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Everyone knows that trust between two individuals
is a fragile thing. But as Robert Galford and Anne Seibold Galford and Drapeau describe eight individual and organizational behaviours that will quickly tear down what took so long to build up:
Galford and Drapeau also provide a number of practical wisdoms - such as people will hold you accountable for what they think you said (which may not be what you said) for longer than you might believe. You can download this very worthwhile read for a small fee at www.hbr.com.
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Credibility In their book, 'Credibility', Kouzes and Posner have
a simple message for today's leaders. "If people don't believe in
the messenger, they won't believe in the As an example of the sorry state of leadership credibility today, the authors quote the statistic that only one third of office workers consider executives to be very honest. One-to-One Relationship Building Kouzes and Posner stress that earning credibility is a one-to-one relationship building exercise - a "shop floor" activity. And they point out that credibility is often earned through physical acts - shaking a hand, touching a shoulder, leaning forward to listen. (For an example of this activity in action, just think of the stereotypical politician or salesperson.) The corollary is that leaders who are inaccessible cannot possibly expect to be trusted just because they have a title. They asked people to define credibility in behavioral terms. That is, they asked what behavioural evidence they would use to judge whether or not a leader was believable. The answers they received most frequently were: "they do what they say they will do"; "they practice what they preach"; and "they walk the talk". In other words, credibility is about consistency between words and deeds. Focus on "We" The authors point out that "Do What You Say You Will Do" (DWYSYWD) is a necessary but not sufficient behaviour for a credible leader. That is, it will make you credible but it will not make you a leader. Kouzes and Posner maintain that credible leaders DWWSWWD - "Do What We Say We Will Do". Not only are leaders expected to do what they say but what they say must also be what their constituents believe. Forgetting "we" has derailed many managers. A credible leader must learn how to discover and communicate the shared values and visions that can form a common ground upon which all can stand.
Credibility Building Cycle According to the authors, strengthening leadership credibility has three closely linked phases that are continually cycled through:
Six Disciplines Of Credibility Kouzes and Posner spend the best part of the book delving into detail on the "six disciplines of credibility":
In addition to a detailed exploration of the six disciplines, Kouzes and Posner provide a series of concrete "next steps" to help you develop your capability in each discipline. Based on more than 75,000 surveys spanning nearly two decades, the authors provide an exhaustive investigation of the subject. 'Credibility' is a worthwhile investment of time for leaders in these times of damaged executive integrity.
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Drapeau
point out, in a recent article in Harvard Business Review, 'The
Enemies of Trust', within an organization, it is a far more complicated
and fragile affair.
message.
If they don't believe in you, they won't believe in what you say."
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The Leadership Engine is an extremely
effective combination of theory, teaching stories, and application
handbook. One of the most novel and striking perspectives put
forth by Tichy and Cohen is also the heart of their theory of
how to build leaders and become a winning organization. Fundamental
to their approach is that leaders must also be teachers with teachable
points of view. Simply put, teaching is at the heart of leading
and if you aren't teaching, you If You Aren't Teaching, You Aren't Leading The authors believe that the ultimate test of a leader is not whether he or she makes smart decisions and takes decisive action, but whether he or she teaches other to be leaders and builds an organization that can sustain its success even when he or she is not around. And this is because the ultimate test of success for an organization is not whether it can win today but whether it can keep winning tomorrow and the day after. The Teaching Organization Much has been written about the need to create a "learning organization" in order to compete in today's competitive world. Tichy and Cohen turn that around and say that you should focus on creating a "teaching organization". When combined with the principle that every leader needs to be a teacher, this is much more than mere semantics. It demands a new capability of your leaders - the ability to teach. And it places another responsibility on your leaders and another demand on their time. But if executed effectively the payoffs can be significant as their teaching stories distributed throughout the book show. Four Fundamentals of Winning Leaders The authors point out that winning organizations come in all shapes and sizes but they all share the following four fundamentals: Development of Other Leaders First, leaders with a proven track record of success take direct responsibility for the development of other leaders. Teachable Points of View Second, leaders who develop other leaders have teachable points of view in the specific areas of ideas, values and something they call E-cubed - emotional, energy and edge. Winning leaders/teachers have ideas that they can articulate and teach to others about both how to make the organization successful in the marketplace and how to develop other leaders. They have teachable values about the kinds of behaviour that will lead to organizational and personal success. They deliberately generate positive emotional energy in others and they demonstrate, and encourage others to demonstrate, edge, which is the ability to face reality and make tough decisions. |
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Third, leaders embody their teachable points of view in living stories. They tell stories about their pasts that explain their learning experiences and their beliefs. And they create stories about the future of their organizations that engage others, both emotionally and intellectually, to attain the winning future that they describe. Well Defined Coaching & Teaching Techniques Fourth, because winning leaders invest considerable time developing other leaders, they have well-defined methodologies and coaching and teaching techniques. Among these is the willingness to admit mistakes and show their vulnerabilities in order to serve as effective role models for others. When Tichy and Cohen speak of leaders teaching others, they mean actually holding formal teaching sessions as well as integrating leadership development and coaching into the fabric of everyday activities. Of course, this also demands that leaders be avid learners, able to draw from their pasts and reflect on their experiences to develop lessons for the future. |
