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WebThe Leadership Challenge 6th Edition Pdf Free Download is the gold-standard manual for effective leadership, grounded in research and written by the premier authorities in WebJun 23, · [PDF] Download The Leadership Challenge Sixth Edition: How to Make Extraordinary Things Happen in Organizations in format PDF The Leadership WebMar 14, · The Leadership Challenge Workbook - Free PDF Download - pages - year: Home. Printed in the United States of America first edition ISBN WebTHE LEADERSHIP CHALLENGE 6/3/07 PM Page 55 cate that personal values clarity makes a significant difference in behavior at work. Figure shows what we discovered WebMay 24, · The The Leadership Challenge 6Th Edition Free Pdf is a great read for those who love information and learning new things. When you get your hands on The ... read more
We asked people to tell us a story about one project they led that they considered their Personal Best Leadership Experience—an experience that set their individual standard of excellence. We collected thousands of stories of leaders performing at their peak, and we looked for actions that were consistent across all the stories. Many years—and several thousand quantitative and qualitative analyses later, we found that there are Five Practices that define exemplary leadership. Or you might know The Five Practices because you have used our degree assessment instrument, Leadership Practices Inventory LPI to further your development as a leader. In case the practices are new to you, we provide a brief overview in Chapter 2 of this workbook.
Whether you are familiar with our other work or not, we ask you to keep this in mind: When you engage in The Five Practices more frequently than you do at present, you will be more effective. We know from our research that those who Model, Inspire, Challenge, Enable, and Encourage more frequently are more likely to get extraordinary things done than those who do so less frequently. Exemplary leadership, in other words, is not an accident of birth or circumstance. PROJECTS PROVIDE THE CONTEXT Projects are how we tend to organize work these days. Projects create the context for our goals, determine with whom we work, and set our schedules. We will be more specific in Chapter 3 about what kind of project to select, but you might start thinking now about something you are currently leading or about to lead that could benefit from the application of exemplary practices. One important point to keep in mind is that every new project you take on provides you with an opportunity.
It all depends on how you approach the challenge. Your next project is your chance to create extraordinary results for your organization and to develop your leadership capabilities. This workbook is designed to help you plan and prepare so that you can lead at your personal best. This workbook is designed for anyone in a leadership role. Its purpose is to help you further your abilities to lead others to get extraordinary things done. Whether you are in the private or public sector, an employee or a volunteer, a first-line supervisor or a senior executive, a student or a parent, you will find that this workbook applies to you.
You can grant someone the title of chief executive, but that does not make him or her a leader. Leadership is earned. You get to be a leader in the eyes of others because of what you do. Leadership is about hav- ing the courage and spirit to move from whatever circumstances you are in to a place of mak- ing a difference in the world. This workbook is designed to help anyone who has the desire to lead and the will to make a difference. While our research has taught us many things about the practice of leadership, our inter- action with the thousands of individuals we have studied has taught us something more important.
We need more leaders today, not fewer. We need more people to accept responsibility for bringing about sig- nificant changes in what we do and how we do it. We need more people to answer the call. The world is in great need of your talents. We believe that you are capable of developing yourself as a leader far more than tradition or mythology has ever assumed possible. Simply imagine yourself standing at the base of Mt. Rainier, and then start climbing—one hop at a time. We wish you great joy and success on your next leadership adventure. Onward and upward! James M.
They see all experiences as learning experiences. If you want to become a better leader, you need to study your own perfor- mance and become more conscious about the choices that you are making and how you are act- ing on your intentions. The purpose of The Leadership Challenge Workbook is to help you become a better leader by applying The Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership to a project of your choice. As with the learning of any new discipline, we will ask you to do some exercises that isolate specific skills. If you are not already familiar with The Five Practices, read this chapter carefully— it provides the foundation for the work that you will be doing. As you progress through the activities, the Workbook supports your success in three ways: 1. We want you to think about how you approach leadership. The questions we pose are designed to challenge your thinking and help you become more conscious about how well you engage in each of the Practices.
Contrary to myths about leader- ship that assume you either have it or you do not, we know from our research that the very best leaders spend time examining what they have done and are planning to do. We want you to apply the practices and commitments to your project. To do that, we provide exercises that help put The Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership to work. In some cases you will do this application alone. In other cases, you will go out to talk to your team members and engage them in an activity. As a result of your reflections and applications, you will learn about your- self, your team, your organization, and your project.
At the end of each chapter, we ask you to jot down the implications of what you have learned about leadership. On a practical level, that may not be possible. The way you use the Workbook depends on the nature of your project and your situation. Then go back and start with those worksheets that address immediate concerns. For example, your team may have been working long hours and has not taken a break. You believe that they need some recognition and celebration. In that case, start with Chapter 8, Encourage the Heart. Or you may feel that conflicts have arisen because there is not con- sensus around shared values. In that instance, begin with Chapter 4 on Model the Way. However, make sure you address all of The Five Practices and complete all activities as soon as you can. The majority of respondents are from the United States. Since we asked people to select seven characteristics, the total adds up to more than percent.
Percentage of Respondents Selecting Each Characteristic Honest ForwardLooking Australia 93 83 73 59 Canada 88 88 73 60 Japan 67 83 51 61 Korea 74 82 55 62 Malaysia 95 78 60 62 Mexico 85 82 71 62 New Zealand 86 86 71 68 Singapore 72 76 69 76 Sweden, Denmark 84 86 90 53 United States 89 71 69 68 Country Inspiring Competent performing at their peak, leaders are doing more than just getting results. For example, leaders cannot Model the Way without being seen as honest. The leadership practice of Inspire a Shared Vision involves being forward-looking and inspiring. When leaders demonstrate capacity in all of The Five Practices, they show others they have the competence to get extraordinary things done.
