Part One – What Leaders Do and What Constituents Expect

Like I said, last week, I have decided to pass along my notes from the book The Leadership Challenge. So, here we go...

Preface – Everyone's Business (they are referring, of course, to leadership)

While the content of leadership has not changed, the context has.

It's human networks that make things happen, not computer networks.

Social capital is amassed over years of investing in building relationships.

Special interest lobbying tears at our sense of community.

Global leadership means global understanding.

Create wholeness out of diversity.

More and more of us are on a quest for greater meaning in our lives.

There's a growing yearning for a sense of higher purpose. How can leaders provide a climate for people to bring their souls to work, not just their heads and hands?

Weave the innocence and wisdom of different generations into our workplace.

Good leadership is an understandable and universal process.

The most significant contribution leaders make is not simply to today's bottom line; it is to the long-term development of people and institutions so they can adapt, change, prosper, and grow.

We need leaders who can unite us and ignite us.

Part One – What Leaders Do and What Constituents Expect

Chapter One – The Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership

Business is really all about people … making them feel motivated, empowered, and trusted.

Getting something concrete done got people over the 'I've heard it all before' reaction. It was an essential preliminary to changing attitudes and mindsets … Once the team had a few successes under their belts, they had the confidence to move on to bigger projects.

You can never stop communicating, nor do enough communicating with people.

The key is being able to align these two – personal and organizational values – and being at home in your skin, and being honest with yourself.

You can't pay people enough to care.

Assume the best in people.

(Be) a model for how other leaders can get extraordinary things done in a world of constant chaos and change.

Leaders mobilize others.

Creative people by nature want some sense of ownership. They want some sense of empowerment and spirit.

To get the most out of people, you need to see them on more than a surface level. You really have to get to know what makes them tick.

We played a lot … it should be a fun place to work.

Figuring out how to make things work … we developed a bond.

Mobilize other people … to want to climb to the summit.

Leadership is not at all about personality; it's about practice.

Guide others toward peak achievements.

It's your behavior that wins you respect.

Leaders must first be clear about their guiding principles.

Exemplary leaders go first.

Distinguished by relentless effort, steadfastness, competence, and attendance to detail.

When people described to us their personal-best leadership experiences, they told of times when they imagined an exciting, highly attractive future for their organizations.

Every organization, every social movement, begins with a dream.

Leaders cannot command commitment, only inspire it.

People must believe that leaders understand their needs and have their interests at heart. Leadership is a dialogue, not a monologue.

Those who lead others to greatness seek and accept challenge.

Whatever the challenge, all the cases involved a change from the status quo. Not one person claimed to have achieved a personal best by keeping things the same.

Innovation and change all involve experimentation, risk, and failure.

One way of dealing with the potential risks and failure of experimentation is to approach change through incremental steps and small wins. Little victories, when piled on top of each other, build confidence that even the biggest challenges can be met.

Leaders learn by leading, and they learn best by leading in the face of obstacles. As weather shapes mountains, problems shape leaders.

Exemplary leaders enable others to act. They foster collaboration and build trust.

Those who are expected to produce the results must feel a sense of personal power and ownership.

It's part of the leader's job to show appreciation for people's contributions and to create a culture of celebration.

Encouragement is curiously serious business.

No one needs to wait around to be saved.

Success in leadership, success in business, and success in life has been, is now, and will continue to be a function of how well people work and play together.

Chapter Two – Credibility is the Foundation of Leadership

We asked constituents to tell us what they look for and admire in a leader.

What people most look for and admire in a leader has been constant. As the data clearly show, for people to follow someone willingly, the majority of constituents must believe the leader is: honest, forward-looking, competent, and inspiring.

Leaders are doing more than just getting results. They're also responding to the expectations of their constituents, underscoring the point that leadership is a relationship and that the relationship is one of service to a purpose and service to people.

(Honesty is) the single most important ingredient in the leader-constituent relationship.

We want leaders to be honest because their honesty is a reflection upon our own honesty.

