What makes an outstanding leader? This question seems to be one of the burning questions of our time. Over the last few years we've seen, heard and experienced the consequences of leadership - the positive and negative. Corporations that spent millions of dollars to acquire the most outstanding leaders found themselves led into bankruptcy. Segments of our economy that were believed to have the best and brightest leaders have failed, leaving a wake of economic and human suffering.
Hundreds of books have been written by leaders past and present, as well as experts from the academic world, all claiming to have the answer to this question. Glancing over at my bookcase, I can count at least 62 books devoted to Leadership. Do any of these authors or books have the answer ? Maybe, but few have the research that can support their theories and suppositions.
Hundreds of books have been written by leaders past and present, as well as experts from the academic world, all claiming to have the answer to this question. Glancing over at my bookcase, I can count at least 62 books devoted to Leadership. Do any of these authors or books have the answer ? Maybe, but few have the research that can support their theories and suppositions.
Recently an answer has emerged, and it's based on a two-year qualitative study entitled, Exceeding Expectations: The Principles of Outstanding Leadership, conducted by The Work Foundation. In summary the "research found that outstanding leaders combine a drive for high performance with an almost obsessive focus on people as the means of achieving this." If you read the postmortems of the leaders of the companies that failed, it would seem that their obsessive focus was on financial performance - profits. The report goes on to say, "that there is now evidence to support a systemic, people centered approach to high performance leadership. This is a paradigm shift for most leaders who remain focused on the numbers and has implications for all organizations seeking to improve performance."
This may indeed be a paradigm shift for many and a much needed one, but it isn't for many of my colleagues and myself. For our entire careers we have advocated for people centered approaches as a way to improve and achieve high performance. I formalized my beliefs, experiences and the insights of many of the authors sitting on my bookshelf into a program entitled Relationship - Centered Leadership®. This study is an affirmation of this program and my continued pursuit of a relationship/peopled - centered approach to assisting leaders and organizations in making the shift from "good to outstanding".
This may indeed be a paradigm shift for many and a much needed one, but it isn't for many of my colleagues and myself. For our entire careers we have advocated for people centered approaches as a way to improve and achieve high performance. I formalized my beliefs, experiences and the insights of many of the authors sitting on my bookshelf into a program entitled Relationship - Centered Leadership®. This study is an affirmation of this program and my continued pursuit of a relationship/peopled - centered approach to assisting leaders and organizations in making the shift from "good to outstanding".
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