The percentages vary, but the final ranking does not. Since the very first time we conducted our studies honesty has been at the top of the list. They want to know that the person is truthful, ethical, and principled. When people talk to us about the qualities they admire in leaders, they often use the terms integrity and character as synonymous with honesty. No matter what the setting, everyone wants to be fully confident in their leaders, and to be fully confident they have to believe that their leaders are individuals of strong character and solid integrity. We want to be told the truth. We want a leader who knows right from wrong. We want our leaders to be honest because their honesty is also a reflection upon our own honesty. Of all the qualities that people look for and admire in a leader, honesty is by far the most personal.
More than likely this is also why it consistently ranks number one. Over time, we not only lose respect for the leader, we lose respect for ourselves. Honesty is strongly tied to values and ethics. We appreciate people who know where they stand on important principles. We resolutely refuse to follow those who lack confidence in their own beliefs. Forward-Looking A little more than 70 percent of our most recent respondents selected the ability to look ahead as one of their most sought-after leadership traits. People expect leaders to have a sense of direction and a concern for the future of the organization.
This expectation directly corresponds to the ability to envision the future that leaders described in their personal-best cases. They have to have a point of view about the future envisioned for their organizations, and they need to be able to connect that point of view to the hopes and dreams of their constituents. The reality is far more down to earth. Vision reveals the beckoning summit that provides others with the capacity to chart their course toward the future. We want to know what the organization will look like, feel like, and be like when it arrives at its destination in six quarters or six years.
Compared to all the other leadership qualities constituents expect, this is the one that most distinguishes leaders from other credible people. But this expectation does mean that leaders have a special responsibility to attend to the future of their organizations. A leader must be able to communicate the vision in ways that encourage people to sign on for the duration and excite them about the cause. Although the enthusiasm, energy, and positive attitude of an exemplary leader may not change the content of work, they certainly can make the context more meaningful. If a leader displays no passion for a cause, why should anyone else? Being upbeat, positive, and optimistic about the future offers people hope. Instead, they need leaders who communicate in words, demeanor, and actions that they believe their constituents will overcome. Emotions are contagious, and positive emotions resonate throughout an organization and into relationships with other constituents.
To get extraordinary things done in extraordinary times, leaders must inspire optimal performance—and that can only be fueled with positive emotions. They must see the leader as having relevant experience and sound judgment. This kind of competence inspires confidence that the leader will be able to guide the entire organization, large or small, in the direction in which it needs to go. Organizations are too complex and multifunctional for that ever to be the case. This is particularly true as people reach the more senior levels. For example, those who hold officer positions are definitely expected to demonstrate abilities in strategic planning and policymaking. If a company desperately needs to clarify its core competence and market position, a CEO who is savvy in competitive marketing may be perceived as a fine leader.
But in the line function, where people expect guidance in technical areas, these same strategic marketing abilities will be insufficient. Relevant experience is a dimension of competence, one that is different from technical expertise. Experience is about active participation in situational, functional, and industry events and activities and the accumulation of knowledge derived from participation. An effective leader in a high-technology company, for example, may not need to be a master programmer but must understand the business implications of electronic data interchange, networking, and the Internet. A health care administrator with experience only in the insurance industry is more than likely doomed; the job needs extensive experience in the delivery of human services. There may be notable exceptions, but it is highly unlikely that a leader can succeed without both relevant experience and, most important, exceptionally good people skills.
The relative importance of the most desired qualities has varied somewhat over time, but there has been no change in the fact that these are the four qualities people want most in their leaders. Whether they believe their leaders are true to these values is another matter, but what they would like from them has remained constant. Those who are rated more highly on these dimensions are considered to be more credible sources of information. What we found in our in- foundation of vestigation of admired leadership qualities is that more leadership. than anything, people want to follow leaders who are credible. Credibility is the foundation of leadership. Above all else, we as constituents must be able to believe in our leaders. Adding forward-looking to what we expect from our leaders is what sets leaders apart from other credible individuals. Compared to other sources of information for example, news anchors , leaders must do more than be reliable reporters of the news.
Leaders make the news, interpret the news, and make sense of the news. We expect our leaders to have a point of view about the future. We expect them to articulate exciting possibilities. Even so, although compelling visions are necessary for leadership, if the leader is not credible the message rests on a weak and precarious foundation. Their ability to take strong stands, to challenge the status quo, and to point us in new directions depends on their being highly credible. Leaders must never take their credibility for granted, regardless of the times or their positions. To believe in the exciting future possibilities leaders present, constituents must first believe in their leaders.
Does credibility really matter? Does it make a difference? We asked people to rate their immediate managers. As part of our quantitative research, using a behavioral measure of credibility, we asked organization members to think about the extent to which their immediate manager exhibited credibility-enhancing behaviors. Credibility makes a difference, and leaders must take it personally. Loyalty, commitment, energy, and productivity depend on it. Credibility goes far beyond employee attitudes. It influences customer and investor loyalty as well as employee loyalty.
They found further that disloyalty can dampen performance by a stunning 25—50 percent. So what accounts for business loyalty? Price does not rule the Web; trust does. The data confirm that credibility is the foundation of leadership. But what is credibility behaviorally? How do you know it when you see it? When it comes to deciding whether a leader is believable, people first listen to the words, then they watch the actions. They listen to the talk, and then they watch the walk. They listen to the promises of resources to support change initiatives, and then they wait to see if the money and materials follow. They hear the promises to deliver, and then they look for evidence that the commitments are met.
