‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
1
The Death of Leadership A Personal Report...
38 downloads
1050 Views
2MB Size
Report
This content was uploaded by our users and we assume good faith they have the permission to share this book. If you own the copyright to this book and it is wrongfully on our website, we offer a simple DMCA procedure to remove your content from our site. Start by pressing the button below!
Report copyright / DMCA form
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
1
The Death of Leadership A Personal Report by Steven Sonsino
“A Leader was just a Manager who did the Right Things. But what if there are just too many ‘Right Things’ to do? And what if there’s no real help from above or below? Now throw in an army of people trying to block every move. Is it any wonder your leadership is dying?” Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore ‘The Death of Leadership’
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
2
THINKING ALOUD A SPECIAL NOTE FROM STEVEN SONSINO “I am sorry if the title of this report offends you. To tell you the truth, it offends me, too. However, in the last few weeks I’ve had my leadership world turned upside down – and speaking personally I’ve found myself in a place where I haven’t been for many years. “So we’ve decided it is time to shake up our readers as well by writing in a fairly blunt and directive way. We’re thinking aloud here. “But although ‘The Death of Leadership’ is written in a very personal and informal style don’t mistake how significant this could be for you. This is IMPORTANT material. “That being said, please share this with your friends and colleagues. We want them to get the message too. Thanks.” With best wishes Steven Sonsino
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
3
Contents An Open Letter: Welcome to ‘The Death of Leadership’
5
1) Introduction: Your Leadership Pain
7
2) What is ‘The Death of Leadership’? (And why should you care?)
18
The threats to your leadership success The dangers of being overwhelmed by your ‘To Do’ list The frustrations of managing your boss and your people The Death of Leadership is inevitable, unless … 3) The forgotten task: overcoming resistance
33
Resistance from the team you lead Resistance from other managers and staff Resistance from above The most dangerous resistance of all 4) Critical leadership tactics: building support
44
Building support among those you lead Crafting support among your peers Winning support at boardlevel Keeping the faith with yourself – building momentum
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
5) What Now? Reinventing your Personal Leadership Strategy
4
48
“Am I a good leader?” “How can I do it all alone when the chips are down?” “How can I challenge the status quo, turn the supertanker and not be seen as a troublemaker?” “How can I be the leader I want to be when everything is so short term?” 6) Action Steps: What Comes After ‘The Death of Leadership’?
55
Is ‘The Death of Leadership’ on target? What next for you?
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
5
Welcome to ‘The Death of Leadership’ An Open Letter from Steven Sonsino
Dear Reader The report that you hold in your hands, ‘The Death of Leadership’, is a snapshot of what it’s like to be a leader today. We compiled it after 24 months of research and testing, with many of today’s senior managers and leaders around the world. Not with celebrity CEOs, journalists or TV pundits, but with real managers like you. As well as formal and informal interviews, we’ve conducted short but telling surveys that reveal the true concerns of senior executives around the world. And this has been truly thought provoking. (We’ll explain why later in the report.) Until now, we’ve kept a close hold on this material and only made it available to those managers who have personally attended our business school seminars and open workshops. We’re not telling you this to brag – if you know us, you know that’s not our style. But you need to know that senior managers at well known companies in London, Hong Kong, Atlanta and Dubai have paid thousands of pounds to attend workshops and programmes where we’ve gladly shared our practical tactics and strategies of leadership. Now we’re making our ideas and material freely available on the internet to you. And for your colleagues and friends. They deserve to hear this message, too. We strongly suggest that you print this report out right now, set 30 minutes aside and read it immediately. Don’t get distracted by your
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
6
inbox, your Blackberry or some other timestealer. (In fact, that’s one of the main points of this report.) We recommend you pay particular attention to the special chart on the cover and the other one on page 51. Frankly, we urge you to print the charts out and tape it to the wall near your PC. (There are printable, full page versions of the charts right at the end of the report for you to print out.) Why should you print them out? Well, there’s an important idea buried in the charts and many managers could make themselves and their companies a small fortune once you grasp the concepts here and turn them into a reality. By the way, when you’ve read this report please tell us what you think. Are we on target in our assessment? Have we missed anything out? This report is to help us make sure we don’t miss out anything you need from us in the future. So please go to DeathofLeadership.com when you’ve read this report. Tell us what you think. We love to hear from you. Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore London, England July 2008
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
7
The Death of Leadership A Personal Report by Steven Sonsino 1) Introduction: Your Leadership Pain “Your back’s to the wall…” “You’re cornered – and you’re in danger” “You even feel that the wellbeing of your family is in on the line…”
Wow, these are shocking images, aren’t they? And if you know me well (through our books or newsletters, or maybe we met at a seminar), this might not be what you’d expect from us. Jacqueline and I are quintessentially “nice” people. We talk about building relationships. We always emphasise treating people well. But there is a disease out there and it’s killing leadership. And as leadership speakers and coaches with your interests at heart, we’re a little upset about that. We are talking about a business killer that is also a careerkiller, frankly. It’s an idea that once took us, as a couple, to the brink of disaster – not to mention the unbelieveable strain it put on our marriage and our family. So believe me when I tell you we have first hand experience of everything in this report. Before I tell you what this disease is, or how we found a cure that restored not only our business future, but our dignity as well, I’d like to tell you what brought these memories back for us.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
8
You see, we’ve had our leadership world rocked in the last few weeks On Thursday May 1 st , at 4.37pm GMT, we sent out a short email to our contacts and colleagues. In that email we asked you to send us your top two questions about leadership. Well, I had no idea what we had set in motion. This is what happened. I sat stunned, refreshing the page again and again, every time surprised to see brand new posts flying in. In fact in less than an hour there were already 32 replies. And these weren’t one or two liners. I am talking about people dropping what they were doing to send us 32 thoughtful, exciting and even heart wrenching questions. In one hour. Less than three days later there were 227 responses piled up. Sitting here writing this now there are 517 responses and they are STILL coming in. Your responses are overwhelming… incredible.
Humbling Yes, we are humbled by the responses. Your replies aren’t one or two sentences… they are a huge outpouring of wants, needs, desires, hopes and, to be honest, disappointments. Lots of pure, raw emotion, fear, anger, joy, excitement … and, if we can say this without getting too dramatic, even love. As we read the entries, at first we were overwhelmed by all the emotion and energy that you put into your questions. We found ourselves surfing on a wave of emotions. We went from excitement, to fear, to passion, to frustration – it went on and on.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
9
“How do you turn an office of bickering, fingerpointing people into a productive team that works together?” “How do you get those ABOVE you in the chain of command to buy in to your leadership?” “How do you know if you are a good leader when absolutely everyone is against you?”
And this comment, too. “Leadership is dead.”
