MORE LEADERSHIP THOUGHTS
“Allow people to fail, that’s how they learn.” Never liked that! I think what good leaders do is allow people to succeed by ensuring they don’t allow people to make the mistakes they made by ensuring they are trained, resourced, and supervised (not micro-managed), to succeed. I think that’s how you grow people; I think that’s how you motivate people to make things better for the organization. Leaders must plan time for this to happen. Invest time to grow people. It’s not a consultant, it’s not a once a quarter event. It should be how an organization should operate.
Most of the time it's not the decision that is important; it’s how and to whom it’s communicated. Almost every decision must be executed at multiple levels. What leaders often fail to do is have a good communications plan to ensure intent is understood and how it applies to people at different levels. Working to make people understand how it applies to them creates motivation, as people can see they aren’t wasting their time trying to execute something they might not understand. Most importantly, this will force improvements to the plan/decision as the people who are actually executing it can react quickly to any needed changes.
Great leaders don’t hire smart people to dictate tasks. They hire them to unleash their experience and potential. But talent needs motivation, resources, and guidance-that’s leadership!
RLTW!
mike