If leaders espouse one set of values but personally practice another, people find them to be duplicitous. If leaders practice what they preach, people are more willing to entrust them with their livelihood and even their lives. DWYSYWD has two essential elements: say and do. To be credible in action, leaders must be clear about their beliefs; they must know what they stand for. This practice includes the clarification of a set of values and being an example of those values to others. This consistent living out of values is a behavioral way of demonstrating honesty and trustworthiness. People trust leaders when their deeds and words match. Who is that leader? Although no single leader receives a majority of the nominations, in the United States the two most frequently mentioned are Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King 45 c Anthony, Benazir Bhutto, César Chávez, Winston Churchill, Mahatma Gandhi, Mikhail Gorbachev, Miguel Hidalgo, Nelson Mandela, Golda Meir, His Holiness the Dalai Lama, J.
Robert Oppenheimer, His Holiness Pope John Paul II, Eleanor Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Mother Teresa, Margaret Thatcher, and Archbishop Desmond Tutu. What do leaders such as these have in common? Among these most admired leaders, one quality stands out above all else. They all have, or had, unwavering commitment to a clear set of values. They all are, or were, passionate about their causes. The lesson from this simple exercise is unmistakable. People admire most those who believe strongly in something, and who are willing to stand up for their beliefs. If anyone is ever to become a leader whom others would willingly follow, one certain prerequisite is that they must be someone of principle. All exemplary leaders share this quality no matter what status they may have achieved.
It could be a leader in your local community, one down the hall from you, one next door—and also you. you have to be able to be honest with yourself in order to be honest with others. I was a walking corpse. This means that I have to let people know and understand what my thoughts are so that I can become a good leader. People expect their leaders to speak out on matters of values and conscience. But to speak out you have to know what to speak about. To stand up for your beliefs, you have to know what you stand for. To walk the talk, you have to have a talk to walk. To do what you say, you have to know what you want to say. To earn and sustain personal credibility, you must first be able to clearly articulate deeply held beliefs. That is why Clarify Values is the first of the leader commitments we discuss in this book.
CLARIFY VALUES 47 c You have to freely and honestly choose the principles you will use to guide your decisions and actions. Then you have to genuinely express yourself. You must authentically communicate your beliefs in ways that uniquely represent who you are. FIND YOUR VOICE We all know deep down that people can only speak the truth when speaking in their own true voice. The techniques and tools that fill the pages of management and leadership books—including this one—are not substitutes for who and what you are. The neonatologist who first examined her told us that she had a 5 to 10 percent chance of living three days.
Realizing this, a wise and caring nurse named Ruth gave me my instructions. I want you to come to the hospital every day to visit Zoe, and when you come, I would like you to rub her body and her legs and her arms with the tip of your finger. But Max goes on. You will not have the integrity to lead. Explore Your Inner Territory Once, when discussing the origins of leadership, our conversation went something like this: CLARIFY VALUES 49 c I think leadership begins with caring. We grabbed one off the shelf, and opened it to care. Suffering and caring, discontent and concern, all come from one source. lose it, and shriek with joy when we achieve it. This is where you must go to find your voice. To find your voice, you have to explore your inner territory. You have to take a journey into those places in your heart and soul where you bury your treasures, so that you can carefully examine them and eventually bring them out for display.
You must know what you care about. And until you get close enough to the flame to feel the heat, how can you know the source? You can only be authentic when you lead according to the principles that matter most to you. But at the end is truth. This is the common lesson we must all learn. To act with integrity, you must first know who you are. You must know what you stand for, what you believe in, and what you care most about. In any organization, credibility building is a process that takes time, hard work, devotion, and patience. Painful as some of this was at the time, it not only contributed to my challenge but caused me to persevere. It reinforced my intent to contribute to a more encouraging and nurturing culture than what I was experiencing.
Every day she used personal journal writing for reflection and contemplation. What have I done inadvertently to demonstrate this is not a value for me? What do I need to do more of to CLARIFY VALUES 51 c They supply us with a moral compass by which to navigate the course of our daily lives. Clarity of values is essential to knowing which way, for each of us, is north, south, east, and west. This kind of guidance is especially needed in difficult and uncertain times. The late Milton Rokeach, one of the leading researchers and scholars in the field of human values, referred to a value as an enduring belief. He noted that values are organized into two sets: means and ends. We will use vision in Chapters Five and Six when we refer to the long-term ends values that leaders and constituents aspire to attain. Leadership takes both. When sailing through the turbulent seas of change and uncertainty, crewmembers need a vision of the destination that lies beyond the horizon, and they also need to understand the principles by which they must navigate their course.
If either of these is absent, the journey is likely to end with the crew lost at sea. Values influence every aspect of our lives: our moral judgments, our responses to others, our commitments to personal and organizational goals. Values set the parameters for the hundreds of decisions we all make every day. Radha Basu, cofounder of SupportSoft, explained how being clear about her personal values regarding career provided her the ability to make choices among competing demands, requests, and claims on her time and attention. If you are clear about your values, and your actions are aligned, it makes all Values serve the hard work worth the effort. We are much more in action. By knowing which means and ends are most important, we can act independently. We can also recognize a conflict between our own values and the values of the organization or society, and we can exercise choice about how to respond. Values also motivate. Values are the banners that fly as we persist, as we struggle, as we toil.
