This interesting article ( the link is below) talks about leadership and that everyone in an organization can effect change. This is so true and CEO's and senior managers should and need to encourage this kind of give and take at all levels within a company. It keeps an organization dynamic and changing, essential ingredients in sustainable and growing organizations confronted daily with global competition. Obviously though, the "effected change" needs to fit in with the core values and strategy of the company on some level.
Many of us have been thrust into management probably before we were really totally equipped for it. However, the key, regardless of being ready or not, is caring for people while also maintaining an eye on the goals and objectives each of us have. (And yes, even CEO's and Presidents have goals and objectives, they report to someone or something. More about that in another blog posting). Once we are placed in a management role, it then takes an individual to figure out how best to manage, to work with their direct reports, and as a result each manager has her/his own method/stamp in how to do this. Training helps, but it has to come from within a person, it isn't just trained in a cookie-cutter fashion. There are guide posts and methodologies that exist, but each of us have to internalize them to be successful, and we have to continually grow and experiment.
I am always amazed how things that I have learned at one point in my career, and that I was so effective in doing, have gotten rusty and need to be honed again, or needs to be changed in some fashion, to work again. That is the beauty of experience and the challenge we all have.
Some executives come into a company and implement or try to change an organization to look like what they did or created before. Personally, I have never found this to work. Even trying to bring in former employees that were so effective in one organization and parachute them into a new company, doesn't generally work. Why? Because it revolves around "Job Fit." It is a different environment and culture. The skills and competencies that worked in place, do not necessarily work as well in another. The company is a living, breathing, growing, changing organism, each as distinct as we are as people.
So being a leader necessitates listening, understanding, and helping to guide and encourage people, as well as the organization, through communication and articulating expectations, objectives and goals.
The major asset in any company is it's people. Products, services, manufacturing capability, technology and patents contribute to assets, but how many companies fail in spite of great products or services? Many successful companies, when purchased or merged with another company lose their identity or success. Why? The products and services are the same as before, but the interpersonal skills and personalities required, change within the newly created organization and may no longer work.
Listen to Jack Welch's interview on this topic:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AuL2wu7j7vs
So, as leaders, our challenge is to tap into these all most mystical personalities we work with, to get everyone on board and pulling in the same direction. This is the challenge of being a leader, titles do not bring respect, it still needs to be earned, day by day and year after year.
Leadership Doesn't Rest on Your Title by Adam Bryant, interview with Terri Ludwig (Enterprise Community Partners):
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/21/business/terri-ludwig-of-enterprise-community-on-leadership.html?src=rechp
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