IgniteSydney presentation I gave recently…
Definition of leader according to Dictionary.com – a person or thing that leads; a guiding or directing head, such as of an army, movement, or political group.
Definition of leader according to the Oxford Dictionary: the person who directs or commands a group, organization or country; the person or team that is winning a sports competition at a given time; an organization or company that is the most advanced or successful in a particular area.
Today we redefine Leadership. Leadership is not exclusively related to the work environment. Leadership is about being in our element, operating from our core. I have real life examples to drive home the point in a work environment that applies equally to all walks of life. The example is a real organization in decline and in real trouble. In administration and having lost six hundred thousand pesos. Later I will show you how Leadership, using this new definition, has impacted this organization.
We are all born natural leaders. But leadership is often educated outside of us in our early days to adjust to normalcy, through the fear of making mistakes.
We celebrate mistakes!
In this organization, the Staff elects its General Director. I am that CEO. I, in turn, nominated the client as our CEO and delegated myself as his assistant. We instituted weekly meetings where the team was encouraged to bring their mistake to the table. If people didn’t, we assumed they weren’t trying hard enough. Management is about control and as a result is driven by the fear of failure. Without risk there is no growth and risk brings fear of being wrong. It is our responsibility as leaders to eliminate the fear of mistakes, since that is where the gold is. Whether at home or in the workplace, where there is a fear of making mistakes, growth and creativity are greatly hampered. As a child, each fall was one step closer to our first step. The light bulb might never have been invented if it weren’t for thousands of errors.
“It means that I can do whatever I want, when I work for your company.” Yes, this is your company. You show up when you want and approach your role in the way that feels best to you. If the customer is satisfied, so are we! “Really? But when I was expressing myself freely as a child, I was told to grow up and stop being silly!”
Such is the rigorous and pervasive normalization training from our earliest days in our culture at large, that fear, though undesirable, takes comfort (the solace of the known) where true freedom of expression is difficult and challenging. Happiness at home and at work has more to do with freedom of expression than with how much we earn. Fear marginalizes us. It makes us feel like a peer fraud. Operating from our essence, without fear of failure, makes us Leaders. Leaders are creative and motivate others to operate from their core and essence. They remove the barriers of fear and shame. They motivate by respecting the individual for their individuality instead of forcing them to comply with standards, hierarchy, roles and KPIs.
Moms can be leaders. Artists can be leaders. Receptionists can be leaders. Leaders are not hierarchically or financially motivated. The managers are! However, in my experience, the hardest thing for people is to trust that they are allowed to make mistakes and that they are allowed to “be themselves.” That is the real test. I was lucky to work closely with Stan Shih (founder of Acer Computer). I thought the errors are the cost of education and the losses applied to our training budget. Stan’s company became the world’s third largest PC manufacturer. When we set out to be the best of what we are, doing what we believe in, not for economic or hierarchical advancement, as Steve Jobs demonstrated, we end up changing the world and receiving a great financial reward.
So, operating from our Essence is the best way to take care of the board of directors and shareholders. We met our clients and asked them many questions about us. We turned rhetoric and clichés into action, we marketed less, we established a customer-focused internal vision, we eliminated unprofitable products, we allowed the organization to realign behind the new vision, we did not replace sales staff who left, we eliminated the Sales Department, we redistributed the amount traditionally allocated to sales commissions in incentives for everyone. Most of the providers abandoned us. This had a significant impact on our Vision and had to choose a new, more profitable and sustainable direction. I gave 40% of the company to the staff and we divided it equally between us.
We made the team have more fun, flexible working hours, table football in the office, go-karts and karaoke nights, hours/days off without affecting license fees, work smarter not harder, eliminate manual processes, work environment open space and more. 14 employees spend less time at work, they produced more than 29 did, income continued to fall! Profitability increased SIGNIFICANTLY, ending 2011/12 with a $600,000 profit (a turnaround of $1.2 million) and on track for a record 2.6 million in 2012/13.