Tag: Book

Trapped in our leadership comfort?

The leader we could become will always be trapped by what we are unwilling to give up.

The barriers revolve around the effort we will need to summon. This universally feels like too much energy, time, money, and discomfort.

So we don’t do anything.

Even when we choose not to decide, we still have made a choice.

What kind of leader do you long to become?

What’s missing from making that happen?

What are you willing to change?

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This website is about our MIND. To read today’s post about our BODY, click here.

It doesn’t matter what leaders look at, what matters is what leaders see

When we focus on the surface, we risk missing everything else.

Imagine that for a moment.

You may marvel at Disney’s world-famous grooming guidelines and completely miss the fact that grooming guidelines aren’t the insight.

The insight is Disney’s uncompromising focus on delivering what the Guest wants.

The Guest wants something Magical, something no one else in the world provides.

And prior to Disneyland, the American standard for a Family outing was an Amusement Park, a Circus, a State Fair, a Carnival.

The American Carnival was a traveling show. Descending on a town, the Carnival would quickly set up in a vacant field or empty parking lot.

The mechanical rides never won awards for passenger safety.

The Carnival workers, known as “Carnies”, had a reputation for being unkempt.

Walt Disney ruptured the negative stereotypes and reinvented the industry, including the workers, becoming a category of one.

Why?

Because the Public would pay for quality, return often, and tell their friends.

Is there a business leader you know who wouldn’t want that?

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This website is about our MIND. To read today’s post about our BODY, click here.

One of the ideas was making an uncommon book

Make a leadership book that flies in the face of what normal books look like?

Are you crazy?

• What if people shun it?
• What if it doesn’t work?

You can feel the logic in those questions because they’re no-brainer questions, questions every smart leader would ask.

But what about these.

• What if people love it?
• What if it works better than your wildest dreams?

Of course, there’s no guarantee either way.

This is why most people, and most organizations, stay on the tried and true path of good and very good.

The commitment to make excellence the only goal is scary for most.

Why?

Because it requires risk.

Risk scares people and organizations.

This is fundamental, elementary even.

And true.

But what if instead of being scary, risk was embraced as essential to your health and the health of your organization?

Not until leaders, and organizations, desire to make leadership risk-taking mandatory will cultural transformation start spreading its wings.

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This website is about our MIND. To read today’s post about our BODY, click here.

Leadership Next Steps activity

Strike while the iron is hot. Iron is easily malleable when hot, and impossible to shape when not.

Now (yes, right now) is the time to write down some important, top-of-mind leadership excellence thoughts.

Make a few lists and don’t fuss over minute details – this is high-level, very rough-draft thinking. Have fun, and don’t over-analyze. This should be quick:

Who (whom should you involve):

What (what needs to be done):

Where (where will the work occur):

When (when will the work happen):

How (how will the work be accomplished):

Why (why is this important; what’s to be gained by doing it, what’s to be lost by doing nothing):

How’d that feel?

Have you perceived what’s happened in the past few minutes?

You’ve just started planting, on paper, the seeds of intentional leadership behavior that will facilitate the slow and steady path forward to leadership transformation.

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This website is about our MIND. To read today’s post about our BODY, click here.

Who better than you?

From the Leadership activity you just completed, you should be somewhere on the spectrum between overjoyed with future possibility or overwhelmed with hopelessness.

The next best step for your current state is action.

Action will harness your joy for possibility and it will also mitigate your feelings of hopelessness by giving you the initial small steps required to gain a feeling of progress and hope.

Who better than you to have this remarkable leadership opportunity?

Pause for a moment before reading the next sentence and contemplate and answer the question above: “Who better than you?”

How did your answer resonate?

Okay, let’s continue with another question.

How did it feel to write and/or draw your leadership thoughts on paper?

Was it easy?

Why?

Was it hard?

Why?

Do you feel more optimistic or less optimistic from the exercise?

Regardless of your answer, what are your next leadership steps?

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This website is about our MIND. To read today’s post about our BODY, click here.