I have never been in leadership but I want to be a leader. How can I achieve this target?
Though straight-forward, your question has some depth of thinking…
Two things to start:
Be a leader where you are. Demonstrate leadership, empathy, support, advocacy for others, etc. wherever you are. Leadership, in its true form, doesn’t need a business card.
Make sure your boss, and others in the food chain, are aware you would like to advance and at some time move into leadership. It’s important for them to know—the floors are littered with employees who were expecting someone to just “recognize their potential” and promote them extemporaneously. It happens, but don’t live your life expecting it. Take action and let someone know.
Now, to be promoted, I tell people to be mindful of the Three P’s for promotion… for you to be promoted:
Performance. Yours must be top-notch. Maybe not the best, but certainly well above satisfactory. You’ve got to demonstrate discretionary effort, above just doing your job.
Potential. You’ll need to demonstrate that you can do more. By doing more, by asking to do more, by accepting almost anything that comes your way, by requesting and embracing any learning opportunity, etc.
Position. You can knock #1 and #2 out of the park, but there still must be a position to promote to, or you cannot move. This is where your patience will be tested, and you simply must rise to the challenge. If someone is promoted “over” you, your performance, attitude, etc. cannot falter. Even if you were unjustly skipped. Keep the performance top-notch, and your behaviors positive.
You know, sometimes we look for specific events or publicized actions to identify a really special leader. We’ve even been guilty of that here in our Leaders & Laggards section. And that’s shortsighted.
How about, instead of the single, flashy, attention-getting PR piece, we showcase someone who has simply exemplified successful leadership over time. What a concept…!
Katia is a rock star. Not much in the way of prior experience, she co-founded Birchbox in 2010, completely disrupting the women’s cosmetics space; today, after celebrating their 6-year anniversary, the venture boasts revenue of around $200 million. It’s hard to say that’s anything but a rip-roaring success, even given some recent challenges. And when you read about her, you can’t help but like her. This 33-year old just seems to do the right thing, because it’s the right thing.
“Criticism is a learning moment and in many cases it is what you need to push you toward exponential growth in the moments when you need that. I would be lying if I didn’t say it’s hard to hear sometimes. It can be painful when you are working so hard and giving everything to your work, to ever let people down. But I have had to toughen up a lot over the years. I know, intellectually, that criticism is a form of caring for someone because it does give you that push.”
“I try to avoid providing answers, and encourage my team to do that instead.”
“I’m here to provide a reminder for why we’re here and what we’re doing, but I’m not here to always provide the answer.”
“You need to give your team the room they need to breathe.”
So, nothing singularly flashy this month; just an entrepreneurial leader who’s getting it done, and doing so with style and aplomb. Her 250 employees (including a brick-and-mortar store in SoHo) and well over a million subscribers would likely agree. Her proud moments are things that make us smile…
“My proudest moments are not the big wins, but the smaller things – like sitting in a meeting and seeing how smart and thoughtful my team is. We’ve evolved into something bigger than just me.”
Plus, she’s a native Texan and likes 1970 Ford Broncos. What’s not to like?
Thanks, Katia Beauchamp, for being this month’s Leadership Leader.
Leadership Milquetoast
Daimler AG (Ever wonder what the AG means? Aktiengesellschaft.)
Daimler AG almost got it right when they removed a senior executive from their Daimler Greater China late last month.
One could argue that they took fairly swift action against Rainer Gärtner, ex-President and CEO of Daimler Trucks and Busses (China) Ltd (DTBC), a mere 48-hours after he allegedly slandered not just a Chinese driver, but thewhole country – and pepper-sprayed the crowd – in a parking spot version of road rage.
Daimler apologized for Gärtner’s behavior the day after it happened but couldn’t withstand the onslaught of negative Chinese social media attacks, and removed him from his position the day after.
“We deeply regret the outcome of the personal dispute. The words and actions involved in this dispute as reported in the media do not represent at all the views of the company.”
And after a very short “investigation,” Daimler released this statement the next day:
“The nature of the dispute and in particular the manner in which it was conducted, irrespective of any comments alleged to have been made, is adjudged to be not only of concern to the public but viewed by us as detrimental to the standing of our company, unbecoming of a manager of our brand and prejudicial to our good name.”
