How Organizational Leadership Destroys Itself

In the past several years, there have been numerous organizations that have seen failure because of their leaders and their leadership theory. I am currently reading William Cohan’s book House of Cards that works through the financial crisis of the early 2000’s. Cohan focuses on Bear Stearns as one of the financial institutes that failed during the financial crisis. The noticeable piece about the Bear Stearns failure was as much about the leadership of the financial institute as anything else. What is more amazing is the type of leadership style that contributed to the failure is still at work in many organizations. Because of this faulty leadership style, many organizations have reached an unhealthy state.

There are three pitfalls that leaders and organizations model that can lead to a failure of the institute. The first two are personal decisions that are made by individuals in their attempt to climb up the ladder to lead. The third is an organizational decision about leadership promotion that can lead to possible failure in a department, unit, group, or entire organization.

Me vs. We

When leadership begins on the foundation of “Me/Self” rather than “We/Team”, the opportunity for true success is small. This is not to say success defined in some manner will not happen. However, it will not be a success that leads to the total growth of an organization and its team members.

Individuals that are leaders by position who think only of themselves can cause division and lack of value in their team. The idea of leadership for them is to highlight their achievements and skills while neglecting or taking advantage of the team members. They want the limelight and believe only they deserve it.

As stated before, this can be true, but it does not provide for a healthy organization. A true leader will understand that “Me” is actually “We”. This means the entire team and not only those they favor. The breadth of knowledge, ideas, and skills of an entire team is a valuable asset for a leader. The opportunity to harness this and use it to bring about organizational success that everyone can feel a part is beneficial.

Positional Privilege

Besides the leader that operates with only their self in mind, there is also the leader that leads because of the privileges that surround the position. I have been in organizations that leaders, whether they are true leaders or not, take advantage of their position. This can be a little difficult but let me explain.

I often talk about the need to have a healthy life balance of work, family, and relaxation. However, as a leader you need to know when the appropriate time to take time off and when not to take it off. As a leader, the participation in organizational events, meetings, and conferences is important to your entire team. However, if you decide to take the time off during one of these scheduled occasions, to your staff, it can indicate your lack of support for the event or that you do not care about it. On the other hand, I have a good friend that does extensive traveling returning home late at night but will still be up and available for early morning meetings. Even though traveling is a part of the position, the commitment to the team he leads is more important than the positional privilege of taking time off.

Competency vs. Leadership

A third area of concern is an organization that promotes individuals based solely on competency and length of service into leadership positions. Let me state first, that any true leader does need to have competency in order to lead at any level of an organization. However, that is not the primary requirement for leadership. If an individual knows how a specific program works but does not know how that interfaces with processes or its role in strategic planning, that can cause an issue for an organization. Additionally, the knowledge of a program does not offset the inability to lead, motivate, or grow people that they are set to lead.

I think that any strong, successful leader is continually learning and gaining knowledge. The difference is not to gain control or move up in company but to better serve the company. The competency that a leader strives for is to provide growth for everyone, not just themselves. The individual that seeks knowledge for themselves becomes a “Me” leader and not a “We” leader and is usually wanting to move up into leadership for power and privilege not to serve others.

Your Choice

The world of business, higher education, government, and many other industries look for individuals who will lead them to success. However, that does not mean they leave behind the values of team growth, valuing individuals, and serving others. It now requires those items and many more. The questions now become; how is your organization being led? How are you leading? Do you do it for yourself and the privileges associated with the position? Do you desire to assist others to succeed and in it see the organization grow? That decision is up to each individual and through it success and growth can be experienced. If not, your organization could be the next Bear Stearns. 

Rebel Innovators - Committed to the Cause

This past weekend we celebrated Independence Day, or more commonly known as the “4^th of July”, and this year was our nation’s 140^th birthday. As I enjoyed the day off with friends and family, I thought back to a couple of books that I have enjoyed that recount some of the history of America’s birth. The first is David McCullough’s Pulitzer Prize winning book 1776, and the other Joseph J. Ellis, also a Pulitzer Prize winner, book The Quartet. The themes that impacted me from these two great books showed individuals involved with the revolution and the beginning of the nation were:

•  Rebels to the status quo
• Innovators of a new standard
•  Totally committed to the cause

As I thought through these themes, the three characteristics that marked the Founding Fathers are the same as those found in successful leaders and organizations.

Rebels to the Status Quo

The economical, social, and political environment in the Colonies was not vastly different from the one found in the other parts of the United Kingdom. The lack of representation, followed by an imbalanced amount of taxes, and the inability for class growth made the Colonies susceptible to serious problems. However, very few “brave” individuals were willing to take on the powerful British state to demand the changes. The ones that did decide saw a future not linked to the status quo of the current environment but a new, vibrant future. They were marked traitors, rebels.

Today, the current business environment could label Apple, Google, Netflix, etc., as traitors, rebels. These organization, and others, saw the status quo but decided to rebel against it and demand changes to create a vibrant future. The risks, the failures, the obstacles did not deter them, and it does not deter individuals, leaders, organizations that look to change the status quo. The mark of organizational death is the mindset to continue to do things the same way because it has always been done that way. A rebel does not want death, it demands life.

Innovators of a New Standard

Beyond being rebels, the founders needed to design a “country” that would provide the freedoms that they sought to have in their lives. As innovators, Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and others did not look to create a country from scratch, but looked at other countries and ancient writers to take concepts and philosophies and implement the ideas. Innovators and disruptors do not always come up with new ideas as much as understanding the current situation, taking ideas from various areas and then implementing them to make a difference. They become the doers of ideas and not just the thinkers.

This is the same with leaders and organizations. Innovators often look beyond their industry to understand new trends and ideas and then look to implement it into their organization. An example would be in the Bitcoin and blockchain technology. Beyond the innovative opportunities for monetary possibilities, the prospects of taking this idea and adapting it to education will be revolutionary. This innovation could be a game changer in education and how we provide competency-based learning.

This will, like the country’s founders, will cause people to be uneasy and will fight against it. Creating things and innovating often disrupts the status quo and those with a stake. Successful leaders and organizations are often disruptors in not only their industry but other industries as well.

Totally Committed to the Cause

Although it is not easy to be a rebel and innovator in an industry, the part that often can trip most individuals or organizations is the commitment level. The history of America’s beginning is filled with disappointments, gaffs, and defeats; however, the total commitment to the cause of freedom did not deter the founders. With each set back, the opportunity to learn and grow from the experience pushed the birth of the country forward. Others did fall away, but a core team stayed in focused to the cause.

For successful leaders and organizations, the road to success is never easy. The realization and acceptance of failures and defeats are used to empower, as learning outcomes, and ultimately, become the basis for a better product, service, or idea. It is the leader or organization that allows others to try and fail so they learn, that build an environment of success. When failure is taken off of the table as a complete negative, then individuals and organizations thrive.

Like the rebels, innovators and individual totally committed to the cause of freedom, those leaders and organizations that take on the same characteristics will become the new standard for others to follow. Do you desire to be a rebel? Is that who you are or your organization is? If not, how do you become the disruptor and new standard-bearer for your industry.

We need revolution in our business world, and especially in our education system. Let begin now!