More on Leadership

I thought it was interesting today when I asked the class about what leadership means and several students offered up certain practices that, to them, exemplified what leadership is about.  I want to critique that idea somewhat in this post, but first here is the working definition I offered up of leadership.

Leadership - the act of raising the performance of other members of your team.  

The reason why formulaic approaches are limited in this regard is because the world is complex and somehow we have to grapple with the complexity.  One of my favorite quotes on this come from George Orwell.

To see what is in front of one's nose needs a constant struggle.

The full essay from which this line has been taken is well worth the read.  We make mistakes in what we think is true because we want something to be true even if we should know better that it can't be true.  Further, the evidence is never as straightforward as you'd like it to be.

Chin Up

Something like this graphic was presented at leadership training I attended in 2003 at something called the Frye Leadership Institute.  This was during the very first session on Chin Up Leadership, which meant you have to be on the lookout for what is going on because things are complicated so it isn't easy to sort out the prevailing currents.  It was also supposed to be a double entendre - chin up also means to keep your spirits up in the presence of difficult situations at work. 

Now let me go back to the working definition of leadership given above.  One possible reason why leadership can matter is the the team members are currently underperforming.  I am going to close this post by asking - are there multiple possible reasons for this, each plausible in their own right, that might explain the low level of performance?  I encourage you to think through that question and try to come up with some possible causes.  

You don't recommend a cure till you do a diagnosis.  In class today students were recommending cures.  If you make a wrong diagnosis, the cure you propose might make matters worse.  So leadership of this sort requires some patience.  Keep Orwell's line in mind.  That will help.