Nice apology written by the PC public affairs bunch, but I don’t buy it. That’s called damage control, not leadership.
Okay, so they recognized that one of their senior executives was about to be persona non grata and hastily repatriated him, but they did it under withering fire.
And if a CEO of one of your major operating units thinks he’s entitled to act like an ass, maybe you need to change your vetting process. You see, you don’t choose to lead by example; you can only choose whether it will be a good example or a bad one. Gärtner chose poorly.
Regardless of what they say, a CEO’s behavior does reflect an organization’s culture, and that’s a leadership issue. Gärtner’s behavior, while boorish, had nothing to do with running DTBC. But leadership is less about what you’re doing than how you’re being. Gärter was being a jerk – don’t pretend he didn’t know what he was doing – and that reflects a senior leadership entitlement mentality in Daimler’s culture.
I also couldn’t help but notice that the media maelstrom ended with the announcement that Gartner had been “removed.” In fact, it’s as if Rainer Gärtner ceased to exist after Nov 22nd.
If Daimler was serious about demonstrating that Gärtner’s behavior was unacceptable, the company would have taken a different tack than out of sight out of mind for a CEO that pissed off a country that buys 22% of Daimler’s vehicles.
Bottom line for me: Gärtner acted like a jackass; he probably wouldn’t have gotten away with it in Texas. Daimler had an opportunity to show what their company really stood for and how they expected their senior leadership to reflect that culture. They blew it.Gärtner’s behavior probably deserved a Leadership Laggard award, but I thought it was better to reward Daimler’s namby-pamby response with this month’s award for a classic missed opportunity. Congratulations, Daimler, you’re December’s Leadership Milquetoast.
Leadership Laggard
Steve Huffman, Reddit CEO
Every now and then, some clown discovers himself atop an organization, and everyone wonders “why?” Hilarity (or calamity) ensues, usually ending with someone scratching their heads and asking, “what was he thinking??”
The poster child for that this month Is Reddit’s Steve Huffman.
(Caution: in one of the following paragraphs, I say “Donald Trump.” You’ve been warned.)
For troglodytes, Luddites and those over 50 (I’m certain I fit at least two of those), Reddit is essentially the offspring when an online newspaper mates with a bulletin board; content is both curated and sometimes created. People upvote or downvote your content, making it more or less visible to others. Sort of like a Facebook without the duck-lip selfies and cat videos.
Huffman was an original founder and creator, and the name “Reddit” is a play on words from “read it.” Anyway, it’s a fairly big deal with over 500 million visitors each month, and in the top 25 of website traffic in the world. Users fiercely advocate for the open nature and diverse community. Sort of a free speech test bed. The former CEO, Ellen Pao, was literally voted off the island for banning a few communities for fostering off-site harassment. Censorship is pretty much unheard of on Reddit.
Until now.
Huffman, apparently not a fan of Donald Trump, found himself the target of personal attacks from one of the more extreme Reddit communities, so instead of blocking or even deleting the community, he quickly made a stand… by taking the low road. He modified the contents of many public user comments on Reddit that he disliked. He literally went into the program and changed insulting comments made towards him and made it appear as if the insult were directed at the moderators of the “The Donald” Reddit community.
Needless to say, that didn’t end well. And to make things worse, Stevie wandered through several excuses: first, he said it was frustration with communities that try his patience. Next, he was “just joking” with those people, unsure why they “took it wrong.” Yeah, I call bullshit on that one. Finally, he said “well, that sort of thing shouldn’t be allowed on Reddit anyway.” Could be true (I don’t know, didn’t read them), but that only makes the case for deleting, not falsifying the content to favor yourself.
He restored the comments to their original form, but made it clear he didn’t feel he really did anything wrong, merely that he should’ve found another way to do it, with his “I abused my power to give the bullies a hard time.” Classic #sorrynotsorry.
I’ve got a better idea—why not figure out how to be a CEO, and take it from there.
But then, we’d have to find another Leadership Laggard for December.
So, with CPIs hovering around 3-3.5%, and most surveys showing 3.5-4.0% increases in salary budgets for 2007, life’s a breeze, right? Just add the percentages into the Excel formula, press “Enter,” and you’re done, right?
Actually, wrong.
Enter “wage inflation.”
