. One of the reasons I’ve learned on why some issues take a long time to raise is because teams have no idea how their leader will react.

Every leader must strive to have great relationships with his team. They have a direct and great impact on their output. Relationships create a platform for team members to not only understand each other but their leader.

Predictability can only be fostered when leaders are open about how they arrive at decisions for those recurring situations. They can work at being predictable by emphasizing the values of their enterprise as the framework for all actions.

If you’re always acting on the values of your enterprise as the basis for your actions, it makes you more predictable. Your team will take cues from this. Contexts may differ but values are a compass and anchor.

Don’t be that leader who challenges his teams to take initiative and be upset when they do and when they don’t take initiative. It is this unpredictability that takes confidence away from the team.

In working toward predictability, you make highlight why actions taken by your team may not have been the best but celebrate that they took action.

When your team knows that when they have done the best they can do to make the best decision and that ultimately you will praise them for taking action, they will act more boldly. They will even be more inspired to innovate.

Predictable leaders equip their teams to plan without having to check everything with their leaders. Thus, teams with predictable leaders are rapidly advancing teams compared to ones with unpredictable ones.

Leaders who make being unpredictable a team functioning value, hurt their enterprise more than those who are predictable. You might just want to have a conversation with your team about where they need you to be more predictable. Lead well ;-)

[image by: whologwhy | cc]

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An Overlooked Quality In Identifying Exceptional Leaders

23/04/2013 — Leave a comment 
This is a guest post by Michael Mpofu. Michael is a Research and Communications Officer. A great young 
leader and communicator passionate about inspiring others to great leadership and significance. He blogs (less than he should) here.

I’ve had the privilege of being part of something greater than me. An opportunity to play whatever leadership role I have been asked to… I’ve learnt a valuable lesson:

Simply that some of our best leaders are not always the most talented, but the most committed.

I’ve also been fortunate enough to sit around tables with some brilliant leaders, and can say that the mark of their great leadership was evident not on their abilities (which were exceptional), but their commitment.

The trouble, I think, is that we too easily assume that the one with the gift is the one poised for leadership, heir to the throne, or however you would put it. But his / her gift is worth nothing if they aren’t committed to the vision. This might seem rather obvious, but very often, the opposite happens.

5828741996 b33dd60ef0 z An Overlooked Quality In Identifying Exceptional Leaders

commitment is often undermined when talent is the only thing considered in appointing leaders  || image by tdm911 | cc

We often look around for the gifted one among us to do the job but overlook the person who has been there from the beginning. Don’t get me wrong; one has to be adding value to the team.

So the question is how do we “test” commitment?

The answer is simple: we don’t, people often do it for you. They test themselves.

In observing those that have gone before me and are farther ahead on the road, I’ve learnt that time will separated the committed, from the non-committed.

This will then help you lay the foundation and give you the best opportunity to invest in those that have chosen to attend those meetings, go the extra mile, send those emails or pick up whatever needs to be fetched.

Time separates groups and categories of people well.

It is often from those who have stuck it out, that your best leaders emerge, because you don’t have to teach them anything about the need for commitment, they already have it. And it is often that your most committed are the ones most willing to learn.

Am I saying we don’t have a responsibility to inspire people to that place? Absolutely not!

But I am saying that after you have tried your level best to do so, the choice is often the individual’s to make.

Some of the greatest “would have been” leaders are on the sidelines because they simply failed to show commitment.

For example, you can fault a bad basketball team full of “stars”, the best players in the land, that DOESN’T train and loses!

But you cannot fault a team, with average players, but puts in the yards, and while it may lose, they have shown their heart.

The trouble is we only realize it after some time that perhaps they weren’t the most obvious choice because of their gift.

So perhaps next time when looking for your “go-to” man / woman, keep it in mind, that time will separate the gifted from the committed, then only can you begin to build something significant.

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Why You Should Never Appoint Caretaker / Interim Leaders

18/01/2013 — 1 Comment

Transition is at the core of leadership. Leadership is about change and there can be no worthwhile change if there is no movement from the present into a well-planned future. Besides transitions affecting enterprises, leadership itself has to navigate a lot of transitions.

Enterprises face challenges at an abrupt departure of a key leaders or team members. Sometimes challenges arise when there is no one to fill in the gap at that moment. As part of well-meant interventions caretaker or interim leaders are appointed.

These leaders may have the heart for the cause of the enterprise but deemed not completely fit to occupy the post over a long period. In other instances the leaders themselves may have concerns about themselves, opting to momentarily fill the post or get a feel for it before making a concrete commitment.

6761629189 eba187884e Why You Should Never Appoint Caretaker / Interim Leaders

caretaker / interim can keep the boat afloat for now, but can harm the enterprise in the long term || image by loop_oh | cc

Here’s why you should never appoint caretaker / interim leaders:

Moment

 

Caretaker or interim leaders are generally appointed for a short period. Though they may have the long-term in mind, they are going to act for the interim. Caretaker leaders’ focus is keeping the boat afloat for the short-term. Caretakers, that is what they are. While interim leaders may keep the boat afloat, there have great potential of crippling the enterprise in the long-term.

caretaker leadership can rob your enterprise of innovation that needs to be sustained beyond its tenure [Tweet this]

Take Over

Responsible leadership is about ensuring that core operations are sustained. The permanent leaders who succeed interim leaders generally see the actions of their predecessor as temporary.