Regardless of what leaders say about their own integrity, people wait to be shown; they observe the behavior.

We resolutely refuse to follow those who lack confidence in their own beliefs.

Whether we call (it a) vision, a dream, a calling, a goal, or a personal agenda, the message is clear: leaders must know where they're going if they expect others to willingly join them on the journey.

Leadership competence refers to the leader's track record and ability to get things done.

An effective leader … must understand the business implications.

It is highly unlikely that a leader can succeed without both relevant experience and, most important, exceptionally good people skills.

We expect (our leaders) to be inspiring – a bit of the cheerleader, as a matter of fact.

We all long for some greater sense of purpose and worth in our day-to-day working lives.

In times of great uncertainty, leading with positive emotions is absolutely essential to moving people upward and forward.

Enthusiasm and excitement are essential, and they signal the leader's personal commitment to pursuing a dream.

These key characteristics make up what communications experts refer to as “source credibility.”

The First Law of Leadership: If you don't believe in the messenger, you won't believe the message.

Loyalty is clearly responsible for extraordinary value creation.

Price does not rule the Web; trust does. (remember this book was written in 2002)

We may want newscasters to be cool, reasoned, and objective, but we want leaders to articulate the exciting possibilities. Leaders don't just report the news; they make the news. The dilemma is that leaders who are forward-looking are also biased.

Leaders have to learn to thrive on the tensions between their own calling and the voice of the people.

Leaders stay true to their principles whatever the situation.

People first listen to the words, then they watch the actions … If people don't see consistency, they conclude that the leaders is, at best, not really serious, or, at worst, an outright hypocrite.

Align actions with values.

Leadership is Not a Facebook Meme

One horse I while never stop beating, no matter how dead, is the two entrepreneurial functions. They are: innovation and selling/marketing. Because these two functions are all you need to build a business, the current tend towards solopreneurs does make sense.

That said, some businesses do need scale if they are to succeed. And, to scale a business means to build an organization.

Organization building is a complicated subject, beyond the purview of any one blog post. Nonetheless, one element that is necessary in all healthy organizations is leadership. So, let us talk about it.

One thing I can state, with certainty, is the fact that leaders need to be recruiters. As Mort Mandel would say business is, “All about who.” What is more, you can click here to view a short YouTube of Steve Jobs's thoughts on the matter.

Whatever you wish to call it, recruiting is important.

Recently I asked John Doerr what his three favorite books are. Doerr's reply included Laszlo Bock's book Work Rules! Click here to watch a great talk Lazlo gave on the subject of recruiting. Recruiting is not easy and many aspiring leaders abdicate their responsibilities. 

One thing I do believe is it becomes easier to recruit as you become a better leader. As I have said, leadership is a thorny subject. Indeed, leadership is not a facebook meme. So, the question becomes, how do we improve our leadership skills? I think it is a good question.

The short answer is that people learn to lead by leading. Now, I do not know about you, but that answer has never sat well with me.

Of course, I believe in the wisdom of learning by doing. However, as I said last week, I believe we can benefit from both practice and theory. Trial and error is very useful but so are mental models.

So, what I have decided to do is try something new. Who knows, maybe it will end up being another error from which I can learn ;)

There are some great books, out there, on the subject of leadership (There is also utter B.S.) One leadership book, that I do get down with, is The Leadership Challenge by James Kouzes and Barry Posner.

As it turns out, I take A LOT of notes. So, here is my plan. Over the next few weeks I am going to post my notes from this book by Kouzes and Posner. Seeing as The Leadership Challenge is more than 400 pages in length, my goal is to help you save some time.

See you next week!

Entrepreneur = Experimenter

Gary Vaynerchuk is a pretty solid entrepreneur. Here is a meme he recently posted.

Kurt Lewin once said, “There is nothing so practical as a good theory.” I do not know about you but I definitely agree.

Could you imagine trying to do chemistry without the periodic table? Спасибо Dmitri!

We need theory as well as practice. We need a system and a framework. Hopefully, my blog helps. For example, my recent material on the buying cycle. Here and here.

