LEADER MANAGER BOSS OR COORDINATOR

For the past 21+ years many books have been written about leadership.

Some have compared leader to manager.

Some have compared leader to boss.

Some have talked about leader styles.

Many have talked about traits, skills, characteristics of successful leaders.

All are valuable in one aspect or another.

My major challenge with most of them based upon reading and reviewing about 200 of them since 1984 has been most are focused on LEADERS AS HEROS, GIANTS, BIGGER THAN LIFE, MYTHS.

My 46 years of working plus studying leaders, leadership and leading over the past 25+ years has shown me more that what we need are people who can coordinate the work of other people either together in teams, groups or individually or in pairs whether long - range or short - range.

Leaders are nice.

It is nice to have a hero or heroine to relish, to follow, to believe in.

Please take 2 minutes to make a list of leaders you truly have followed, relished and believed who you directly worked with. Please do not include giants who you only read about in newspapers, magazines, hear about on television or read about in organization publications.

In most cases we don't have many to list.

Independent people (most Americans and many other people in other countries) hate to be MANAGED, they want their freedom. They will follow, at least in principle, leaders they believe in. Unfortunately the length of time that independent people believe in leaders is generally very short.

Too many cultures on this earth talk about how this leader or that leader saved their company, organization, country, state, city, town, church, synagoge.

My questions...

1. Was it the leader actually?
2. Was it what the leader stood for?
3. Was it because the past leader was so bad and the latest was new?
4. Was it that some things actually did change in the organization and allowed the people do actually do their jobs better and more correctly?

Too often leaders that are written about in newspapers, magazines, trade journals, books hold their positions for less than 3 years.

My experiences with over 50,000 supervisors and employees working in many companies, organizations, government agencies, military bases and universities and colleges has shown me that it typically takes 18 months to 3 or more years for new ideas that LEADERS try to get started. Then by the time the ideas, methods, processes, etc. get into practice the leader who promoted them is gone and there is a new leader to try their new ideas, methods, processes, etc.

Look at your job.

Do you need a leader?
a Manager?
a Boss?

or might you prefer to work WITH not FOR a coordinator whose responsibility to coordinate the work of several people.

Leaders are nice in chaos or catastrophe but 8 to 5 daily work seldom needs a leader.

What do you think?

Alan
alan@cre8ng.com
http://www.cre8ng.com

Are you SUPPORTING the SPREAD of Creative Thinking in your Organization?

Every day we can SUPPORT creative thinking in every employee from the front or back door to the executive floor of our organizations whether we are a small consulting firm or a giant manufacturing firm with offices and locations around the world.

The question today for you is....

ARE YOU SUPPORTING CREATIVE THINKING?

Hopefully you are.

HOW ARE YOUR SUPPORTING CREATIVE THINKING?

Are you sharing feedback, saying supportive things to people in the hallways, in meetings, in their work spaces?

Are you sending out messages that show your ongoing support?

Are you refraining from using KILLER PHRASES or as I call them TOMBSTONES of CREATIVITY...

it won't work
it won't fit the budget
the top won't accept it
it's too far out

Are you instead sharing supportive feedback...

looks interesting
keep working on it and let me know your progress
fit some time in with your other work and keep working at it
it seems far out yet may very well have great potential keep working on it

Your facial expressions
your body language
tone of voice
tone of your emails
ongoing encouraging comments

All these can play important parts in your ongoing efforts to truly SUPPORT CREATIVE THINKING in your organization from top down and back up again.

What else are you doing that SUPPORTS CREATIVE THINKING?

Please share your ideas, anecdotes, stories, examples.

Alan
http://www.cre8ng.com

alan@cre8ng.com