We refer to them when we need to replenish our energy. For example, John Siegel, M. Without actually saying it, I pushed the button that was in each of us, reminding us of the values we are living and the dream we all have for where we work. I had the least seniority of anyone, but I could say what I believed in, with confidence and a strength that comes from that personal commitment to values, and they listened. The mood changed, we were constructively engaged again, and eventually settled on a restructure plan that will improve how our department works. Just reminding yourself of the principles that are most important often can refocus your attention on the things that really matter. How much difference does being clear about values really make? We set out to empirically investigate the relationship between personal values clarity, organizational values clarity, and a variety of outcomes such as commitment and job satisfaction. Figure 3. Along the horizontal axis is the extent to which these same people report being clear about their own personal values.
We then correlated these responses with the extent to which people said they were committed to the organization as measured on a scale of 1 low to 7 high. The numbers in each of the four cells represent the average level of commitment people have to their organizations as it relates to the degree of their clarity about personal and organizational values. Take a look at where the highest level of commitment is. The people who have the greatest clarity about both personal and organizational values have the highest degree of commitment to the organization.
Now, take another look. Clarity of Organizational Values c qxd High 4. And indeed these folks are not significantly more committed than those with lower levels of organizational values clarity. It did us. So we looked again at the data to see if we could understand what people were telling us. Take a look at the second-highest level of commitment which, by the way, is not statistically different from the highest level. In other words, personal values drive commitment. Personal values are the route Personal values drive commitment. to loyalty and commitment, not organizational values. How can this be? How can people who are very clear about their own values be committed to a place that has never posted its organizational values? Think about it. Of course you have.
Clarity about personal values is more important in your attitude about work than is clarity about organizational values alone. Those individuals who are clearest about personal values are better prepared to make choices based on principle—including deciding whether the principles of the organization fit with their own! Say It in Your Own Words Once you have the words you want to say, you must also give voice to those words. In this book we present a lot of scientific data to support our assertions about each of the five leadership practices. But leadership is also an art. To become a credible leader you have to learn to express yourself in ways that are uniquely your own. As author Anne Lamott tells would-be writers in her classes: And the truth of your experience can only come through in your own voice. You can only lead out of your own. They follow you. One route to a true and genuine voice is in being more conscious about the words you choose and the words you use.
Words matter. Words send signals, and, if you listen intently, you just may hear the hidden assumptions about how someone views the world. Take the following examples from an after-lunch speech we heard a bank manager give to his employees. His intent was to motivate, but as we listened we heard more than that. We heard a fundamental belief system about how business functioned and what he believed to be important. Somehow it humanizes us. they want to grow and they want to be part of an organization that helps them to contribute to something that is far bigger than they could ever create on their own. Once we 9 get this right, then the rest will come into place. His is not about business as war, but about business as service and love. Tex and the bank manager are speaking in entirely different voices. Their words are internally congruent for each of them. Each would be disingenuous and inauthentic if they spoke like the other. Instead, you are free to choose what you want to express and the way you want to express it.
AFFIRM SHARED VALUES Shared values are the foundations for building productive and genuine working relationships. Although credible leaders honor the diversity of their many constituencies, they also stress their common values. Leaders build on agreement. Moreover, to achieve it would negate the very advantages of diversity. But to take a first step, and then a second, and then a third, people must have some common core of understanding. If disagreements over fundamental values continue, the result is intense conflict, false expectations, and diminished capacity. Leaders must be able to gain consensus on a common cause and a common set of principles. They must be able to build and affirm a community of shared values. He asked various team members to recall the NetApp values and provide examples of them at work. Recognition of shared values provides people with a common language.
Tremendous energy is generated when individual, group, and organizational values are in synch. Commitment, enthusiasm, and drive are intensified. People have reasons for caring about their work. When individuals are able to care about what they are doing, they are more effective and satisfied. They experience less stress and tension. Shared values are the internal compasses that enable people to act both independently and interdependently. As noted earlier in this chapter, employees are more loyal when they believe that their values and those of the organization are aligned. The quality and accuracy of communication and the integrity of the decision-making process increase when people feel part of the same team. They are more creative because they become immersed in what they are doing. Across a wide range of companies and industries, people whose personal values match those of their company feel significantly more strongly attached CLARIFY VALUES 61 c Not surprisingly, these two groups differ in the extent to which they find their management to be credible.
When leaders seek consensus around shared values, constituents are more positive. The energy that goes into coping with, and possibly fighting about, incompatible values takes its toll on both personal effectiveness and organizational productivity. difference in work attitudes and Research confirms that organizations with a strong corporate culture based on a foundation of shared val- performance. ues outperformed other firms by a huge margin. Studies of adaptive corporate cultures—organizations with consistent guiding values, a shared purpose, teamwork, innovation, and learning— showed similar powerful results. CLARIFY VALUES 63 c It renews commitment. It engages the institution in discussing values such as diversity, accessibility, sustainability, and so on that are more relevant to a changing constituency.
Which Shared Values Are Important? Is there some particular value or set of values that fuels organizational vitality? Consider this example of three electronics companies, each of which has a strong set of values. The second company is much flashier; its have very differ- important organizational values are associated with ent values. marketing, and the company gears itself toward providing outstanding customer service. Each of these companies operates by a different set of values. Is one more successful than the other? No, not really. All three companies compete in the same market, and all are successful, each with a different strategy and culture. Although there may not be one best set of values, you can find some guidance from the research on central themes in the values of highly successful, strong-culture organizations. These three common threads seem to be critical to weaving a values tapestry that leads to greatness.