And then I started to get ANGRY Now, let’s be clear… I am NOT angry at the people who sent in questions. No. We salute their spirit, desire, zeal, energy and their hard work. No, I got angry at the folks who are standing in the way. Not because conflict is a problem. Conflict in a management team can be very healthy. But I am very angry at the people that discourage you every step of the way for selfish reasons of their own. The people who don’t value teamwork, when everyone knows it’s the best way to deliver productivity. The people who don’t respect other people, when everyone knows that’s the best way to increase performance. The people who are out for their own benefit, when everyone knows they should be focused on the benefit to their team or the benefit to the business as a whole.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
10
If your days are filled with politics and pettiness, and if you’re worried about how every move you make looks, rather than doing what you want to do for the business, then I sympathise. I’ve been there, too. If you’ve had a job like this, then you may know exactly how this feels – to be stuck in a place where you feel like you’re moving in one direction and the entire world is going the other way.
I have had to learn to lead like I was cornered and the only way to come out is with both guns blazing I don’t want to be condescending here. I know you’re intelligent. I know you work long hours. I know you work hard. I can see it in the workplaces I visit and you tell us in the surveys we conduct. And maybe you’re one of the few who already have leadership completely figured out. But the odds are – if you feel frustrated by the daytoday nitty gritty of life in the real world, if you’re blocked at every stage by cynics and skeptics, if you’re overwhelmed by just how much there is to do – then for you leadership may be dead.
You may think ‘Why bother?’ I can understand it if you’re thinking of throwing in the towel. What is the point of aspiring to be the best leader you can be, when all around you people drag everything down into the mud? Frankly, it’s no wonder that so many promising leadership careers get blown out of the water. When there is so much cynicism in the workplace. So many naysayers. So much fingerpointing and blame. Well, let’s remind ourselves that it’s easy to be cynical. Yes, your colleagues may carp, criticise and chip away at your leadership. But you know better. You know that the collaborative, constructive approach to leadership will win in the end.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
11
The question is … when? And you may well be wondering how can you, just one person, turn things round?
The Wrong Leadership Challenge After researching and writing ‘The Seven Failings of Really Useless Leaders’, which you helped take to number 2 on Amazon’s business bestseller list, I was hoping with our next project to talk about leading like it really matters. With Jacqueline I wanted to help you to create the leadership future you really want. Leadership in your business life and in your personal life. And I wanted to help you grasp that future with both hands and not let go. What I wanted to work on with you is taking your leadership, your future, your ideas… and really treating them like your life depended on it. I wanted to urge you to REALLY GO FOR IT. Strive for the ambition you hold dear that you’ve never told anyone else but yourself. I wanted you not to be afraid to reach out and TOUCH your people with your ideas about leadership … like THEIR life depended on it. But, now, when it comes down to it, I’m not sure if everyone is ready yet for that particular leadership challenge. Because the leadership challenge you currently face is not what we thought it was. Frankly, you’re facing too much resistance from every quarter. There’s another important factor, too. And here it is…
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
12
The Challenge of Leadership Utopia We have been to hundreds of leadership seminars, workshops and conferences in the past 10 years. And every one of the speakers and consultants has their own idea about how leadership should work. Sadly, and with due respect for some great thinkers, most of them have got it completely wrong. The first thing we need you to understand is that everyone in the business world seems to be looking for this place called ‘Leadership Utopia’. To reach Leadership Utopia, your objectives in business must be these: · to be an inspirational leader like Gandhi or Mother Theresa · to create the perfect business team · and to put brilliant business processes in place All this will, of course, magically: · minimise your costs · and maximise your profits. But our problem lies in the fact that Leadership Utopia doesn’t exist. It’s an illusion. A mirage. It’s fiction. Let’s face the facts and tell it like it really is. Are you ready for this?
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
13
Leadership Utopia: telling it like it is
è Point 1: Setting out to copy Gandhi or Jack Welch or Anita Roddick of Mother Teresa is not going to help you. Inspirational though these folks are, their larger than life stories will not help you manage your day to day reality. è Point 2: You’re NEVER going to have a 100% supportive team in place. Get used to this idea. è Point 3: your business processes are going to be OK on the whole, but they are going to be shaky from time to time. Sometimes they will even collapse under you. You know this in your heart, but have you accepted it? è Point 4: Your costs are going to be all over the place, but overall they are going to increase, especially what used to be commodities like energy and raw materials. In some parts of the world cost increases will even accelerate. è Point 5: Your profits WILL fall. Isn’t this inevitable? Especially if you compete on price alone. Your margins WILL be compressed. And if they aren’t now they will be very soon. And they could soon shrink to almost nothing. What then?
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
14
The natural result? Your team or business will be sold off, stripped down, or just plain closed. You may lose your job. BUT… Does the risk of business failure mean you should stop trying to improve your leadership style and your leadership skills? Does it mean you should stop trying to be a better leader? Should you just stand up and shoult at people till they do what you want them to do? Should you just be a dictator to get things done? No! This is not what it means.
But before you can reinvent your leadership, you’ve got to be hugely realistic What the reality of the daytoday world means is this. Before you do anything else, before you can reinvent your leadership and be as hugely successful as you know is possible, you’ve got to be realistic. You’ve got to realise that you’re NEVER going to achieve 100% leadership success with your people or your processes. And you’re NEVER going to have the perfect team in place. Or as soon as you do someone will leave. (Have you realised yet that finding and building a great team is a full time job.) What’s more, you will NEVER have the optimal processes you need in place to do business, to deliver profits above and beyond expectations. Never.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
15
And there’s a larger problem in all of this. Many people have been told to believe – either by their boss or by some business consultant – that if anyone disagrees with you and doesn’t do what you want, that they’re a stick on the mud. That maybe you should get rid of them. Maybe you have been told that getting 15% or 20% of your people ‘on side’ is the best you’re ever going to do. Meaning that you should stop there because you are never going to achieve any better. But that’s not true. We’ve seen people who have maybe half their team, sometimes more than half their team, rooting for them. Crawling over broken glass for them. And it’s nothing to do with dictatorship that’s for sure. When it happens it can be incredible and it can lead to huge performance and profitability gains. Isn’t that worth fighting for?
The price of bad leadership advice Perhaps the worst aspect of the picture I’ve just painted is that people have been getting bad advice from people who should know better. I don’t want to bite the hand that feeds us, but this problem can be laid firmly at the door of the speakers at leadership conferences, professors in business schools and the management consultants who say to managers things like this:
‘All you have to do is inspire your people!’ ‘Set a compelling vision!’ ‘Be like Gandhi or Mother Teresa!’
This is useless advice.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
16
This sets such an outrageous aspiration level for the rest of us. We are ordinary men and women. But with superheroes as a standard, our failure is guaranteed even before we set out on the journey. Somebody said this to us at one seminar ‘How can I be like Gandhi or Mother Theresa? I’m a mere mortal.’ So remember this: the advice to ‘be an inspirational leader’, even from the most worthy of sources, can have exactly the opposite effect from what the gurus intend. Don’t get us wrong. Business schools and leadership speakers MUST set high aspirations. They have to give us something to work towards. But they shouldn’t just IGNORE the practical tools that managers need for the issues they have to deal with day after day.