Thus they may not see any need in taking seriously and or sustaining some the decisions and systems implemented by their predecessors.

Authority

 

Interim leaders often have limited authority; they have limitations on calls they can make. Thus, they are somewhat regarded as mere figureheads.They are seen a lesser leaders. While they may command respect of those they lead, there are undertones of that they don’t measure up, hence their appointment as interim.

This can set a bad precedence as far as respect of their function when a more permanent leader takes over. Respect in the sense of appreciating what their function is supposed to fulfill.

To Consider

If you really have to appoint an interim leader, make sure they have authority over issues that affect the long-term. Be clear about what their role is and make it clear to the rest of your enterprise.

Guard the ‘sanctity’ of their function for the sake of either the interim leader in the event they assume their post permanently or for their permanent successor.

Bonus

I highly recommend you also read (if you haven’t done so already):

What what you add? I really would love your to hear your thoughts…

 

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In Leadership, Productivity, Teamwork, Vision
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Ah… The Little Things

15/05/2013 — Leave a comment

This is one of those posts that just remind us. Uhm… remind us of how human we can be. That sounds a little odd. Let’s try again. This is one of those posts that remind us how human we are.

So, I had a brain fart. You know, those moments your attention and logic lapses. We’re very good at laughing at others’ stupid mistakes. “How on earth could someone do something so silly?!”

Let others’ (“funny”) mistakes be more than a reason for laughter. Let those moments be a remind of our humanity. Let it be a reminder of how we’re all equally capable of faux pas moments under the right conditions.

Let me illustrate:

little things Ah... The Little Things

Instead of looking for the scissors we keep in the kitchen, I decided to use the sharpest knife in our kitchen to open vacuum-sealed cheese. That was only the beginning of my “mistake” (<— see what I did there? made it a little more “civil”).

I was successful in doing two things:

1. I managed to open the cheese
2. I managed to cut my little finger in the process

It is always the little things that remind us of our humanity. Yes, it’s my turn to be human…

It is often the mundane that we overlook. The impact of small things done mindlessly can have grave consequences. It is moments we get lost in our thoughts while doing the mundane that can derail us.

It can be reaching for something while driving that can land you in hospital.

There are a lot of seemingly small things we do day to day that have the capacity to impale us in many ways. This is generally the result of either familiarity or concentration lapses.

Perhaps you need to move a little slower. Think a little longer, and most of all be present. Be very present.

What little things have reminded you of how human you are lately? 

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The Mine Of Being Undermined

13/05/2013 — Leave a comment

As I’ve said before, “The truth is we all want people to think of us as more capable than we really are”. It can be gravely damaging to let people hold on to such perceptions, especially to the extent to which we get entrusted with something on the premise that we are perfectly capable.

Honesty is the basis of integrity. Being one with who you say you are and what you’re capable of and letting your actions match with that…

Related: The Grading Tango | Honest

The other side of the coin, however, is being undermined. Undermined not in the sense of being patronized. Undermined when people “grade or perceive” us as less capable than we really are.

3633969341 6a0e73505c z The Mine Of Being Undermined

you can draw value out of being undermined

Irony: We generally hate being undermined yet we can let people “grade” us higher than we deserve. In fact, we’re often infuriated when we are said to be less, in whatever way, than we are. We go into tirades. After all, it is justified. How can we be undermined and disrespected in such a way?!

Whatever you do, you have to choice to how you respond to being undermined. Before you launch your counter attack on being undermined consider the mine that you could dig:

Expectations

Being undermined comes with less expected of you. Thus, whatever you deliver above whatever was expected of you makes you exceptional. It will bring attention. Which is what you want anyway, right?

Show

Instead of talking about how much you are more than what you are said to be, show it. Action still speaks louder than words. The proof of the pudding is still in the eating.

Pressure

Rather be undermined than overrated. When you’re undermined the pressure is less than what would be on you if you were overrated. Use the obscurity being undermined provides you to deliver even better, no greater than what you were said to be.

Challenge

Use being undermined as a reminder that there is always room to be greater. The more you learn, the more you’ll realize how much you don’t know. The higher you climb the more you’ll realize there is still higher to go.

When you’re undermined allow it to remind you stay humble. Let it remind you to stay hungry. Let being undermined drive you closer to getting better than you are already. Don’t let it take your focus to addressing the people who’ve undermined you. As, I’ve already said, let your work speak for you.

Point

People are not always going to have an accurate estimation of your capabilities. Be careful how you respond those estimations. When they’re overrated don’t lie and go along with them. When your capabilities are undermined mine the mine of being undermined; let it work for you and not against.

[ image by Max0rz | cc ]

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