Leadership: Aspire to Inspire . . .

Some thoughts from the perspective of multiple careers

Leadership_ Aspire to Inspire

I have been given a golden opportunity to share my thoughts on leadership from the perspective of having two very different and fulfilling careers. I will take this opportunity to discuss with you two words that mean a great deal to me and to the legacy we leave behind in this world. Many people believe that in our younger years we work hard since we aspire to great things.

Some call this effort our “inner drive” to be the best we can be. How does that aspiration “grab hold?” How do we know when our aspirations are realistic, achievable and worthy of commitment? Therein lies the rub! In my opinion, we feed that aspiration through inspiration.

When we have great leaders, mentors, friends or family that inspire us and guide us through life-giving opportunities that we are blessed with every day, we begin to feed those aspirations and give strength to that aspirational drive. Inspiration is such a beautiful, and often, a spiritual trait. Although inspiration is available to all, at times it seems that only a few people seem to truly recognize and avail themselves of this precious gift to make life better for themselves and for others. There are, however, people in our midst who live quiet lives of integrity, trust, and faith. They inspire, often without words, through their example. These people, whether they know it or not, are able to inspire others through their strong sense of faith and to help others to see the best in themselves and to be and to live “inspired” lives.

I have been so fortunate to have had two wonderful careers.

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Leadership Traditions Build a Leadership Legacy

Practice Makes Permanent

Leadership Traditions Build a Leadership Legacy

How many of you are already thinking that I have made a mistake in my writing the subtitle of this article? Most of us have grown up hearing that “Practice makes perfect.” Well, for those of us who have done any coaching, we will tell you that “Practice makes permanent.” Therefore, your practice must be focused and it must direct you toward an ideal.

Recently I had the opportunity to observe the Traditions Ceremony at the school where several of my grandchildren attend. It was interesting to observe. At the Traditions Ceremony, there are special items that are presented to the students throughout their time at the school. Every other year they receive a Tradition item.

  • Children in Kindergarten receive a Bible with their name and their year of graduation printed on the cover. This provides the foundation for everything else that they will learn.
  • Second graders receive a Compass. This reminds them of the importance of guiding principles and the importance of being able to find our way.
  • Fourth graders receive the School Crest. This contains the Knight’s Code and reinforces the duties as well as the rights and responsibilities to speak truth, right wrongs, live pure and follow Christ.
  • Sixth graders receive a Journal and Pen. It is with these that they will begin to formulate and articulate their thoughts and practice the rhetorical skills that are needed to communicate clearly and with conviction.
  • Eighth graders receive a Blue Blazer with the school crest on the left over their heart. The crest has those principles of the Knight’s Code.
  • Sophomores receive a Gold Leadership Pin to wear on the right lapel of their blazers. This is to remind them of their ascending leadership role to the rest of the school community.
  • And seniors receive a Walking Stick. Yes, that’s right. They receive a walking stick.

Why a Walking Stick?

Well, to be perfectly clear, it is not a walking stick. It is a “walking staff.” What is the difference between a stick and a staff?

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You can lead a horse . . .

You can lead a horse

You can lead a horse to water . . .

How many times have you heard that statement? It is an old bit of country wisdom. You can bring your horse to the water trough. But, if he ain’t thirsty, then he ain’t drinkin’.

Now, consider an update to that piece of rural wisdom.

You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink. However, you can salt his oats!

In days gone by, our forefathers knew that if a horse has been sick and is weak and in danger of going down, you can put a little salt in his oats and that salt will draw it to the watering trough and make it want to drink. This is a great analogy of one of the skills that we need as leaders from time to time.

From time to time we will have reluctant followers. Their reluctance may be the result of factors beyond our control. Nevertheless, we have to lead them even when they are not exactly in the mood to be led.

What is the leadership lesson here?

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The Business of Ethics

MM - Ethics

I am sure there has been much written about ethics in leadership but I wanted to share some insights recently revealed to me.

I had a visit with some dear friends who have been in leadership positions and one is currently writing a book on “ethics in the university”. He is a retired professor and is a dear friend so, jokingly, I asked him if he had discovered any, to which there was a resounding NO.