The Emperor’s New Clothes? Frankly, I’m very worried. I’m worried because we seem to be prepared to say what no one else is saying. Are you ready to hear what we’re prepared to say? Let’s talk for a moment about the consultants and the training companies who focus exclusively on ‘strengths’ and ‘feeling good’. Does it seem to you that everyone is a good leader? Because that’s what some people seem to be saying. All the case studies you read and all the books written by white elderly male CEOs seem to say that all CEOs, for example, are great leaders. You can see why business schools and the big consultancies would say that, can’t you? It’s in their interests, after all, to build up the reputations (and egos) of the senior executives who fund them. But we simply don’t think it’s possible that every CEO knows exactly in advance how every strategy will turn out. Implementation can’t be flawless. Can it? Surely there are ALWAYS problems with staff, or the unions, or the shortage of resources? Does anyone else think the story in the old white CEO books is a bit unreal?
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
17
So… let’s talk about the dirty reality of daily leadership life. Not some CEO fiction. Let’s talk about what everyone is REALLY grappling with. You see, a leader is just a manager who does the Right Things.But what if there are too many ‘Right Things’ to do? And what if there’s no help from above or below? Now throw in an army of people being obstructive and blocking your every move. Is it any wonder your leadership is dying? So let’s talk about why leadership is dying.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
18
2) What is ‘The Death of Leadership’? (And why should you care?) Starting with this report and in the free training videos we’re posting on The Death of Leadership website we’re going to share with you the practical leadership processes we’ve discovered from our real world research in business over the last 10 years. We know this training material will make you increasingly successful on a day to day basis, and with the challenges you face in the real world of work. (We know because we’ve been sharing these ideas with managers for ten years. So we’ve got proof that they work.) Now this material is going to be very important to you because you’re telling us that there are some very real threats to your leadership success. How do we know you’re leadership is facing these threats? Well, because you told us. Last year we issued a short survey to the folks who had attended our seminars and to the subscribers on our mailing list. At random we issued the survey to half the people on our complete mailing list of clients and subscribers. We issued an electronic survey to 533 managers in total and received 102 replies – a response rate of 19.1%. And to make sure we were on the right track we issued the survey again this year – again to half the clients and subscribers of our seminars and newsletters. This time we sent the survey to 740 managers in total and received 154 replies – a response rate of 20.8% And the overwhelming conclusion we reach from the questions and challenges you sent us is that you really aspire to become better leaders. Which is great. But that’s not your MAIN concern. Your main concern is…
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
19
You’re obsessed with progress in the real world Your main concern – and it’s an obsession frankly – is with the challenges and realworld problems facing you every day. You do NOT want any blue sky inspirational material. You don’t want articles of a general nature on Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Mother Theresa, Anita Roddick. Well, we’re not sure that this is strictly true. Material like that is always valuable to read and review. And you can get that material almost anywhere. Some of it better – some of it worse. No, what you are looking for is compelling material that will help you in a practical and tangible way. So we want to give you that practical help, focused on your real, day today leadership challenges. And to get right to it, your real, daytoday concerns are these. 1) You’re overwhelmed with hundreds of things to do. Yes, you’re overwhelmed with hundreds, if not thousands of things to do. Now, some of these things are valuable and strategic, urgent and important. But some of them are just sheer petty bureacracy driven by the CYA (or ‘cover your assets’) mindset of some of the people, in some parts of
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore 20
your business.
2) You’re frustrated and blocked in what you want to achieve. Have you noticed that some of the people above, you and many of your colleagues, supposedly on the same side as you, are giving you less or no support? Have you found that some of the very people you’re trying to lead are also blocking your every move? Crazy, isn’t it? But it’s true. Many of you are telling me that fewer and fewer of your people are making the right effort today to get the business tasks done that need to be done. Some of them appear to you to be making no effort at all. Some of you think that perhaps your people are confused by mixed priorities. The things they are doing appear to them to be the important things. But you know they’re wrong. And whenever they do what appears to you to be wrong it frustrates you terribly. If this sounds like you then it’s no surprise you’re anxious. We’ve been overloaded and frustrated, too. We know what you’re dealing with. And what’s the result of all this overload and frustration?
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
21
Overwhelmed + Frustrated = Helpless
Yes, even though there are major things to do, major challenges to overcome, it’s inevitable that some managers feel helpless. It may not be something you are personally experiencing right now. It may just be the people around you. Maybe they feel helpless. But this is still a major problem for you as a business leader. Because helpless means inactive. Not taking action. And this is when the worst happens for a leader. This is when leadership dies.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
22
When leadership dies Leadership dies when the leaders of a business don’t have the energy or strength to hear the things that need to be heard. To see the things that need to be seen. Or to say the things that need to be said. The Death of Leadership kills courage and creates three wise monkeys.
. The Death of Leadership comes in that moment you feel there is no point standing up to be counted. No point challenging the status quo because there’s just too much to turn round. With this much overload and this much frustration isn’t the death of your leadership inevitable? Let’s talk.
Let’s take stock for a minute – can we talk? Let’s take stock for a moment. We’re going to be straight and honest with you here.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
23
As a leader, you may be overwhelmed with things to do OR you may be blocked and frustrated in what you want to achieve. And either one of these is bad enough. But together the combination is a killer. If you’re overwhelmed and frustrated as a leader, the chances are you’re feeling drained of energy. Your physical, emotional and spiritual resources are at an alltime low. And it’s no wonder that – to be honest – things are not getting done as quickly as you’d like, or to the standard you’d like to expect. But it’s not as if there is any one big thing that you can point to and say ‘That’s it, that’s what’s causing this problem.’ It’s more like a case of ‘the 400 blows’. There is a deluge of events or projects or challenges raining down on you, drowning you. To be honest, the situation isn’t helped by the extremely senior executives in your business. They’re issuing too many targets and goals, too many KPIs, frankly. And it’s not helping anyone.
“A little hard work never hurt anybody…” And then there is the biggest management myth of all. “All you’ve got to do is work harder!” Have you ever been told this? Or have you ever thought this – that you should just work harder? Please don’t. Please don’t beat yourself up.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
24
This is the slippery slope to mental and physical burnout. Working more of your day. Working longer hours. This is NOT THE ANSWER. Don’t burn the candle at both ends. Don’t try to do more yourself. This is not leadership. It’s stupidity. We know that CEOs have stripped many middle managers out of business today. We know that you’re struggling with fewer resources and fewer people. But doing everything yourself is NOT the answer. So why do so many leaders try to do exactly this? Is this how life looks from where you’re standing?
