Everyday People, Extraordinary Leadership | Book Review

“Leadership matters. It’s essential in every sector, in every
community, and in every country.” (p. xix)

Book of the year.

The most consistent, enduring, and challenging feedback offered during Academy Leadership Excellence Courses remains that of the Subject Matter Expert (SME), individual contributor, or professional without formal direct reports proclaiming leadership practices either less relevant or not applicable by definition. Thank you James Kouzes and Barry Posner for your timely antidote.

Yes, this book is for and about people who do not have titles, like supervisor, manager, executive, chief, head, director, captain, boss, and the like, or some formal authority over other people (p. xv).

It seems useful thinking about leadership as a verb, rather than a noun. The authors offer another terrific insight - underscoring the truth that leadership is a relationship (p. 5). A good way to start doing this is not thinking of ourselves. The authors close with a great list on page 173 highlighting what happens when we think as leaders, not individual contributors. It’s wonderful and worth reading before embarking on the Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership (p.11):

• Model the Way
• Inspire a Shared Vision
• Challenge the Process
• Enable Others to Act
• Encourage the Heart

This review shares each of the five practices and correlates each to one or more Academy Leadership workshops and/or influential authors with similar findings.

I | Model

Often a shared Personal Leadership Philosophy, or PLP, includes an expectation such as lead by example, or defining integrity as doing the right thing even when no one is watching. Both are examples of modeling behaviors. Empathy matters. The authors share stories concluding that whatever it is, no act of kindness is unworthy and doesn’t go unrecognized (p. 24). Clarity matters. When you are clear about your personal values, you are better prepared to make choices based on principle, rather than the whims, fashions, and pressures of the moment (p. 29). Our values by themselves are not enough. Alignment matters. Discovering and affirming shared values is the foundation for building productive and genuine work relationships (p. 32). We’re credible when we put this all together.

Language matters. Most people are “prisoners” of their organizational vocabulary – try talking for a day about the people in an organization without using the words employee, managers, boss, supervisor, staff, subordinate, rank-and-file, or hierarchy (p. 41). This is terrific and a challenge worth sharing in upcoming courses. Frequently these ‘nouns’ trigger passivity and a scarcity mindset – cancer for an effective leader.

Feedback matters. The authors cite LPI (Leadership Practices Inventory) data showing that asking for feedback is one of the least frequently engaged in leader behaviors (p. 45). We need to check our egos and our fears for growth. There is simply no way to get around the fact that while you may not always like the feedback you receive, it is the only way you can really know how good you are doing and possibly learn better ways you can become even better (p. 46).

II | Inspire

Creating a Motivational Environment workshops develop the theme of environment creation rather than the conceit we may control others’ behavior. How to start?

Crossing the chasm from individual contributor to leader
requires fully embracing the need to develop the capacity
to envision the future. (p. 54)

Visionary statements in our PLP are powerful. Visions are projections of your fundamental beliefs and assumptions about human nature, technology, economics, science, politics, art, ethics, and the like (p. 56). People want to know the why behind our decisions and the direction we are going. This may be a challenge for the highly intelligent SME, repeatedly rewarded and promoted for individual effort. You have to get off automatic pilot, believing that you know everything you need to know, viewing the world through pre-established categories, and not noticing what’s going on around you (p. 60).

Remember leadership is about relationships. You have to engage the people you are involved with and work with in conversations about their lives, about their own hopes and dreams, and how they can see these realized by sharing and participating in the vision (p. 64). Many leadership course attendees feel shock when they discover during the Aligning and Accomplishing Goals workshop, they have not given much serious thought to their own personal goals and dreams, and usually no thought to those of anyone else.

III | Challenge the Process

The vast majority of organizations, institutions, and even communities and families are not typically bastions of change; often quite the contrary (p. 80). Chances are, each of us can think of several improvements, but often fear speaking up. The authors share that the reality is most challenges choose you and not the other way around (p. 83). It’s a call for initiative, often rewarded after the fact (seek forgiveness rather than permission).

Humility matters. One of the reasons that people are often afraid to ask around for advice and input from others is because they perceive that doing so means, or at least implies, that they’re incompetent or don’t know something that they should already know (p. 88). Think about professional athletes – they continuously and deliberately, practice. And they are already very, very, good.

Similar to Kotter’s Leading Change, you make something happen when you notice what isn’t working, create a possible solution for the problem, gain buy-in from constituents, and implement the desired outcome (p. 84). Knowledge matters. Researchers shadowing senior executives discovered that the most successful ones were not waiting for information to come to them. Instead they were out and about gathering knowledge (p. 87), reminiscent of Pfeffer and Sutton’s findings in The Knowing-Doing Gap.

Curiosity matters. When the after-action review is not about getting called out for making a mistake and more about getting better, defensive posture lessens and learning happens in the “other” category of experiences (p. 99). Shared knowledge builds a powerful organization.

IV | Enable Others

Coaching is not a job, but a process that relies especially
on an interpersonal relationship. (p. 128)

Once genuine coaching is viewed separately from evaluation, our Coaching to Develop Leaders workshop defines Performance Coaching as an energizing, positive experience. Kouzes and Posner do the same. You show people that you trust them when you listen, provide opportunities for them to contribute freely, make choices, and be innovative (p. 109).

Marshall Goldsmith and Mark Reiter develop active questions in Triggers. Similarly, our authors notice that [the best listeners] demonstrated that they were listening by asking questions that “promoted discovery and insight.” (p. 111) Consider pausing a bit longer before asking questions, and tie active questions to your PLP and vision.

Connections matter. The most well-connected individuals are typically those who are involved in activities outside of their immediate job function or discipline, and who avoid being too strongly typecast in one field, function, administrative body, or community (p. 117). Perhaps this mitigates the belief that we must hold on too tightly, or the traditional thinking promoting the archaic idea that power is a fixed sum, and correspondingly, if you give any of your power away to others, you will have less power and be less powerful (p. 120).

Accountability matters. Consider an accountability commitment, perhaps in your PLP, as a requirement for team eligibility. When people take personal responsibility and hold themselves accountable (by others) for their actions, their colleagues will be considerably more inclined to work with them and be more cooperative (p. 127).

IV | Heart

A companion section to Mark Crowley’s Lead From the Heart.

When we get past thinking about ourselves, we may focus on all the good around us. Leaders give heart to others by recognizing individual contributions and celebrating victories together (p. 135). Consider starting staff meetings or events with teammates recognizing each other. This practice may additionally offer insights into how best to recognize each other -- [we] can recognize them in a way that they personally value, because it’s relevant to what they care about (p. 144). One example: Not everyone wishes public recognition.

Telling stories about how people demonstrate their commitment to values is another way to show your personal involvement, and it is one of the quickest and most effective ways to communicate how people are supposed to act and make decisions (p. 156). Our Academy Leadership team has practiced this for years, and it pulls us closer together.

Lastly, don’t make the mistake of assuming that people only respond to formal or monetary rewards (p. 146). Recall Dan Pink’s findings highlighting autonomy, mastery and purpose as fundamental drivers.

Summary

In short, we’re all leaders, and the best leaders are lifelong learners.

“…those leaders who engage in learning for five or more hours per
week, compared to those who spend an hour or less per week, are
74 percent more likely to have more direction in their careers and 48
percent more likely to find purpose in their work.”
(p. 169)