Even with commonly identified values, there may be little agreement on the meaning of values statements. One study, for example, uncovered different behavioral expectations about the value of integrity alone. A common understanding of values emerges from a process, not a pronouncement. This is precisely what Michael Lin discovered when he became the technical support manager for a small wireless company. One of his initial actions was to bring people together just for that purpose, so that they could arrive at common and shared understandings of what their key priorities and values were and what these meant in action: The last thing I wanted them to feel was that my values were being imposed on them. So each person talked about their own values, the reasoning behind them. In this fashion we were able to identify the common values that were important to us as a group.
The key values that the team and I felt were most important to model were honesty, responsibility, customer focus, and teamwork. This led us to drafting a team credo: Do whatever it takes to satisfy the customer. The process of deciding on one common set of values was an extremely valuable unifying and clarifying experience. Instead they must be proactive in involving people in the process of creating shared values. Imagine how much ownership of values there would be if leaders actively engaged a wide range of people in their development. Shared values are the result of listening, appreciating, building consensus, and practicing conflict resolution. For people to understand the values and come to agree with them, they must participate in the process: unity is forged, not forced.
Someone who knows all about resolving conflict and building consensus around a unifying set of values is Pat Christen, president of HopeLab, a nonprofit organization that combines rigorous research with some very innovative solutions to improving the health and quality of life of young people with chronic illnesses. Pat found that shared values were critical guideposts when difficulties arose: Our staff and external collaborators have competencies that were really critical to our success with Re-Mission, but their different perspectives were often in conflict with one another in terms of how we should move forward with the project. Our leadership role was to manage these tensions to bring out the best in everyone.
It was an extraordinary challenge, but I believe that when you reach difficult crossroads in an organization, you go back to your core values and you constantly ask how you should be behaving and what path you should be taking in order to align your values with actions. The manner in which the staff rose to the occasion in producing such a high-quality product is a real testament to having a set of core values and using them to guide how you act and behave in the world. For values to be truly shared, they must be more than advertising slogans. Constituents must be able to enumerate the values and must have common interpretations of how those values will be put into practice.
They must know how the values influence their own jobs and how they directly contribute to organizational success. One word of caution: shared values should never be used as an excuse for the suppression of dissent. When dissenting voices are silenced, and when shared values become unquestioned doctrine, freedom of expression is lost— and with it goes innovation, creativity, and talent. Freedom of expression is essential to creating a culture of contribution and commitment. If leaders desire long-term sustainable growth and development, then freedom just may be that value that makes possible all the others. A unified voice on values results from discovery and dialogue. Leaders must provide a chance for individuals to engage in a discussion of what the values mean and how their personal beliefs and behaviors are influenced by CLARIFY VALUES 67 c Leaders must also be prepared to discuss values and expectations in the recruitment, selection, and orientation of new members.
That journey involves an exploration of the inner territory where your true voice resides. There must be agreement on the shared values that everyone will commit to upholding. Shared values make a significant and positive difference in work attitudes and performance, and a common understanding of those values emerges from a process, not a pronouncement. Unity comes about through dialogue and debate. We talk throughout this book about building your competence to lead in each of The Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership. Here are three actions that you can use to Clarify Values for yourself and others. Write a Tribute to Yourself Begin the process of clarifying your values by reflecting on your ideal image of yourself—how you would most like to be seen by others.
Hundreds of people will gather to pay tribute to your contributions to your family, your colleagues, your organization, or your community. Several people will make speeches praising your performance and your character. What words or phrases would you most like to hear others say about you? How would you like to be remembered tonight? What descriptions would make you feel the proudest? If you could write these tributes yourself, what would you want them to say? These descriptive adjectives and phrases may well be lofty and ideal. CLARIFY VALUES 69 c Write Your Credo Imagine that your organization has afforded you the chance to take a sixmonth sabbatical, all expenses paid. You will not be permitted to communicate to anyone at your office or plant while you are away.
Not by letter, phone, fax, e-mail, or other means. But before you depart, those with whom you work need to know the principles that you believe should guide their decisions and actions in your absence. You are not to write a long report, however. It usually takes about five to ten minutes to write a Credo Memo. We do not pretend that this exercise is a substitute for more in-depth self-discovery, but it does provide a useful starting point for articulating your guiding principles. To deepen the clarification process, identify the values you listed in your memo usually they appear as key words or phrases and put them in order of priority. Or rank them from low to high. Or place them on a continuum. Forcing yourself to express preferences enables you to see the relative potency of each value.
Explain the Credo Memo process to them see previous action and give them each time to write something—five to ten minutes should be sufficient. Once they have all written their own Credo Memos, ask each person to share with a few colleagues in small groups what he or she wrote. Ask them to describe both what they wrote and why they selected the values they recorded in the memo. Before they begin, you can model the process by reading your memo to them and telling them why you prize the values you chose. Remind your team that the objective of this activity is clarity. Once each person has had a chance to express key values, ask the groups to reflect on what was discussed. Ask, What are the common values that were expressed? The critical thing is that you begin to build consensus around a common set of values that emerges from the group and not one that is imposed from the top.
CLARIFY VALUES 71 c This in turn has had an effect on my mood, and I can see how this is also reflected in the ways others perceive me at work. Understanding my values allows me to be more passionate about my work and gives a focus for what everyone on the team should be striving for. While his company was applying a product upgrade to the live system of one of their customers, something went terribly wrong. This was a critical process for their customer, and there was simply no way they could wait until the next regular workday to work on the problem. This voice was fundamental in my decisions about getting personally involved in taking action and pulling the team together on a weekend. He described the situation, and learned that it helped immensely that he had already spent several hours testing the scope of the issue. But he clearly understood that even if the situation had been handled successfully, the wounds to morale and motivation would probably have been deep.