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
25
This is a picture we found in a course for selfemployed entrepreneurs, but it applies equally well to us as leaders and managers in the business world. Does this look like your team or business? If it does, then for you the Death of Leadership may be inevitable. Unless…
The Death of Leadership is inevitable, unless … We know this is harsh. But the two blockbuster challenges of overload and frustration combined are why you need to lead your people like your back is against the wall. Once again, let’s keep it really simple and let’s tell it like it is. You have got to move away from believing that your leadership success depends on the number of hours you work. That’s all.
More Time Working == / More Success
More time working, does NOT mean more success. When you first become a leader maybe there is an argument for spending a few more hours to get some systems in place and to learn the ropes. But now you know the business, now you know the people involved, now it’s time to get everyone focused on the real challenge of business. .
So what needs to happen now? Right now you need to lead differently from other people. Maybe this next idea doesn’t apply to you, but most people are walking around in a
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
26
daze, just hoping their team of people will somehow magically start working together and kill the competition. IT ISN’T GOING TO HAPPEN. That’s why we’re trying to shake you by the throat here. Look around you… there are a lot of leaders pretending to have success. But the truth is they aren’t there yet. Now if you’re not firing on all cylinders yet, that’s OK… there’s no shame in still being ‘on your way’. But you aren’t ‘on your way’ if you keep on doing the same old thing. If you think that your leadership is going to magically take off… If you think that the next project you tackle is going to turn things round for you... we’ve got news for you. It isn’t and it won’t. So… are you tired of feeling overwhelmed, blocked and frustrated? Isn’t it time to do something different? It’s time to think about your back being against the wall.
No More Mr Nice Guy People think that I am a ‘nice person’. (Too nice, some say.) I’m mild mannered. It’s hard to get me mad. I say ‘thank you’ to people. I treat waiters and porters nicely. (I’ve been one, I know how hard it can be.) And I always hold the door open for people.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
27
But let’s just say this: I am deadly serious about leadership training. And behind the ‘nice’ personality I am extremely INTENSE about this. When I give you a leadership strategy to try, I want you to consider it like a chess game. A trial of wills. Your strategy against the socalled unmanageable employee. Or your tactics against the unmovable boss. Now, please consider this. It isn’t a real fight. And it isn’t that you’re trying to manipulate other people. In fact if you ARE trying to manipulate the people in your team or if you get a kick out of beating them up, STOP READING NOW. This report and our best advice is NOT for you. (That’s a ‘Leadershark’ attitude!)
What will happen when you try to lead differently? When you use these tactics we’re about to share with you in the coming weeks, you will change the way YOU behave, and you will come to change the way you think about leading. In addition, you will come to change your opinions about the people working with you. Why? Because they will start performing out of their skin for you. Because you told them to? No. Because they want to. So when we describe leadership like a chess game, don’t make the mistake of thinking these tactics and strategies are a kind of leadership ju jitsu designed to force your opponent into submission.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore 28
We just want you to know that we’re serious about sharing our strategies with you and that you should develop your leadership as seriously as a chess player develops his or her skills and strategies. Sure, we’re trying to educate managers to the better, nicer aspects of leadership with our leadership books and articles. Yes, we’re trying to do the best for our clients. But this is the deal. We’ve decided that when it comes to leadership training and development… when it comes to promoting our tactics and strategies to you, then it is sink or swim. It is a battle, a force of wills. And it’s you we’re trying to win over! Some of our business school clients don’t like how aggressively we are getting our message out to the marketplace. But I don’t play this game to lose. And if I’ve read you right, neither do you. You see, I want you to fight like your back’s against the wall. I want you to be there with us. I want to show you how to fight for your leadership, your team and your business. I want you to fight like your life depends on it. Your business life, at least. (But perhaps your personal life too. The personal life you dream about for yourself and your family.)
An aside… don’t take our word for it Some of you, certainly, will be thinking that this sounds like a lot of hot air and hype. And it could be… if it weren’t for the fact that Jacqueline and I have been living and breathing leadership strategy very
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
29
successfully for 10 years now, and with clients and companies at the highest level. But instead of US talking about how great we are, which isn’t very British, you should read what our colleagues and clients say about us. This short section is an aside and you certainly don’t need to read it. But it will give you an insight into our style and where we are coming from. But before we show you this material let us just say one thing… If you pull the Steven Sonsino and Jacqueline Moore ‘Encyclopaedia of Leadership Strategy’ down from the shelf and look up the word ‘Master’, you’ll see a picture of one man – Jay Conger. Many people know Jay Conger as the guy who Business Week ranks as the world’s leading leadership professor. For us he is a superhero. His work on leadership, persuasion and storytelling is simple, brilliant and it has always been an inspiration to us. Jay is a quiet spoken American and he teaches a lot of the time in California. But he also works at London Business School where I’m a Fellow in the Centre for Management Development. And that’s where I first met him. Well, let me tell you this about Jay… he is a humble and modest man. He will listen to anyone who has a problem and he’ll coach and counsel anyone, at any level in the organization. And he never talks down to you.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore 30
He makes you feel for the moment you spend with him, that you are the most important person in the world. It’s his gift. Well, when we were finishing our last book ‘Leadership Unplugged’ I wanted to check a couple of things with him. Was what we were saying really new? And did he think managers would find it valuable? I sat down in Jay’s office and asked for his thoughts. I explained about setting leadership strategy through uncomfortable conversations and I suggested how our ideas could really help people to become profoundly better as leaders. Jay thought about what I said, but he didn’t answer immediately. He quietly pulled a huge leadership reference book off the shelf, by his friend Gary Yukl. He read a couple of paragraphs, checked the index and the references, and then he said … ‘Yes, you’ve really got something there. I don’t see this material anywhere else.’ I almost punched the air. That approval meant so much to us. And the long and the short of it is that Jay agreed to write the Foreword to OUR book. Now this may seem a small story to you, but this is a big deal to us. To get a Foreword from one of the folks who inspired us, and who just happens to be the world’s leading leadership professor is amazing. Anyhow, this is part of what Jay wrote in his Foreword for ‘Leadership Unplugged’…
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
31
“In Leadership Unplugged, Jacqueline Moore and Steven Sonsino have dedicated themselves to exploring how and why conversations are a foundation of great leadership. They zero in on leadership communications through two way conversations and their direct impact on organizational strategy. And they emphasize the importance of uncomfortable conversations. “What is particularly refreshing about Leadership Unplugged is its detailed exploration of the language of leadership through the eyes of a new writing team. They are a husband and wife who were originally involved in training journalists before moving into the field of management and leadership development. Jacqueline is a Financial Times journalist and Steven is a researcher and tutor at London Business School. It is a winning combination for a book on this topic.” Jay Conger, Professor, London Business School
Now that was incredibly gracious of Jay to write … in his position in the world’s spotlight he can take the time to deflect some of that spotlight towards us. This is all we have to say… “Jay, you are pure gold. Thank you.” To be honest, we hesitated about including Jay’s comments here. We worried that you might think our material will only work in the academic or business school world. Nothing could be further from the truth, as these other comments from industries including retailing, banking and publishing show.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