The chats usually go with the state of our country then circles around to business models and ethics.

First, I’m not sure why we call it “business ethics”.

Is the place we learn business ethics, in business, or is it too late then?  Our conversation had me asking that question, “Where do we learn” ethics?

Well, I got the standard business answer we all should expect and the one you are thinking. We teach them in college and have training classes and seminars. Which isn’t bad, I might add!

As you may guess at this point in the conversation, I still had plenty of questions. So, one immediate question was; at what age do we start to teach ethics?

Where and when do “we” learn ethics?

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Teach Gratitude to a Preschooler in Four Simple Steps

Gratitude

In all things give thanks… The five year old just celebrated her birthday. She received a predictably mountainous and diverse pile of presents from family and friends, and we had a princess party with Rapunzel wigs, manicures, make up, and an assortment of little princess activities. As any parent might, we made a big deal out of her day. Yet as her daddy, I asked myself before the party and after: what lessons are my little girl learning from this showering of attention and gifts, and are those lessons the right ones?

There are obvious lessons: I am special. I am loved. I am blessed. I am liked. My life is appreciated.

There are subtle lessons: Some people brought me nicer gifts than others. Some people seem to be having a better time than others. Some people seem to be sad (or angry) that I am the one receiving all the attention. Some people wish they had my toys.

And there are some lessons that are insidious: I didn’t get as many presents as my older sister got at her birthday. I think the present I got my friend for her birthday party is better than the one she got me. The party I went to last month was much more fun than my party. I don’t have as many friends as some of my other friends do.

You get the idea – all of these are non-specific and all of them apply. I am amazed as a still-rookie Daddy that these lessons are taught and learned at such a tender age. Yet it is my responsibility to lead my family through them: contentment, envy, fairness, jealousy, joy… but our focus for today is gratitude. As you develop a plan for teaching your kids to be grateful, consider these things:

1. You can’t teach what you don’t know.

Before you can teach anything to anyone – and especially your kids – you’re going to need to understand what it is you are teaching them. The word “gratitude” come from the same latin root word from which we derive the word “grace”. Although grace and gratitude don’t share precisely the same meaning, they are two sides to the same coin. Indeed, one could make a strong case that the proper response to grace is gratitude.

So, start like this: make a list of the graces you experience in your own life. Life itself is a good place to start, and while you are at it, think of other people who have led you, and taught you, and corrected you. And maybe even consider how people who have been less than gracious to you have shaped you in ways that have somehow or another worked out well. You can continue from there. Perhaps (and hopefully!) your children themselves are high on this list. Make certain that you consider how the people in your life figure into the grace/gratitude spectrum. This could as easily be called “counting your blessings”, but your list will have greater meaning to you and your kids if you write it down.

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Baidu and the Persistent Pursuit of Leadership

Baidu Logo - Large

There are many things that we take for granted in life.  “Google” is probably high on that list.  At least it is for me.  That is until I took my first business trip to China.  I am back in China this week and I didn’t realize until this week how important social networking sites like Facebook and Google’s search engine were to me.

Most of the people that I spoke with about this do not really feel a sense of loss.  There is an alternative that provides most of the features and functions of the suite of tools and portals that Google provides.  China’s equivalent to Google is “Baidu”.  Baidu exists because China has blocked Google’s access to the 1.2 billion people in the country through its state sponsored filtering software.

The name was inspired by a poem written more than 800 years ago during the Song Dynasty. The poem compares the search for a retreating beauty amid chaotic glamour with the search for one’s dream while confronted by life’s many obstacles. Consider this line from that poem.

“…hundreds and thousands of times, for her I searched in chaos,
suddenly, I turned by chance, to where the lights were waning, and there she stood.”

What is the leadership lesson here?

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The Education of a Leader

 

Education of a Leader - 1

The education of a minister should not end with the theological school, but should be prolonged, like that of a teacher or physician, to the latest day of his (or her) life.
– Charles Eliot, longest tenured president of Harvard University and brother of TS Eliot

You know, I wish I could confine that quote only to the clerical profession.  But, I can’t.  That is a quote that is tailor made for leadership development if ever there was one.  And it hits me square between the eyes.

