High Performance Leadership

Are you comfortable with uncertainty? Or does it make you a little edgy. We live with much uncertainty. What will the stock market do? What will our customers want next quarter? What is our competition up to? How do we find and retain the best talent? What style of leadership suits our team the best? Lots of uncertainty. Unless we plan carefully, the amount of uncertainty we deal with magnifies. It grows. Take a little uncertainty, and ignore it, and it grows. Yikes. Uncertainty is not your friend. Still, as high performance leaders we must not only tolerate some uncertainty, we must embrace it. What if it is in the little in-between unknowns where the biggest change is coming? What if by staying uncertain about a certain detail we open up more possibilities. We can't be ambiguous, yet we can be open to the unexpected as opportunity. Uncertainty is not your enemy. You need some uncertainty. Just not so much that nothing gets planned, built, or created. Leaders sometime...

High performance leaders are constantly looking ahead while grounded in the now. It's not either/or. It's not a choice between tactical and strategic or leadership and management. High performance leaders do it all and they do it all at once: looking ahead (what's the big picture and how does that shift our direction now?) and staying grounded in the now (how do we take care of the team?) Do you tactics align with your strategy? Are you attending to both today? -- Doug Smith

Do you spend most of your time on strategic issues or tactical tasks? The common thought on leadership is that the higher you go in an organization the more you should focus on strategic things and the less you should spend on tactical tasks. That makes sense. And yet, is it the whole picture? Wherever you stand as a leader, your team members look to you for help and support in both the mission AND in their individual goals. So yes, focus on the strategic aspects of communicating your mission. Remember also that your people may need help on their goals - and you are likely the best source of that help. The art of leadership is keeping a team focused on its mission while also helping each member with individual goals. Are you ready for that? Are you doing that? -- Doug Smith Front Range Leadership: Training Supervisors for Success  doug smith training: how to achieve your project goals