32
Steven allows you to think, its a rare opportunity to stop fire fighting and look at the longer term on how one can become not just a good leader but a great leader. Stevens key note speech at the Leadership Forum in Abu Dhabi opened my eyes to focusing on the important and urgent for the longer term. The Seven Failings of Really Useless Leaders is a real opportunity to take some practical steps in becoming a great leader. Kazal Ahmed, Paris Gallery, Dubai, UAE
Working with Steven was one of my outstanding experiences of what teaching could be. Never boring, ever amazing and virtuous in explaining the rationale behind leadership strategy. Steven is the living proof for the powerfull combination of knowledge and humour to succeed and convince. Frank Benze, Deutsche Bank, Bonn, Germany
"The Seven Failings of Really Useless Leaders" did more for my leadership skills than any book exhorting a 'do it like a famous name' approach. It allowed me to be the leader I want to be and not pretend to be somebody else. Ian Angles, Scotland
Steven is an inspiring speaker his energy and enthusiasm for his subject left me wanting to hear (and read) more. He gets his message across in a clear but humourous way I'd recommend him as a speaker and an author to anyone interested in the subject of managing. Janet Mollison, Which? Magazine (Consumers Association)
We hope this convinces you that we mean what we say. We CAN help you to take your leadership to the next level – and the starting point is how to overcome the resistance you’re experiencing. And that’s exactly what we’re going to deal with in the next chapter.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
33
3) The forgotten task: overcoming resistance Before you go storming ahead, enthusiastic for what you’re trying to do, there is a critical step that most leaders miss. Most leaders go straight into announcing what they want to do and how they’re going to go about it. This is a mistake. When you’re planning any new project – from a change programme to a product launch – unless you find out what resistance you face and unless you neutralise it first, 9 times out of 10 your project will not meet its objectives And many projects will fail completely. We know from research studies that more than 90% of all change projects fail. So this is not a myth. What is always a surprise, though, is the fact is that many leaders don’t have a clue why their projects fail. Not the real reason, anyway.
Resistance can sometimes be invisible Has this ever happened to you? You’ve run a project that hasn’t quite come off – or not the way you intended – and you don’t really know why? I guarantee that somewhere along the line you had resistance. But maybe it was invisible to you. So what do you have to do before you get going on a project? You must first assess and then overcome the resistance you’re experiencing BEFORE you can launch any new initiative. Let’s sketch out here the challenges you face, according to our research surveys.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
34
Resistance from your own team It seems hard to believe, but often you face resistance from the very team you’re trying to lead. Incredible isn’t it? You’re on the same side after all. So let’s go to some of the questions you asked in our research. And we want you to pay particular attention to the questions here. We want you to tell us: are these questions relevant for you? Why do we want you to tell us this? Well, we want you to help us identify the exact resistance that you face so we can prepare training material to help you overcome the challenge. Here’s the first question.
What are the main signs of resistance and how can we detect them at an early stage?
Many managers like you are struggling to overcome resistance. And there are many, many symptoms of resistance. Here are just a few of the signs: · Open cynicism and skepticism are the norm · Meetings that go nowhere · Extensive backbiting and gossip · Regular fingerpointing, blame and witch hunts · Little or reduced eye contact at crucial moments in the conversation Of course these are just SOME of the things you might experience. There are many more that we just don’t have the space for right now.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
35
The awful thing is that in many cases these symptoms of resistance are: 1) illogical 2) and they’re often often extremely childish. And this is exactly the point of another question we received.
How do you overcome purely illogical human resistance to change?
One of your biggest challenges is that in many cases of resistance from your people, logic has nothing to do with it. And so an important part of our coaching is to help you appreciate this fact fully. Because you can’t expect pure logic to help you all the time. In fact, we put a huge emphasis on recognising the emotional aspects of leadership – the feelings your people and you experience as you go about your daily lives. Because it is almost always the feelings your people have that guides how they act. And if they’re resisting what you want to implement, it’s because of something they’re feeling that you don’t know or understand… yet. Let’s look at a few examples of where feelings can undermine logical action.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
36
Take a minute now to run through these 10 questions.
Tick the box for any question you answer ‘yes’
þ
Did anyone on the team apply for the job that you now hold?
£
Has anyone on the team been in the company longer than you?
£
Is anyone on the team more than 10 years older than you?
£
Does anyone have ‘more appropriate’ qualifications than you?
£
Is anyone on the team related to a board member?
£
Is there a ‘professional cynic’ in the team?
£
Does anyone make a big thing of playing ‘devil’s advocate’?
£
Does someone always point out problems – ‘just to be helpful’?
£
Is there someone who never says anything in important meetings?
£
Does anyone on the team openly say “It’ll never work”?
£
Now, how many did you tick? Just 1? 3 or more? All 10? I hope the point is well made – that there are many, many reasons why some of the people on your team may harbour a grudge against you. It may not even be conscious or deliberate. But it’s there. Maybe you ticked none of these. In which case we’ll help you to dig a bit deeper when we get into the coaching programme. But there will always be reasons behind the resistance you face. Now, some of the reasons can be tricky to uncover and deal with. Like these two here.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
37
How do you deal with people that 'nod their head' to change but when it comes to it they actually resist the change? How can you quickly identify the people who are opposed to change, even though they may show willing to a lesser or greater extent?
This is trickier to deal with, isn’t it, because on the face of it these people are paying lipservice to what you want to achieve. Now it may be that you get public support from some people, but privately they’re cynical. (Does anyone ever say to you thing like ‘With respect…’? Which means, of course, with NO respect.) Now what do you do with the people who constant oppose change? Do you remove them as quickly as possible, or should you try to get them on board? Well, you’ve got to deal with them. You must. Or you run the risk of being branded ‘weak’ by other members of your team. Or – worse – being branded weak by your boss.
IS this important to you? Please comment on the blog The question is how to deal with this resistance effectively. And we’ll get into the detail of that very soon. But for now we want you to tell us – are these things you have to deal with? Is this something we should address for you in our coaching programmes and videos? If we can get enough feedback that these matter to you then we can deal with them. So please comment on the blog if this is critical to you.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore 38
Resistance from your colleagues and peers Then there is resistance from other managers and colleagues. Here are a few of the questions you sent in.
How do you overcome resistance and gain support from individuals with an agenda of 'personal' promotion? How do you handle a work environment where the effective leadership practices you apply are challenged or questioned by peers and seniors? How to influence people outside of your sphere of control? How to deal with unsupportive linemanagers? (Your own and those outside your area)
And these are a challenge aren’t they. Where the people you want to influence are trying to do the best for themselves, politically, or they’re just not helping and you don’t know why. Then there is the situation where you are being kept back, for reasons you may not be aware of. Is this something you struggle with? Please tell us on the blog.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
39
Resistance from above Perhaps the most difficult issue to deal with, but we need your feedback on this, is resistance from above. Here are some of the many questions we received on this subject.