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Call (416)
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click here for more info
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Ideas - Developing and Spreading Leaders have clear ideas of what it takes to win in their marketplaces and how the organization should operate. They update their ideas to keep them appropriate to changing circumstances and they help others develop their own ideas. Although winning leaders consider the generation of ideas one of their most important functions, in winning organizations, the source of the ideas isn't what matters. It's the fact that the top leader embraces the ideas, spreads them throughout the organization and encourages others to have good ideas. Values as a Competitive Tool Winning leaders and organizations have strong values that everyone understands and lives up to. The values support the business ideas and are deeply embedded and everyone is held accountable to them, even in seemingly minor everyday decisions and actions. Winning leaders are keenly aware of the importance that values play in shaping people's behavior and see values as a competitive tool that allows their organizations to respond quickly and appropriately. So they invest huge amounts of time nurturing not only the big, immutable values of honesty and integrity, but also day-to-day values-such as teamwork, risk-taking or satisfying customers-that help the organization achieve its goals. Like missionaries, winning leaders constantly think about and preach their organizations' values. They embody them with their own actions. And they teach others to be leaders by constantly encouraging them also to examine the values and wrestle with their application in everyday situations. Tichy and Cohen point out that winning leaders deliberately and consciously do five things:
These five activities allow leaders to develop other leaders who share their values and who can teach them to other people in their companies. And when the values are straight and people who believe in them are in place, laders make sure those values are reflected and reinforced in every decision and action, from compensation and appraisal systems to customer service practices. Generating Positive Energy The authors state that top leaders are not only highly energetic people themselves, but they also actively work to create positive emotional energy in others. They understand that positive energy produces positive results. They use energy, like ideas and values, as a competitive tool. And they consciously work at creating positive energy in everyone else in the organization. They structure the organization to get rid of bureaucratic nonsense and stretch and encourage everyone they meet. They build the determination and self-confidence in others to help them become leaders as well. Winning leaders instinctively realize that every meeting and every activity has the potential to create or destroy positive emotional energy. So they deliberately develop an operating style and design management processes with an eye to their effect on people's energy levels. |
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Find out more, click
here or call us at (416) 657-2331
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Winning leaders are willing to make tough decisions and they encourage and reward others who do the same. Some people call this quality "showing the courage of one's convictions." Tichy and Cohen note that Jack Welch, former CEO of GE, called it "edge". One way to tell if a leader really has edge is if he or she is willing to publicly admit his or her own mistakes because it's the ultimate test of facing reality, the reality that he or she was wrong. It is also a positive sign that the leader will accept the honest mistakes of others as well. The authors describe two major scenarios in which a leader's edge is tested. The first involves decisions about where to invest time, money and resources. The other involves people decisions, facing reality and making tough decisions about people. Tichy and Cohen point out that a lot of leaders stumble because they do not have an edge about people since it involves giving tough face-to-face feedback and sometimes firing people. 3 Types of Stories Forming a 'Leader's Storyline' The authors describe winning leaders as those able to personalize their visions and ideas by telling stories that touch people's emotions as well as their intellects. They drive their messages home with words and actions that engage and excite followers. Leaders use "who I am" stories to describe to themselves and others their fundamental views about the world and to explain how they developed those views. These stories serve as vehicles to both communicate the leader's views and build an understanding between the leader and his or her would-be followers. The second type of story is the "who we are" story which is about the joint experiences and attitudes of the people within the organization. "Who we are" stories are one of the basic building blocks for creating teamwork and energizing individuals to contribute to the ongoing success of an organization. The authors call the third kind of story "future stories" and point out that the best way to get humans to venture into unknown terrain is to make that terrain familiar and desirable by taking them there first in their imaginations. Winning leaders create and use future stories to help people break away from the familiar present and venture boldly ahead to create a better future. They not only describe the future in terms that are personal and compelling, but they help others understand why and what they must do to get there. Without being able to do that, would-be leaders never get the sustained effort required to move toward their goal. Theory, Examples & How-To in a Complete Package Tichy and Cohen tie together all of this theory and much more with a deep base of teaching stories. While they mix in a few stories about losers as examples of what not to do, the majority are about winners and winning organizations driven by a Leadership Engine. And, to ensure that the dedicated reader can put their powerful theories into practice, the authors have included over 120 pages as an application handbook to provide a step-by-step guide. The Leadership Engine is a very significant
book and should be read by everyone who wants to build a winning
organization. —————— |
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Peter Buchanan, President
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aren't
leading.