Before the team departed, Juan went to each team member, one by one, and thanked them personally for all their hard work. Then he sat down and followed up. This was indeed very rewarding. Leading by example is how leaders make visions and values tangible. Setting the Example is all about execution. How consistent are they in deed and word? PERSONIFY THE SHARED VALUES We were talking with Gary McBee, who at the time was executive vice president with a regional telecommunications company. He shared a personal story with us that clearly communicated how powerful modeling is, at home as well as at work. I sat him down in that big chair behind my desk. Call somebody in here and fire him. We send them through the daily choices we make.
We send them verbally and nonverbally. Mary Godwin became acutely aware of the messages she was sending as vice president of operations of a company that creditors were threatening to put into bankruptcy. My credibility depended upon this, and so I had to set the example for others to follow. In the end, they met the deadline from their creditors and kept the company from going into bankruptcy; most important to Mary, the entire operations team stayed on board through the whole process. SET THE EXAMPLE 77 c Cornell professor Tony Simons offers telling evidence of this. What you do speaks more loudly than what you say. our mouths to our feet.
Their mission is to represent the values and standards to the rest of the world, and it is their solemn duty to serve the values to the best of their abil- ities. Here are a few signal-sending actions to consider as you work to personally exemplify the shared values in your organization. Spend this precious nonrenewable resource on the most important values. Use words and phrases that best express the culture you want to create. Raise questions that intentionally stimulate people to think more purposefully about values. Ask others about the impact of your behavior on their performance. Each of these signal-sending opportunities offers a chance to make visible and tangible to others your personal commitment to a shared way of being. Each affords the chance to show where you stand on matters of principle. Exemplary leaders are very mindful of the signals they send and how they send them. If you say, for example, that your top priority is your customers or clients, patients, students, voters, or parishioners , then how much of your daily time do you spend with them?
If an independent auditor were to compare your daily calendar to what you say is important to you, what would it say in the audit report? Account reps from all over the United States, Latin America, and Canada were in the audience. When the show started, we fully expected to see the CEO walk out onto the stage with all the fanfare that goes with the role. Instead, the lights dimmed and a video began playing. There he was, larger than life all right, but instead of being live-and-in-person he was prerecorded. Here were some of the most important people in the company— the folks who call on customers and prospects every day—getting the cold shoulder from their chief. The employees who had invited us to speak said they felt slighted. Leaders make choices about where they spend their time and attention. They send signals by their presence and their SET THE EXAMPLE 79 c Setting an example means arriving early, staying late, and being there to show you care.
Whether the value is family, teamwork, hard work, or fun, the truest measure of what leaders deeply believe is how they spend their time. Constituents look to this metric and use it to judge whether a leader measures up to espoused standards. For example, by attending operating meetings in the field, leaders provide visible evidence of their concerns and the direction they want to pursue. Being there in person said more about how much Roberta values her constituents than any e-mail message, telegram, card, or video could ever do. If you disagree, try talking about an organization for even a day without using the words employee, manager, boss, supervisor, subordinate, or hierarchy. Those words can trap us into a particular way of thinking about our roles and relationships.
You have to make sure that everybody has a good understanding of what the beliefs are and a good understanding of what the expected behaviors are. Part of that belief system is encompassed in our language, and we have to be more deliberate about our language than we have been in the past. DaVita is definitely a name that fits the nature of their work. They take care of each other. They watch out for each other. Every member of the senior leadership crossed the bridge as part of their symbolic rite of passage into those roles. They know the power of words. The words people choose to use are metaphors for concepts that define attitudes and behaviors, structures and systems. Researchers have documented the power of language in shaping thoughts and actions. Just a few words from someone can make the difference in the beliefs that people articulate. For example, at an East Coast university where there was a publicized incidence of hate mail sent to an African American student, researchers randomly stopped students walking across campus and asked them what they thought of the occurrence.
Before the subject could respond, however, a confederate of the researchers would come up and answer. Then the researchers would stop another student and ask the same question. If you want people to act like citizens of a village you have to talk about them that way, not as subordinates in a hierarchy. If you want people to be innovative, you have to use words that spark exploration, discovery, and invention. Ask Purposeful Questions The questions you ask can also be quite powerful in focusing attention. Questions direct attention to the values that should be attended to and how much energy should be devoted to them. You need to be intentional and purposeful about the questions that you ask. You need to make sure that the questions you ask are directly related to the values that you hold dear.
What questions should you be asking, for example, if you want people to focus on integrity? On trust? On customer or client satisfaction? On quality? On innovation? On growth? On personal responsibility? Questions frame the issue and set the agenda. About a month later, we heard from a participant in the workshop who had done what we recommended. The third time, about be very effective 70 percent reported what they had done. And the tools for fourth? asked me what I had done in the last week to improve myself so I was better than I was last week. Questions can also develop people. They help others escape the trap of their own paradigms by broadening their perspectives and taking responsibility for their own viewpoints. Asking good questions, rather than giving answers, forces you to listen attentively to your constituents and what they are saying. This action demonstrates your respect for their ideas and opinions. If you are genuinely interested in what other people have to say then you need to ask their opinion, especially before giving your own.
Asking what others think facilitates participation in whatever decision will ultimately be determined and consequently increases support for that decision. Asking good questions reduces the risk that a decision might be undermined by either inadequate consideration or unexpected opposition. Seek Feedback Feedback comes from a variety of sources. For example, some of the feedback that Seang Wee Lee received when he was promoted at Cisco Systems was from his own management about the need to change the engagement model that his team used with internal organizations and external vendors. I utilize this feedback to further improve my leadership skills, identify shortfalls, and open up communications with the team. This promotes trust in my leadership and creates a climate of trust within the team and with me. I almost always learn about some things I can do to help develop each individual as well as the team, and also me.