How do you facilitate positive, forwardmoving change when resistance occurs at the highest level of the company? How do you deal with cynicism from senior execs? How do you obtain senior management commitment to delegate authority to make operational decisions in periods of difficult trading (ie when they feel personally threatened by the business performance)? How do you get those ABOVE you on the chain of command to buy in to your leadership?
The question of cynicism seems to be widespread and it is an effective tactic for stopping people from acting isn’t it? So how do you deal with that when it comes from the boss? Perhaps even more important are the strategies you need to be able to get the people above you to respect you. Because with respect in place you can probably take more of the actions you think necessary. So winning respect and building your leadership reputation will be something we will focus on. The toughest situation you have to deal with appears to be when senior executives feel personally threatened by the situation. When they take a personal interest in what you’re doing, instead of letting go, you are really blocked. So how do you get senior executives to let go?
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore 40
Clearly all of these are really about getting the boss to really trust you. So how do you get the boss – or anyone, frankly – to trust you? This is something we’ve been looking at for some time and if you know the Seven Failings of Really Useless Leaders then you’ve already got a head start here. The Seventh and worst Failing of Really Useless Leaders is that they kill trust. But although resistance from above can be difficult, there is one place that – if resistance occurs – it can be catastrophic. Let’s look at that right now.
The most dangerous resistance of all Here’s possibly the most important question you sent in.
How do you overcome your internal resistance? How do you take the right calls and see the real (scary) picture? How do you let go of the emotional attachment to the business you have created, the employee you hired etc?
Yes, it’s the resistance inside you – the resistance to accepting any change in what you do or the way you work. So before we get any further, it’s worth exploring this. But let’s rephrase it slightly. Why do leaders NOT have success? Why do people NOT do everything that they should be doing to lead well? Let’s put it another way again: exactly what is killing leadership? a) Some people don’t know what leadership is Well, the first reason is, they don’t know what leadership is… in other words, they don’t know what they should be doing.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
41
And this is a valid excuse. If you don’t know what to do how can you do it? Of course. It makes perfect sense. So we’re going to show you what we know leadership is, but not from a theoretical point of view. Instead we’re going to show you what to do in a very real, practical and tangible sense. We hope the stepbystep videos will do a good job of finishing up on that, but we’ll put all of the steps into a full coaching programme for you, too. In a sense, what we’re sketching out here is a practical agenda for your personal leadership strategy. b) Some people don’t have the leadership skill The second reason leadership is dead, the second reason people don’t do what they should, is that they don’t have the leadership skill. And of course you’ve got to have the right skills. But remember ‘be inspirational’ is not a leadership skill. It may be a worthwhile leadership aspiration or goal. But it doesn’t help you get things done. You’ve got to get the right leadership skills. So we’re going to share with you what we see as the essential, high level leadership skills you should be practising and then putting into action. c) Some people don’t have the time to lead The third reason leadership is dead, is that people don’t have the time to lead. They’re too busy doing their ‘real job’ to lead. If we can be blunt for a second, this is one of the most ridiculous answers we’ve ever heard. What? There are some people who don’t have the time to make their team or business more successful? They don’t have the time to make more money? For their businesses, themselves and their families?
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
42
But we know that being a great leader delivers higher performance, higher productivity and higher profitability than just telling people what to do. There have been decades of research that show this in study after study. It’s just that until now no one’s been very good at is translating that academic knowledge into practical tactics and strategies. So that’s what we’re going to do in our upcoming videos and coaching programmes. Very specifically. And in great detail. We want to show you how to take your leadership to the next level. There is another reason leadership is dying. And the reason is this. d) Some people don’t think they can do it Some people honestly don’t think they can lead. They are filled with UNCERTAINTY. They don’t think they can do it. Now, many of you have shared with us, honestly, your concerns about whether you really can lead. Some of you don’t think you can lead. Well… maybe that’s true. Maybe you can’t. But we’re betting that maybe you can’t for just one reason: you can’t do it because you think you can’t. You know that old saying: ‘whether you think you can or whether you think you can’t – you’re right’. Meaning: think positive. You CAN do it. ANYONE can do this. But only IF you know the process. You have to know the process first before you can do it.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
43
And once you know the process and the techniques, putting things together in a way that tackles even your largest problems becomes very, very straightforward. Not easy, but straightforward. And so our ultimate goal with the videos on The Death of Leadership website, and with the coaching programme we’re about to launch, is to help you craft an effective and practical personal leadership strategy. Does that sound good to you? We hope so. OK, let’s move on to the second essential aspect of your personal leadership strategy: building support.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
44
4) Critical leadership tactics: building support Once you’ve overcome the resistance that you face, then and only then can you begin to build support for what you want to achieve. And building support among those you lead must take place BEFORE you kickstart almost any of the projects and plans you want to implement. How do we know this is an issue for you? Well, once again, you told us. Here are some of the questions you sent in.
How do I convince people that this is not just another initiative that will go away if they keep their heads down long enough? How do you embed more ownership and responsibility in people when micromanagement is the general model? How do you support staff to take risks when the wider organisation encourages a blame culture?
So once again we can see that you have high ambitions, you aspire to do well by your team, but perhaps you’re not able to build support as quickly as you hoped. An interesting observation Jacqueline made to me is that while some of you are keen to explore leadership when you’re new in the role, some of you are concerned to build support in a team you’ve known for a while. Others still, and maybe you’re one of these people, are keen to understand how you can get even better at crafting support among your peers or with the senior executives in your business.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
45
How do I build personal credibility with my peers? How can I be a leader in a team of leaders? How do you build support up the chain (peers/ senior management)?
These are all tricky political questions and we can share with you some of the tactics and strategies we’ve developed for some of our international clients to help you here. The aim is to help you win support and respect for your leadership, but without being – as one writer said – ‘too slimy’ or ‘sucking up’. What’s good is that quite a few of you are willing to be provocative and challenging. Which is a great leadership characteristic. But you’re concerned about how to do this safely.
How do you get hierarchies to recognise that the top is not always right and needs to accept and encourage being challenged? How do you facilitate positive, forwardmoving change when resistance occurs at the highest level of the company? How does a leader maintain the right balance between being dissatisfied with the status quo and being perceived as too critical or negative about the status quo?
Are these issues that bug you? Do you need support in this area? Please tell us on the blog. Because there are some great strategies that we could help you with here, too, and you’re right to be concerned. This is the place where many leaders come unstuck.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
46
But above all we want you to keep the faith. Trust in yourself and your abilities. If you share some of these questions and concerns – and please tell us if you do – then this proves to us that you have the desire to be a good leader. To be a great leader. All you need to do now is begin to build the momentum that will take your leadership to the next level. And that momentum starts with you. So as we move into the last chapter of this report let me ask you an important question.