I’m going to avoid the ecomomist argument that higher wages do or do not cause inflation. That’s just not our relative concern here. What is clearly our concern is that our currently strong economic growth lowers general unemployment rate. This, theoretically, can cause businesses to bid up the price of labor and (hopefully) pass through those higher costs in the form of higher prices.
If only it were so easy. As the CPI shows general inflationary trends (e.g., our product/service cost increases), wage inflation is an additional cost on top of inflationary pricing. In other words, it’s a potential incremental cost.
Now, again theoretically, profit-conscious firms aren’t going to hire employees at a rate of pay more than his utilitarian or marginal value, or more than the additional revenue earned. Hardly rocket science, right?
The reality, however, shows that sometimes wages do increase faster than general inflation, particularly for individual functions, positions and/or jobs, rather than an overall employment market.
Enter compensation planning. It’s easy to get in a cyclical rut: analyze the jobs, survey the market, establish a range. Then adjust for infation a couple of years and start all over again. That’s simply not enough. We must pay close, specific attention to the inflationary movement of key positions within our organziations and adjust accordingly — or at least be acutely aware of the disparity. No reason for a surprise here.
Sometimes compensation planning takes foresight, analysis, and a real awareness of what’s going on in the world.
Not too long ago, I worked with a group of division presidents for a fast-growing company. Two things struck me as interesting, and somewhat of a paradox: First, they were all reasonably successful in their jobs (and their jobs were substantially the same, just different geographic regions). Second, they were all incredibly different. Yes, they each had similar behavior characteristics, such as intelligence and work ethic. In other areas, such as sales, marketing, people management, organizational skills, strategy, planning, and do forth, they were all over the charts.
So what? Well, I’ll tell you “so what.” You hear a lot of garbage about understanding your “strengths and weaknesses,” and then you’re supposed to work on your weaknesses. Let’s look at it differently. How about we assume that succeeding in a position can be done in any of several different ways, using a variety of skills. Using that reasoning, you don’t have strengths and weaknesses, you have learned skills and skills you have yet to learn.
Wow!
So, then, we should then simply “learn more skills,” right?? No, no, no… We should, instead, clearly identify our skills, since we know that we can succeed with them, and work on improving our strengths! That’s right, improve our strengths, since we already know that they work for us. Learning new skills is time consuming, and depending on application, may or may not work for us the way they work for others.
Now, this logic assumes current success, so don’t confuse this with those managers who are clearly unsuccessful, though I would argue this could help them with their improvement also.
In other words, as Bum Phillips (retired Houston Oilers coach) would say, “Dance with who brung you.” Use the skills you have — improve and hone them to a razor’s edge — and continue your increasing levels of success. Over time, identify some additional skills you would like to pick up, and develop a plan to learn them in a reasonable time and fashion.
As such, I frequently read old military books, discourses, and papers to compare corporate leadership today with historical military leadership. The similarities are astounding.
A 1941 book published by the Military Service Publishing Company is one such work. Edited by the staff, it has no specific author, but is a compilation of thoughts, ideas, suggestions and directives from a stream of notable military leaders. Some — just as an example — include the likes of General J.G. Harbord, who began as a private in the Spanish-American war, achieved prominence as General Pershing’s Chief of Staff, and later commanding the USMC’s 2nd Division before assuming the Chairmanship of the RCA Corporation.
Just an example of the caliber of input for this book…
In this book, Chapter II discusses “Orientation.” Of course, it is meant to apply mostly to new officers at a new post or assignment. Truth is, the advice given there — some 65+ years ago to junior officers — is as appropriate today for first time managers as it is senior-most leadership.
Sections and brief summaries include:
Your Brother Officers:
The commissioned officers of the U.S. military are a cross-section of the American Public… as a group, they are subject to the same ambitions, variations in viewpoint, and human frailties as the people they serve.
This, of course, matches up with our corporate situations today. Managers and leaders have different backgrounds and experiences, bringing different thought-processes and judgment. When harnessed for the common good, this is an excellent trait, one we should exploit, not suppress. Different thinking means more choices. More choices usually means better decisions. Or, as many would put it — embrace your weirdness.