Seeking feedback provides a powerful statement about the value of self-improvement and how everyone can be even better than they are today. The lowest-scoring item on its internal leadership assessment was the one on seeking feedback. We hear the same thing from other executive coaches. Credibility, which is at the foundation of leadership, from a behavioral perspective is about doing what you say you will do. How can you really expect to align your words and your actions over the long haul? Troy Hansen was vice president of AgDirect and Leasing, Farm Credit Services FCS of America, a leading financial services provider in Omaha, Nebraska, when he illustrated how his team learned that feedback is essential to both personal and professional development. He did something that had never been done before at FCS. To kick off the initial round of performance appraisals, Troy asked his team members to evaluate his performance first. After a brief orientation, Troy left the group members alone to evaluate his performance in private.
This was the first time the team members had given a performance review on a team leader, and quite naturally they were initially reluctant, particularly in front of other team members and without Troy present. He used that feedback and information to make a difference. Those giving the feedback can often feel a bit exposed themselves and may even fear retribution or hurting someone. Learning to be a better leader requires great self-awareness, and it requires making ourselves vulnerable. Modeling that for others makes it easier for them to do the same when it comes their turn. Part of leadership is making sure that their actions are also aligned with shared values. Respond to those disruptive occurrences in the life of your organization in ways that reinforce core values. Keep score and measure performance to determine consistency with values.
Critical incidents—chance occurrences, particularly at a time of stress and challenge—offer significant moments of learning for leaders and constituents. Critical incidents present opportunities for leaders to teach important lessons about appropriate norms of behavior. While working on a project developing a new technology that would have a huge impact on the way consumers would pay for purchases, she discovered a problem with the documentation that would require further work. There are important critical moments when leaders have to take action to lessons. put values squarely on the table and in front of others so that they can return to this common ground for working together.
In the process, leaders make clear how their actions are compelled by shared values. In this way they set an example for what it means to take actions on the basis of values. By standing up for values, leaders demonstrate that having shared values requires a mutual commitment to aligning words and deeds for everyone. They are those events in the lives of leaders and organizations that offer the chance to improvise while still staying true to the script. Tell Stories Critical incidents create important teachable moments. Stories are another way that leaders pass on lessons about shared values and get others working together. SET THE EXAMPLE 89 c When Steve was program director of knowledge management for the World Bank, one day he was sitting with a colleague over lunch and swapping work stories. His colleague thought this was a neat illustration of how knowledge sharing on the Web was working, even in one of the poorest countries on earth.
In the weeks that followed, Steve saw the Zambia story starting to have unexpectedly positive results. Why storytelling? Charts left listeners bemused. Prose remained unread. Dialogue was just too laborious and slow. Time after time, when faced with the task of persuading a group of managers or frontline staff in a large organization to get enthusiastic about a major change, I found that storytelling was the only thing that worked. Why tell stories? On the basis of his personal experience with storytelling, David offers a dozen reasons why telling stories is such an effective leadership practice. Among them are these: stories are simple, timeless, and can appeal to everybody regardless of age, gender, or race.
They pull back. They get upset. They withdraw. But telling stories is friendly and enjoyable. People want to hear what you have to say. Research on stories shows that when leaders want to communicate standards, stories are a much more effective means of communication than are corporate policy statements, data about performance, and even a story plus the data. It gives you an actual example that people can remember a lot better. Storytelling can be tied to people and names and events that are much more relevant. SET THE EXAMPLE 91 c It forces leaders to pay close attention to what their constituents are doing. When others hear or read a story about someone with whom they can identify, they are much more likely to see themselves doing the same thing. People seldom tire of hearing stories about themselves and the people they know. These stories get repeated, and the lessons of the stories get spread far and wide. Reinforce the Behavior You Want Repeated Leaders need feedback to help keep them on track.
So do their constituents. Research indicates clearly that measurement and feedback are absolutely essential to increasing efforts to improve performance. For instance, the game of hockey was altered forever when the league changed the rules so that players got points for assists and not just for goals. All of a sudden team members started passing the puck to each other rather than trying to be the one that put it through the net. Brian Coleman knows firsthand about the impact of scorekeeping. When he was tool-and-die manager with Ford Motor Company in the United Kingdom, he led a turnaround effort at one of their plants. After only five hours there What you were more than fourteen hundred ticks on our draw- choose to rein- ing!
I asked the team where we should begin, and they pointed to the area with the densest mass of ticks. For Brian and his team, that simple measuring device was a major factor in reducing the number of defects by over 70 percent and nearly doubling productivity in three months. Leaders can easily influence outcome by providing the tools for measuring progress. The important message to keep in mind is that what you choose to reinforce is what people will choose to value. You have to reinforce the key values important to building and sustaining the kind of culture you want. Leaders must be attentive to how people are made to feel when they take risks SET THE EXAMPLE 93 c Are people rewarded or punished when they fail? Are positive or negative stories told about failure? The same goes for all other support systems—incentive, recruitment, training, information, and the like.
Setting the Example is all about execution and action. Time is a precious asset, because once passed it can never be recovered. But if invested wisely, it can earn returns for years. The language leaders use and the questions they ask are other powerful ways that shape perceptions of what they value. Critical incidents—those chance occurrences in the lives of all organizations—offer marvelous teachable moments. They offer leaders the opportunity to pass along lessons in real time, not just in the classroom. Sometimes critical incidents become stories, and stories are among the most influential tools leaders have to teach values. And leaders also have to remember that what gets reinforced gets done. They also have to reward the appropriate behavior if they expect it to get repeated. People are always watching you, always talking about you. Audit your daily routines.