Are you a leader? Do you have the will to lead? Do you have the will to lead? Do you have the courage to do what it takes to become an even better leader than you already are? This is not an abstract or fluffy question. It’s real and important. Because leadership means not being a technical professional any longer. And I wonder whether you have fully appreciated that fact yet. I’ll say it again. Leadership is not about your being a technical professional specialist. A question I ask in my seminars and workshops is ‘why do people call you?’ In other words, what do people think you are an expert in? What’s your expertise? What are you known for? Because your present leadership success and your future leadership career do NOT depend on your being known as a specialist. But they DO depend on your being known as a leader. Someone capable of energising a team or division. Capable of turning round a failing department or turbocharging an already successful division.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
47
So ask yourself this: what leadership value do you add? What do you bring to the table? What is the added value that you bring as a leader? There’s a related question that’s almost as important for you to consider here.
Are you prepared to be a visible leader in your organisation? Are you prepared to step up to the mark and to be recognised as the leader you are? Are you prepared to be visible as a leader? Because it’s no good hiding your lights if you want to make a great impact on your people and your business. Now, do you REALLY know appreciate what this means in terms of visibility in the organisation? Do you appreciate how exposed you're going to be and how lonely this is? My guess is that you do. But my worry is that this makes you unsure about taking this next step. Because when some people reach that point, leadership dies. Ambition dies. You’re forced back into your comfort zone. The uncomfortable conversations get shelved or swept under the carpet. But I don’t believe that you, reading this report, really want this. You don't really want to spend the rest of your business career in the zone of comfortable debate. So before we can explore how you can take the next step on the road to leadership success I’ve got to ask you one last question What's stopping you?
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore 48
5) What Now? Reinventing Your Personal Leadership Strategy Poor Leadership Strategy Means You Do All The Work
“Am I a good leader?” “How can I do it all alone when the chips are down?” “How can I challenge the status quo, turn the supertanker and not be seen as a troublemaker?” “How can I be the leader I want to be when everything is so short term?”
OK, we’ve looked at the challenge of being overwhelmed, that many managers have. And we’ve also looked at the huge sense of frustration that you also report. If this sounds like the kind of experience you are having as a leader please go to the blog at deathofleadership.com and tell us. Are we right? Are we wrong? What is your experience of leading today? Are we on the right track? We need to know if you want to see more material answering the questions we’ve posed here. Do you want strategies to help you face the very real challenges that you have. Do you need our support to take your leadership to the next level?
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
49
You see, we’re really not sure how many people are in this position. Our research is only based on responses from 517 managers in 36 countries. So it would be good to get your feedback too. Having said that, let’s set out a few key thoughts that will help you move forward.
You the leader as a strategist for the business In short, we want you to see your role as leader as much more strategic than perhaps you have in the past. We want you to think about the short, medium and the long term. And this means two specific things. It means first that you as leader are a teacher in your business. You have to energise the people around you, excite them to work with you and to work on the task as you see it. And as a teacher you’ve got to help your people to become better skilled and better able to deliver on the strategy. Let’s be clear. Telling people what to do doesn't work. You’ve got to teach people what to do. And this, frankly, is what will allow you to lead through others. Because you should not be doing everything YOURSELF. You should be shaping how everyone else tackles the work. Where we need to go from here is to help you get a firm grip on what ‘leading through others’ really means, but in a very downtoearth and practical sense.
Your focus as a strategic leader Over the past 24 months we’ve analysed the traditional business model into twelve critical areas. All of them are important, we’re sure you’ll agree. (And we may have missed some out.) But after identifying all the activities that you need to lead in your business, or in your part of the business (and by no means is this break
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
50
out exhaustive), you are left with a leadership strategy that is quite ridiculous. If you’re ready to see what your leadership responsibilities really look like, go ahead and turn the page (but brace yourself).
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
51
In a very real sense you are responsible for all this as it relates to your team or unit. And isn’t this ridiculous? It’s no wonder you’re overwhelmed and frustrated. And all those feelings of being overwhelmed. All that frustration. All that hard work. For what? Only marginal results If you’ve ever been frustrated with your personal progress as a leader, is it any surprise if you’re personal leadership strategy involves all of this?
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
52
If you’re managing or leading a team who don’t have a clear longterm direction it’s no wonder you are overwhelmed and drowning with the volume of work that you personally need to complete. You’ll be exhausted. You probably are already. But is it any wonder why? Of course it isn’t. And seriously, even if you WERE able to outsource ALL this activity, you couldn’t manage all the suppliers that you’d need to outsource it all to. And what is astonishingly crazy about this, is that even though this is the model that most leaders follow, do you know what they spend an overwhelming amount of their time on? Searching for MORE activities, tactics and tricks to squeeze in to the chart. Looking for more things to do. It seems to me that this is crazy. Isn’t it? Why on earth would you spend time looking for more things to do? You aren’t even completing all the things that you already want to do. The reason is quite simple, if a little silly. First of all, the usual management mythology states that ‘managers are supposed to do things’. And having ‘managed’ your projects over to your people, you haven’t got anything to do any more. So you look for more projects to do. Secondly, if you’re an entrepreneur or an opportunist, you are ALWAYS on the lookout for the latest and greatest opportunity.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
53
However, all you manage, of course, is to add to the list of stuff that isn’t going to get done. It’s a vicious circle. Make no mistake: the chart on page 51 is the chart of a person who is sadly lacking in leadership strategy. It screams OPPORTUNIST! So here’s my question to you... since when is more the answer to having too much?
The Challenge Facing The Opportunistic Leader Why on earth would you spend time looking for more things to do? You aren’t even completing all the things that you already want to do. Since when is ‘more’ the answer to having too much?
The solution to having too much to do is NOT to add more tasks to your to do list. If you were to watch that behaviour in someone else you’d know exactly what to do. But when it comes to your own activities it’s much more difficult to see the situation for what it is.
Do you do this? (Be honest) Would you agree that you’ve been subconsciously adding more and more tactics and activities to your personal list of 'things to do'? If that sounds like you, let us right now offer you one piece of advice for the future. If your organizational chart looks like the one on the next page, you’ll always be struggling with this, spinning your wheels and wondering why you’re not achieving the right level of success that you’ve always wanted.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
54
If this chart looks anything like your day job, it tells you that something has to change. But don’t jump to any conclusions about what I’m recommending. Because I certainly am not recommending that you hire more people to lead. No, the problem with leadership today goes much deeper than the game of ‘headcount’. You see, I’ve only peeled back the first few layers of the leadership onion. If you want to know the real truth behind this situation you and I are going to have to get personal.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
55
“Me Too” Is Not A Leadership Strategy Let’s return to our previous conversation about your leadership strategy. And my big question to you on this point is: Do you actually have a personal leadership strategy? I came up with this paragraph after a late night conversation with Jules Goddard, one of my close friends and a frequent partner on leadership programmes at London Business School. We were talking about personal leadership strategy and the lack of it in the traditional corporate world. And Jules pointed out that almost everybody’s strategy was to do the same as everyone else, but just a little better and not any worse.