Performance of Duty:
In the military, the performance of duty to the limit of one’s capacity is a fetish. Striving for perfection is more than a figure of speech… as you demonstrate your capacity for additional responsibility, it will come to you; be not impatient… there is much to learn.
Wow, is this apropos or what…? Work hard, smart, and consistent. Do what you say you’ll do. Make well-thought decisions. Those of you who have achieved significant corporate rank: Did you get there through politics, trickery, and slight-of-hand, or was it hard work, diligence, and sacrifice??
This stuff really works.
Get Out, or Get in Line:
Mind your business. If the concern where you are employed is all wrong, and the Old Man a curmudgeon (I like that word), it may be well for you to go tell the Old Man, confidentially, privately, and quietly, that he is a curmudgeon. Explain to him that his policy is absurd and preposterous. Then show him how to reform his ways, and offer to lead the effort to cleanse the faults. Do this, or if for any reason you should prefer not, then take your choice of these: Get Out, Or Get in Line.
If you work for a man, in heaven’s name, work for him! Speak well of him, think well of him, stand by him and the institution he represents. If put to the pinch, an ounce of loyalty is worth more than a pound of cleverness. If you must vilify, condemn, and eternally disparage, why, resign your position and, when on the outside, damn to your heart’s content.
This quotation is so appropriate in corporate management today that it needs no explanation, segue, or pithy remarks from me. Simply put — work for whomever you work for. Grammatical errors aside, you get my point. Don’t we all get tired of those who work “for” us part of the time, and “against” us the rest?
Importance of the Word ‘NO’:
As an officer, many questions will come to you for decisions… the choice you make in the mere act of saying “yes,” or “no,” may constitute the measure of your success.
A weak man can say “yes” to troublesome situations, dissipating the efforts of the whole. An unwise man can say “no,” and by mere obstruction, cause the failure of the unit. It takes a happy combination of courage and wisdom to be able to say “no” at the right time and place.
Simply put, our most significant, regular responsibility — day to day and strategic — is making decisions. Anyone can make the easy ones… they seldom take forethought, intellect, or wisdom, since they are usually painfully obvious and accolades are near. No, they pay us for the hard ones. The lonely decisions. The times when we make the “right” decision in the face of dissent and conflict, and where the easier decision is to abide with consensus. That’s why they pay us the bucks, and give us these fancy business cards.
Adaptability:
Adaptability is required. Leadership is a new and different life. He must be equally quick to detect and avoid those things which are abhorrent to military life… the road to recognition and fame may lie ahead. How well and how quickly the opportunities are embraced depends upon the promptness of adapting himself to the new horizons the career provides.
You can’t always spell out the details of a leadership role in a nice, convenient job description. Our worlds are dynamic, fluctuating, and ever-changing. We’ve got to know when to “stay the course,” and when to turn on a dime. All the while keeping those looking to us for leadership engaged in our path. This is what sets us apart.
I only provided these today for two reasons. First, a reminder: Leadership — it’s theories, concepts, and approaches, really haven’t changed since the beginning of man. Yes, some applications of principles have evolved over time, given our changing workforce, demographics, and societal norms. The real concepts and basis of leadership, however, remain constant.
And lastly, we can learn a lot from simplicity. Sometimes we make this stuff too hard, when we could get to the same place — maybe even a better place — with approaches that embrace simplicity and ease of thought.
First, the fiasco in Chicago was averted — we should all stand and cheer.
For those living on Pluto (the new “non’-planet), Chicago attempted to vote in a “big box” minimum wage, a wage higher than what all other employers must pay, as a penalty for simply “being” a big box retailer.
Mayor Dailey vetoed the bill — his first such veto in his million years in office. Smart man.
Having said that, and against my personal beliefs and desires, minimum wage is going to change from its paltry $5.15 per hour. 10 states have enacted minimum wage laws in 2006 alone, making their state’s minimum wage some level above the Fed’s. That brings to 23 the total number of states with such legislation, and another 6 states have pending legislation awaiting November voting.
You can bet that all, or most, will pass.
Make sure you prepare accordingly, as minimum wage adjustments — particularly significant adjustments — impact more than just your unskilled entry workers. Minimum wage tends to be the benchmark by which other positions base their rates. In other words, you’ll likely face the need to adjust the rate ranges for multiple low and semi-skilled positions within your organziation.