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Leadership is… Teaching

 

Teaching - 1Leadership is teaching.

We must tell others what we are attempting, why we are doing it, how we plan on getting there and how to avoid pitfalls along the way. As leaders we can never assume that the people we are leading know what we are thinking or reaching for.

As we live out our personal mission we must constantly be attentive to leading others through teaching. We must explain why we do what we do, and we must invite others to join us. We cannot be timid in our recruiting or our teaching. Our words must be clear and purposeful.

Teaching - 2Our teaching must be about more than just vision, but also about the process. But let me be clear here: the teaching of leadership doesn’t only go one way. In many ways this facet of leadership could be titled “learning” because not only will our team be learning but we will be as well. Sometimes we are the teacher, sometimes one of our team is doing the teaching and of course many times it is the circumstances and failures along the way that teach us the most.

As leaders we must teach and we must learn, because if we do not then we ourselves, not to mention our team and our organization, will stagnate and become irrelevant and useless.

Photo credit: ben110 / Foter / CC BY-NC-ND
Photo credit: Gates Foundation / Foter / CC BY-NC-ND
Photo credit: Forty Two. / Foter / CC BY-NC

Loneliness in Leadership

Lonely Leadership - 1In February of 2012, Harvard Business Review featured a story acknowledging that it is lonely being the CEO. The article noted that it’s isolating at the top.  Now, if you are at all like me it is a little hard to feel sorry for CEOs on a regular basis.  What with their power, prestige, influence, and wealth — the common man’s perception is that they have it all. They must be the happiest people on the planet.

All those trappings of success notwithstanding, business leaders face some genuine troubles, not least of which is loneliness.

The author of that article cited survey findings from the CEO Snapshot Survey that “half of CEOs report experiencing feelings of loneliness in their role.  And 61 percent believe that it hinders their performance. This was particularly acute with first-time CEOs and young leaders.

Lonely Leadership - 2Maybe you are also like me in that you don’t really care if billionaires like Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg or Jeff Bezos aren’t reaching the pinnacle of Maslow’s hierarchy!

So why am I writing about this?

I would suggest that any leader’s isolation and feelings of loneliness have negative implications on their personal performance, and perhaps more importantly, on how they interact with others. Because it is not just big corporate CEOs who experience this kind of loneliness.   It is team leaders, entrepreneurs, pastors, and community leaders also. And this impacts the bottom-line for organizations.

This loneliness springs from a feeling that they have no one “at their level” to talk to.  They have no “peers” in their view.  They have no one to confide in.  They have no one to bounce ideas off of and no one to turn to for advice.  They also have no one holding them accountable for their actions and deeds.  This isn’t good for decision-making, culture, performance, or the long-term health of the organization.

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The Pot Bowl?

details of my garden
MendezEnrique / Foter.com / CC BY-NC-SA

I want to make clear this viewpoint is from a leadership perspective and NOT a political view. It has plenty to do with the decline in leadership of core moral values that has made America a great country, and Colorado and Washington great states respectively. I have been following this issue with a keen interest for some time and feel now is an appropriate time to share my thoughts. I have arrived at this conclusion largely due to Wyoming being a peripheral state to Colorado.

As many of you know Colorado and Washington have recently embraced the use of marijuana. I have no real issues with people using marijuana, but here is where the real rub comes in. Does Peyton Manning really want to be associated with retiring after the “Pot Bowl”?

Seriously now; During this time when Colorado and Washington are embracing (according to federal law) an illegal drug, for the sake of revenue, Colorado has lost to the state of Wyoming (so far) three legal revenue generating manufactures.

Magpull Winner
abcovey / Foter.com / CC BY-NC-ND

An even deeper look at the issue of safety shows these states are lacking in judgment and are neglecting to provide their residences reasonable safety measures for a “few more dollars”. This is also indicative of a continued moral decline in leadership of both the Federal and State governments by telegraphing the message, “You don’t have to step up and be responsible, we’ll lower our standards to meet you where you are”. Meanwhile signaling danger to all who travel the highways as well.

The short term effects afforded the states are as follows:

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