Then, we need to iterate like crazy. We need speed and stick-to-itiveness.

Like I suggested last week, to succeed we must fail quickly.

Does it Solve a Real Problem?

Will Bitcoin ever take off? Who knows. I, for one, am not a big fan of trying to predict the future. However, one thing we might consider is whether or not Bitcoin solves a real problem.

Like I said, two weeks ago, I do not know very much about Bitcoin. That said, we can still have a short discussion. You see, no solution is perfect. Your aim should never be to create the perfect product. Well, you can shoot for perfection, just know you will never actually reach it.

Anyways, all economic decision are based upon costs and benefits. We call it a “Cost-Benefit Analysis.” If the benefits outweigh the costs we tend to buy.

In the case of Bitcoin, what is the benefit? From best I can tell, the benefit of using Bitcoin is the ability to avoid taxation. Listen, all western countries have established, and efficacious, forms of currency. So, why do we need a new one? Apparently, since Bitcoin is not overseen by a government, it is not taxed.

That strength can also become a profound weakness. The value of Bitcoin seems to be governed by market forces. Which is fine. But, as we know, markets are prone to bubbles and bursts. Just think of the tulip mania that occurred in the Netherlands.

From what I can tell, Bitcoin is a rather insecure form of currency. So, those willing to accept the risk will be rewarded by the absence of taxation. Again, I do not really understand Bitcoin. Whether or not it succeeds, only time will tell.

And, that is a key word. Time.

Every entrepreneur needs to be honest, with him or herself, about whether or not their solution solves a real problem. A big mistake people make is they try to guess, in advance, whether people will want their product.

The right move is to test your offering. Run a pilot program. In the parlance of aviation, get something the air and see if it flies.

Time is critically important in entrepreneurship. That being said, you want your time spent getting feedback from the marketplace. The goal should be to spend as little time as possible in the planning and preparation stages. Instead, run a test. This is the concept of “rapid-prototyping.”

Get something out into the market and see if people buy it. The market is an excellent feedback mechanism. The real challenge is understanding what the market is trying to say.

Just because people do not buy your offering does not mean it is no good. It does not mean your product must fail. The answer might be adjustment. You might not to tweak your product, your target customer, your distribution channel, etc. Or, the answer could be patience.

What we are looking for is proof of concept. If you have ever seen Shark Tank, you have heard about proof of concept. And, what proves your concept might work? In a word: sales.

If enough people buy your product, you will probably succeed. The key is to pour the right amount of gas onto that fire (Hint, err on the side of too much gas rather than not enough.) But, what if they are not buying? How long do you keep adjusting things until you give up?

Well, we have now hit upon one of the most difficult questions in all of entrepreneurship. When do you hold 'em and when do you fold 'em? Sorry, but I have no simple answers. Nor does any other honest person. It is a judgment call. And, like most anything, the only way to get good at making that call is practice.

Unfortunately, in the real world, practice is often synonymous with failure. The truth is, the chances of you hitting a home run, on your first at-bat, are very low. It is much more likely that you will fail. Perhaps even go bankrupt.

Here is a moment for you to pause. I want you to ask yourself a couple of important questions, “Am I willing to lose it all? If I did lose it all, would I have what it takes to bounce back?” If your answer to either of those questions is, “No,” entrepreneurship is not for you.

I am, most certainly, not being pessimistic. As a matter of fact, I am one of the more optimistic people you will ever meet. That said, I have also failed miserably. So, I would not be doing you any favors if I gave you rose-colored glasses.

You can succeed, at entrepreneurship, by creating real solutions to real problems. Just do yourself a favor and get time on your side. Be prepared to fail and try again. And again and again. A key to success, like Angela Duckworth teaches, is grit. If you do not know Duckworth, read her book, which came out just last month.

If you just keep iterating you will eventually succeed. The question is, do you have enough time? No one can answer that question except you. The paradox is this, can you fail fast enough to succeed? This is the entrepreneur's journey.