Leadership Week
"Leadership is not about titles, positions or flowcharts.
It is about one life influencing another."
-- John C Maxwell
I've never really cared about titles much. I've heard it said that the title and fifty cents will buy you a cup of coffee. That advice is dated, isn't it? Who has fifty cent coffee?
Anyway, it's really nice to have authority, support and all the resources one needs to be a leader, but that and a buck and a half will buy you a cup of coffee.
When I was a young manager at 25, I thought having the authority would make it easy for me to manage, but it wasn't and isn't and doesn't--and hasn't. I've found that it certainly doesn't help me be a leader. What makes me a leader comes from within not without. It doesn't require authority other than my own and it doesn't require support, it requires vision, and it doesn't require the resources necessary, it requires heart and creativity. And, I've found that it requires more than this--it requires a willingness to allow others to come up on their own; to expand on their own; to grow into things. In a word that would be patience.
It's easy to get impatient with people. The leader cannot afford to take the easy way, and must be much more caring and supportive than this. Often, in my own subordinate experience, here is what separated the leaders from the managers. Leaders bring you up because they see something in you and they want you to succeed. Managers are constantly weighing the pros and cons, mistakes and goals and performance.
Tom Peters said something along this line nicely. He said, "leaders don't create followers, they create more leaders."
"A Leader Is A Dealer In Hope." -- Napoleon
Spread Some Joy Today--Today is buy yourself a Kindle day and get some great new reads. There's nothing quite like a fresh new book to sparkle your enthusiasm.
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