Leadership in a nutshell

There are many ways to define and describe leadership. I like to look at leadership, especially good and great leadership, as spirituality in action. Leadership to me is about service. It’s about giving the best service you can to the greatest number of people possible.

Therefore, good leadership starts with a purpose and requires a certain level of SQ as well as IQ and EQ.

Great purposes excite people and attract massive followings. They also engender clear visions and a strong sense of mission. A great leader is one who has a vision, a sense of mission, and is able to clearly communicate that mission and vision to their audience. In doing so they inspire the kind of following and support they need to fulfill their mission and vision.

A successful leader always has a trusted team working with them. To build a winning team, one needs to have integrity, respect, trust and care for the people, and continuously develop people to the best they can be.

A winning team and excelling organization has a code of honour which all members take to heart and live upon in their daily operations.

Good, strong leaders listen to other’s opinions, but make their own decisions based on one unalterable, fundamental principle and criterion: mission first, team second and individual last. This principle is part of their organizations’ codes of honour. Bad, mediocre leaders confuse the order of importance and frequently make decisions on a reverse criterion: personal interests first, team second and mission last.

Some of the common practices that define effective leaders are that they prioritize, delegate and empower. They set strategic goals and instill faith in people that inspires them to achieve what they never thought possible.

Great leaders recognize the importance of a strong team with complementary strengths. They understand that what they need is not a group of saints, but individuals with strengths and weaknesses. They must have big enough hearts to tolerate all the human flaws while be wise and skillful enough to contain these flaws, and let the team’s talents shine. They know that people are their most valuable assets and treat them as such.

And finally, a great leader must not overwork. Instead, a leader should do less, listen more, see more, read more, and have meaningful periods of time to do nothing but contemplate in silence. Serenity and detachment are the holy sanctuaries where the toxic noises of the world die and divine wisdom and clarity emerge. A leader’s role is not to do anything specific, but to hold the vision with clarity and shepherd his herd in the right direction. His role is to set the stage, cultivate the culture and create the energy field where heroes shine, ideas flourish and people ‘automagically’ carry out the mission and realize the vision.

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