The leaders of today often think that success is just about being a little bit faster, better or cheaper than the next person In other words, today’s major leadership strategy is just to do the same things that everyone else does. But to do them just a little better. And not any worse. But strategic leaders realise that it’s about being different.
It was a great observation by Jules for a very important reason: the reason is because being the same (but just a little better) is not actually a strategy at all. It’s just the motto of the opportunist writ large. And unfortunately it’s exactly this sort of thinking that reinforces all of the issues that surfaced in the early parts of this report. This is not a leadership strategy. It’s the way lemmings die. This is a leadersheep strategy.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
56
Don’t worry, though, the problem is not hopeless. And actually if you identify with anything you’ve read so far, we hope you feel a sense of relief. You’ve been working harder than you need to. And what should come with this is a realisation that this is not your fault – because no one is really talking about this. Not business schools. Not consultancies. And not the management gurus we’ve come to rely on. OK, now a confession. I have to admit that I too have fallen victim to this same line of thinking. I lost hundreds of thousands of dollars in launching an internet training business seven years ago that wasn’t as focused as it could have been. I was frustrated, overwhelmed and exhausted by the end. I was really acting like an opportunist, mistakenly believing I had a strategy. Not only that I lost the support and good will of my business partners. They saw things very differently from the way I did. We just couldn’t work together any more. When I finally realised the error of my ways it was like waking up from a two year coma. And immediately my life and then my business began to change for the better. Thinking strategically has made such a profound difference for me. I won’t spend time here sharing the bottomless despair I went through as a leader at that time, but I know I need to share that lesson with others. Will you let me help you to benefit from the mistakes I made?
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
57
6) What Now? Recommended Action Steps What comes after ‘The Death of Leadership’ for you? With this report ‘The Death of Leadership’ project is almost over. I want to move forward now into the next phase of our leadership teaching. But to do this we need to know two things from you.
1) Is ‘The Death of Leadership’ on target? Do the challenges and questions you’ve read here capture the main issues you face? Share your experience with us on the blog. 2) What do you want to do next? How much change are you prepared to embrace? How can we help you to reach the heights that you’re capable of? Would an intensive online coaching programme help you? Tell us how we can help you on the blog.
Now, some of you maybe thinking that our tactics and strategies may work great for leaders or managers in big business, but will they work in a small or family business? And to this we say it’s true. Jacqueline and I developed these tactics and strategies over the past 10 years and we know they work in big companies such as software giant Microsoft and banking goliath HSBC. Actually ‘worked’ is an understatement. Let’s just say these techniques can turbocharge your leadership style and your career – if you use them well.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
58
Here is a comment from one big business manager.
“I have been in touch with Steven since 2003 and been reading his leadership materials since the last year. It has made a significant contribution to my management style. “People see me as a different individual and his tips have helped me get noticed. Stakeholders have spotted me in a crowd of 2000 people that I can be a potential candidate for nextgen leaders for my organization. I have been given three strategic initiatives to steer for my organization. “Simply put: If I had not read Steven’s materials, I probably would have kept guessing even after my retirement why my career didn’t take off the way I had dreamt. Now I am very positive that I will reach my career goals. Prabhas Sinha, Computer Associates And here’s another.
“The practical nature of the “Seven Failings" book provided me with a new framework from which to view my actions. Before reading the "Seven Failings", my attempts to 'improve' my leadership were misguided attempts to learn from inspirational stories/examples of excellent leaders. Although these were extremely interesting and often compelling dramas, I found it almost impossible to apply any of the lessons to my situation. “The Seven Failings book, and your podcasts, have provided me with a practical set of tools to increase my, and my team's, productivity. The Seven Failings has increased my awareness of my motivations and actions and their impact on my team. “Although I still have a long way to go, taking just the initial steps of asking myself about my motivations/assumptions and how my actions fit within the 7 failings, especially the first four E's (explanation, emotion, engagement and enthusiasm) has had significant positive impact.” Tom Comery, Principal Research Scientist, Wyeth Research, USA
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
59
But some of you have questions about whether our techniques will work in small companies or in the public sector. Here is one answer.
Steven, your books and materials have been a great help in driving the past year’s 200% growth of my small business. I am looking forward to any future materials you might publish. Tim Oldfield, Sydney, Australia
And another…
The learning from the 'seven failings' book enabled a group of middle managers develop a strategy for beginning to hold their managers to account for demonstrating important behaviours they had been acquiring on their own management development programme. They found this empowering and have been recommending your book to others in our organisation. Jack Arthey, Christian Aid, UK
In short, these techniques will work for you if… I’m not going to fill the rest of this report with comments from every industry and region in the world, though I could. So let me conclude with the news that these techniques will work in your organisation as long as your firm meets one criterion. You are working with people.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore 60
You see, our strategies are based on the psychological triggers that are built into every one of us. Everyone has an inborn instinct that makes us look for food when we’re hungry. This is present in every single one of us. Well, there are other triggers that are buried in our brains, too. Associated with trust and relationships, for instance. And our techniques helps you develop a leadership strategy that can find and understand these triggers over and over again. Once you know the techniques you can tweak and adapt them to suit your own style and the people you’re working with. The techniques are very flexible. The key thing is just to take action now and not to wait any longer for things to get better on their own. This is where we go back to Jay Conger and a key insight he shared with us. “Leadership success is based on momentum.” Get out your notebook and write this down. “Leadership success is based on momentum.” You just can’t allow your leadership strategy to leak out. You need to quickly build momentum. You need to get noticed. You need to help your people get noticed. And you need to do this now. And here is something else… the credibility, recognition and trust you build through a well orchestrated leadership strategy is a LOT more effective than you would get from issuing a strategy document or report. So what should you do now?
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
61
First I want you to comment on the blog. Are we on track with the issues in this report? Are these issues that you face every day at work? We want to know. Second, please pass this report to your friends and colleagues who would benefit from thinking about their leadership. It will help them, I’m sure. Third, tell me, would dealing with all the questions you’ve asked us in an intensive coaching programme be any help to you? For instance, would you like stepbystep strategies to help you identify all the areas where you’re being blocked? Do you want our best advice on how to deal with resistance? And could we help you decide how best to build support for what you want to achieve and help you put that support in place? I will answer these questions in public over the months ahead, but if you want an intensive programme that gets right into this, right now, let me know on the blog. Post your comments now on the Death of Leadership blog. We love to hear from you. Thanks for reading ‘The Death of Leadership’.
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
62
‘The Death of Leadership’ Version 1 Steven Sonsino & Jacqueline Moore
Click here to comment on ‘The Death of Leadership’ blog and for more free training material
63