A Foundation For Effective Leadership
Leadership
development is a passion of mine. I am saddened with the lack of morality
and ethics demonstrated by so many in leadership roles today. It comes at a
time when we desperately need a new vision, led by intrinsically motivated
individuals who are capable of tempering personal temptation for sake of
the greater good. This requires a solid understanding of self, which is
what I refer to as the Leadership Foundation.
One cannot lead and
influence others effectively without being able to lead themselves first. This is my premise for leadership. Whether
leadership takes the form of parenting our children, volunteering for a
charity organization, or the CEO of a major corporation, our ability to
influence others for the betterment of a larger purpose (e.g. society,
organization, employees), is primarily a factor of how well we have taken
that hard look in the mirror in order to understand who and what we are all
about. This is referred to as building our Foundation for Effective
Leadership. Otherwise we are prone to subject others to our ways, our
goals, our standards, which is more influenced by external factors (e.g.
greed, power), that tends to result in focusing only on short term results
and for the benefit of a few.
Below is a link to a paper on leadership I wrote.
The title is “A Foundation For Effective Leadership”. It pertains to my
view that leadership development is a journey and has its impact once an
individual is willing to take a long, hard, open and honest look at
themselves and to learn what makes them click. The trick in leading others
effectively is learning the basics of human behavior, first with yourself
and then with others.
The Foundation for
Effective Leadership incorporates three basic elements; Personal Growth
& Development, Beliefs & Values, and a Personal Vision. Once the
foundation has been defined, than traditional leadership and management
development will build upon this foundation by developing skills such as
coaching, giving & receiving feedback, positive discipline, team
development, motivation, goal setting, managing change, etc. Using the
analogy of building a house, a weak foundation can cause the house to
crumble. The more aware an individual is, and the more they have developed
this awareness into a solid understanding of their personal vision, beliefs
and values, and strengths and development areas, the more effective a leader
they will be.
A Foundation For Effective
Leadership – The Paper (68 pgs)
Download the pdf
A
Foundation For Effective Leadership – The Workshop
The following workshop materials are used
in a workshop I deliver on this topic. One of the greatest joys in my life
has been the honor to lead others in discussions and activities related to
the concept of developing their leadership foundation.
Workshop
Brochure
Slide Presentation
Traditional Leadership
Development
Below
are links to documents that I developed to provide you with some ideas regarding
content for basic leadership development training.
1.
This is a sample workbook used for front line
supervision. Although the content is not included, you will get an idea of
the topics covered.
“Supervisor 101” Download the pdf
2.
This is a one-page
overview of a sample leadership certificate series. It lists the content
used for each certificate level
“Leadership Certificate Overview” Download the pdf
