Reason and judgment from the classics

Tacitus said, "Reason and judgment are the qualities of a leader." Without these, the leader lives in another world. Reason gives the leader a real sense of the world. Judgment gives the leader the ability to choose between right/wrong, right/right, and wrong/wrong.

Situations
Right and Wrong: To discriminate on the basis of sex, religion, race, etc.
Right and Right: Should I give to this or that charity? Which all-star should I promote? Who will be in the starting lineup when I have 10 great players?
Wrong and Wrong: When two wrongs are present, one must be chosen, and the leader chooses the lesser of the two wrongs.

CEO: try the training

From Talking Story with Say Leadership Coaching, try leading a training session for your followers. I would love to see the faces of new managers sitting in a training room expecting someone from HR to pop in and begin the session and then they see the CEO walk in and lead the group on what he thinks new managers ought to be doing. Just the fact the CEO took the time to do this would be impressive for the new managers. It would impress me.

For your networking needs...

Linkedin will help with networking. Go. Sign up. Invite. Learn.

Linkedin blog will also give good advice on the use of the website.

The darkened road

"Faithless is he that says farewell when the road darkens," speaks master Tolkien.

This is the leadership test. Some are given a leadership position, but leadership will be established in the loss, success, and midst of the crucible. The leader must always, and will not always, be successful. Churchill, Leonidas, Ceci St. Geme, Frodo, R. Lee, and all others had lost in the past.

Great free advice

If you are not reading Tom Foster's "Management Skills Blog", you are missing great advice in a socratic dialogue methodology. If you are a leader, make it a habit to read it daily!

Coaching and Mentoring

J. Farrington of the Leadership Turn writes about the "The New Model Leader". Coaching and mentoring are hard and many executives may not have this skill or talent. According the Buckingham and Coffman, if it is a skill it may be learned and trained. However, if it is a missing talent it cannot be taught.

There are basically two options if lacking this skill or talent: If a missing skill, the executive can receive training in order to become more coaching-like. If it is a missing talent, the executive should hire a coach or mentor to receive feedback on what needs to be done. The bottom line is the skill can be learned and integrated eventually without the help of a coach and the talent will need a constant presence in some form. This can be like a counselor that a person visits, a consultant, or someone full time.

The main problem is that many executives have developed habits over the long haul that will be hard to change into a coaching model.

Slaves vs. Warriors

From King Leonidas in 300 "You have many slaves, Xerxes. But few warriors. It won't be long before they fear my spears more than your whips."

A wise quote from the movie. It is a good thought for leaders. Are your followers driven by fear of punishment or driven by desire for the good of society, company, co-worker, and self? History has provided countless examples of battles fought by true followers vs. slaves and/or mercenaries. Time and again, the true followers are given the title of hero while the others are forgotten.

Leadership in business, etc. is not different. Either you will lead others to greatness or you will be forgotten at best or hated at worst. Which company do you think will provide better employee engagement and pride, customer service, and loyalty?

While adding benefits is a good as a reward for a job well done, as a retention tool it fails. Benefits as a retention tool are similar to the mercenary in an army. If the employee is seeking money for the sake of money, how long will that person stay in the midst of hard times or when offered a higher wage from a competitor? Talent retention is a creeping problem, especially as boomers retire. Offering more money, more vacation, etc. will never bring a company to greatness. The highest value will be effectiveness without heart. And then the pressure is to make sure the employee is compensated highly because there will be other companies seeking that employee's talent and willing to pay more for it. Attraction and retention of talent will prevail because of the company's treatment of people, not solely pay.