I started watching “The Apprectice” for the first time this season and I got totally into the show. However, I didn’t find the contestants as “creative” as The Donald and family thought they were, but to me that is not what the show was about. The show was about leadership and lately that is all I have been able to think about…leadership. What does that mean and how do you know if you are being a leader? I ask myself constantly if I am a leader. Sometimes I say yes, other times I say no and sometimes I just don’t know, it is tough to understand. I just did a search on
Amazon.com using the word “Leadership” there were over 205,000 results returned. I guess everyone knows what leadership is but me. I do believe one thing about leadership, you are born with it, I don’t think you can learn to be a leader, it is one of those things that you either have or you don’t. Sure there are books you can read (as proof with the over 200,000 results after a search on
Amazon.com) to become a better leader, but to become a great leader, my guess is you were born with it. A couple other takes I have about being a leader, these are purely my thoughts, I have never read a book on the subject. I take that back. I read the first chapter or Rudy Guilianni’s book titled “Leadership” but it wasn’t what I was looking for. Okay, now on with some of my thoughts on what it takes to be a great leader.
To be a great leader you have to know who you are leading. If you are going to make decisions for a group of people, you better have a pretty good idea how they are going to react. Good or bad. If you decision is going to cause your group to rebel, you should know that, otherwise you will be caught off guard and could quickly lose any control that you have.
You need to respect who you are leading. Respect is key in all relationships and although a leadership roll may be a relationship with one person or 10,000 you have to respect the group and believe in their abilities. If you don’t respect them, how in the world will they be expected to respect you.
Easy segue here…
The people you are leading have to respect you. An entire book could be written on gaining respect and I am sure it has, but to me the old saying “Lead by example” is the golden rule. If you ask your people to wade a mile through 3 feet of soupy pig poop, you better be in the front of the line encouraging them to keep going. How can you possibly lead someone into something that you would never do or have never done.
To be a leader, you better believe what you are preaching and if you believe it you can sell it. I can always tell when someone is towing the company line, covering their ass, and being a “Yes Man” I can always tell because they try to sell it but do a miserable job of it because they don’t believe it. When you really believe it, you don’t have to sell it, it just comes out of you. When John Kennedy said, “ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country” it poured out of him, his body language told the world what he was saying. When Martin Luther King gave his beautiful, “I have a dream” speach, it poured out of him, that emotion can’t be faked. When Bill Clinton said, “I did not have sexual relations with that women!” No one believed him becuase he didn’t believe himself, he couldn’t sell it because he didn’t believe it.
I have more to say about this, including pissing people off, admitting your wrong and knowing when to fight and when to flee but my favorite TV show, “The Shield” is getting ready to start. I’ll finish up later.
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