Favorite Leadership Statements and Quotes

The ultimate leader is one who is willing to develop people to the point that they eventually surpass his/her in knowledge and ability.
- Anonymous

Good leaders make people feel that they are at the very heart of things, not at the periphery. Everyone feels that he/she makes a difference to the success of the organization. When that happens, people feel centered and that gives their work meaning.
- Anonymous


“The first responsibility of a leader is to define reality. The last is to say “Thank you”. In between the leader is the servant.”
- Max De Pree


“Leadership is a combination of strategy and character. If you must be without one, be without strategy.”

- Gen. Norman Schartzkopf

Have You Experienced The “Chicken Little” Syndrome?

Everyday in business and or our personal lives we encounter situations that at first appear to be catastrophic. Appear. After a little investigation we often find things are not as bad as they first appeared. How do you handle these situations? Do the people involved go running around as in the story we all know; Chicken Little? I refer to this crazy reaction as this as the *Chicken Little Syndrome*.

I have found that if you address the problem in eight (8) phases each and every time you can counter these situations very efficiently and effectively.

The 8 phases are:

Phase 1. Keep the emotions in check. Emotional control gives you the edge in these types of situations because it allows you to think clear and make rational decisions.

Phase 2. Define the real problem. Ask the people involved what the real problem is, you need to get this defined clearly before any other actins are taken or you are wasting your time as well as others.

Phase 3. Double check to verify the problem. Always double check the facts, data measurements, original plans or whatever triggered the issue in the first place. This is also a critical step because you do not want to be chasing or reacting to non problems. In most cases, seek out the person who discovered the problem and review with them what the facts are. Sometimes the problem is only communication or a misunderstanding. If the facts warrant, you may be able to resolve the situation at this phase.

Phase 4. Understand the Magnitude of the problem. After you have in fact verified there is a problem, now you must understand the impact. What ramifications will this problem cause to support groups, customers or family members? Will it shut down the manufacturing process, is safety involved and so on.

Phase 5. Containment. Try and understand if this affects a single item or multiple items in work of that may have been shipped outside your facility. If the problem is product related you must go to both sides of the supply chain to determine the effect on previously produced product or not. Try to establish boundaries for the problem, have you heard of something called a *Recall*?

Phase 6. Investigate and define root cause. Determine the most efficient way to determine root cause, depending on the problem this phase can take many different paths and required actions.

Phase 7. Correction. Simple, find it fix it. Keep in mind the economics involved when evaluating any correction of a problem.

Phase 8. Closure. Communicate to all affected parties is a clear and concise manner. More often in business, the management team wants to know the problem, what it took to fix it, are there additional resources or costs involved. Beyond that, spare the details unless you requested to provide them to someone.

One of the key threads throughout this whose process is your ability to communicate with affected personnel. As you can tell this takes an organized approach, but still relies on your leadership ability to manage the process and closure of each phase. One suggestion is to utilize this approach on a smaller problem just to see how it works for you and gain some experience to improve your skill set. You will be successful, try it.

Keeping People Motivated

As we approach the summer months, many people will be distracted from work or normal routines by increase outdoor activities, vacations, and our kids out of school, business cycles and even the warmer weather. Your challenge as a parent, manager or small business owner is how to keep people motivated to perform their assignments. I think there are three key factors that you need to recognize and prepare for behavior adaptation and modification during this period. Recognize you are the example people are keying off of.

Key Factors for Successful Motivation.

Communication, always important, but this time of year it is critical. Why, because everyone else is juggling their personal schedules as well job assignments. You must encourage two way communiqué, this will assure everyone is involved and keeps the work flowing smoothly with minimal disruption. Start communicating the critical milestones or dates that need to be supported and planned for now, then each of these items can be planned around. The identified critical dates can be the customer orders, product releases, holidays, planned vacations, depending on your situation identify these through the summer months. Be aware, your normal routine may not begin again until up to 3 months for now when the kids are back in school. Maybe you should backwards plan from this date week by week until you can arrive at today.

Flexibility, is your ability to adapt to change at any given time or when presented with an abnormal situation. If you have are a company with built in flex time (window of arrival and departure times for worker schedules) around standard core hours, communicate this to everyone and as a manager treat each situation differently if possible. You may be limited by Human Resource procedures or State Workforce Regulations, check into these if you have questions. The key is to let the flex time work in your favor, but everyone must be communicating so the work or task is still ultimately covered.

Positive attitude, keep your smile it truly is contagious. Sure there are going to be disappointed people during this period, but focus on the bigger picture, not just the individual situation. Keep the goals informant of everyone, why are we doing this, how we are doing against the goals. Schedule an activity that can be viewed as a reword and positive gesture about the midpoint and if possible prior to a holiday. This can be a catered lunch for everyone, prize give-ways of some type, let everyone off for the afternoon with pay. You get the idea, let the people know you appreciate their efforts during this time of year.

Set forth a constructive model for everyone to follow, do not become the negative case in point.