Are you spending sufficient time on matters consistent with your shared values? Use your shared values as the basis for planning your weekly schedule. Let values be your guide, not old habits or the in-basket. Audit your daily calendar. How much time are you spending modeling shared values? How do your appointments contribute to communicating and reinforcing shared values?
edu no longer supports Internet Explorer. To browse Academia. edu and the wider internet faster and more securely, please take a few seconds to upgrade your browser. Log in with Facebook Log in with Google. Remember me on this computer. Enter the email address you signed up with and we'll email you a reset link. Need an account? Click here to sign up. Download Free PDF. The Leadership Challenge Workbook. jumaal smith. Read Article Download. Kouzes and Barry Z. All rights reserved. Published by Jossey-Bass A Wiley Imprint Market Street, San Francisco, CA www. com No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, elec- tronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as permitted under Section or of the United States Copyright Act, without the prior written permission of the Publisher.
Jossey-Bass books and products are available through most bookstores. To contact Jossey-Bass directly call our Customer Care Department within the U. at , outside the U. at or fax Jossey-Bass also publishes its books in a variety of electronic formats. Some content that appears in print may not be available in electronic books. Don is the first amputee to climb Mt. One hop at a time. As much as you might desire it, you simply cannot leap to the top of a mountain. Yet we sometimes find ourselves simply paralyzed by the mere scale of the challenge. We are challenged to do more with less, adapt quickly to changing circumstances, innovate on the fly, deal with extreme uncertainty, and somehow still find time for our families and friends.
But so is looking up to the top of that mountain when you are at the bottom. But Don had something else in mind when he looked up at the top of that mountain. When we asked Don to tell us why he wanted to be the first amputee to climb Mt. Rainier, he told us it was because he wanted to demonstrate to other disabled people that they were capable of doing more than they might have thought they could do. Don had aspirations that went beyond individual glory and success. He was the one doing the climbing, but he was not climbing just for himself.
He was climbing for an entire community. He had a vision of others doing great things. This is a practical guide that is designed to help you use The Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership®—the model of leadership derived from more than twenty years of research—as a tool for planning and preparing for your next climb to the summit. The Leadership Challenge Workbook is a one-hop-at-a-time guide for leaders. When we began our research, we wanted to find out what practices characterize exemplary leadership, so we created a question that framed everything else.
We did not want to know what the most famous and the most senior leaders did. We wanted to know what leaders at all levels and in all contexts did. We asked people to tell us a story about one project they led that they considered their Personal Best Leadership Experience—an experience that set their individual standard of excellence. We collected thousands of stories of leaders performing at their peak, and we looked for actions that were consistent across all the stories. Many years—and several thousand quantitative and qualitative analyses later, we found that there are Five Practices that define exemplary leadership.
Or you might know The Five Practices because you have used our degree assessment instrument, Leadership Practices Inventory LPI to further your development as a leader. In case the practices are new to you, we provide a brief overview in Chapter 2 of this workbook. Whether you are familiar with our other work or not, we ask you to keep this in mind: When you engage in The Five Practices more frequently than you do at present, you will be more effective. We know from our research that those who Model, Inspire, Challenge, Enable, and Encourage more frequently are more likely to get extraordinary things done than those who do so less frequently.
Exemplary leadership, in other words, is not an accident of birth or circumstance. PROJECTS PROVIDE THE CONTEXT Projects are how we tend to organize work these days. Projects create the context for our goals, determine with whom we work, and set our schedules. We will be more specific in Chapter 3 about what kind of project to select, but you might start thinking now about something you are currently leading or about to lead that could benefit from the application of exemplary practices. One important point to keep in mind is that every new project you take on provides you with an opportunity. It all depends on how you approach the challenge. Your next project is your chance to create extraordinary results for your organization and to develop your leadership capabilities. This workbook is designed to help you plan and prepare so that you can lead at your personal best. This workbook is designed for anyone in a leadership role.
Its purpose is to help you further your abilities to lead others to get extraordinary things done. Whether you are in the private or public sector, an employee or a volunteer, a first-line supervisor or a senior executive, a student or a parent, you will find that this workbook applies to you. You can grant someone the title of chief executive, but that does not make him or her a leader. Leadership is earned. You get to be a leader in the eyes of others because of what you do. Leadership is about hav- ing the courage and spirit to move from whatever circumstances you are in to a place of mak- ing a difference in the world. This workbook is designed to help anyone who has the desire to lead and the will to make a difference. While our research has taught us many things about the practice of leadership, our inter- action with the thousands of individuals we have studied has taught us something more important.
We need more leaders today, not fewer. We need more people to accept responsibility for bringing about sig- nificant changes in what we do and how we do it. We need more people to answer the call. The world is in great need of your talents. We believe that you are capable of developing yourself as a leader far more than tradition or mythology has ever assumed possible. Simply imagine yourself standing at the base of Mt. Rainier, and then start climbing—one hop at a time. We wish you great joy and success on your next leadership adventure. Onward and upward! James M. They see all experiences as learning experiences. If you want to become a better leader, you need to study your own perfor- mance and become more conscious about the choices that you are making and how you are act- ing on your intentions. The purpose of The Leadership Challenge Workbook is to help you become a better leader by applying The Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership to a project of your choice. As with the learning of any new discipline, we will ask you to do some exercises that isolate specific skills.
If you are not already familiar with The Five Practices, read this chapter carefully— it provides the foundation for the work that you will be doing. As you progress through the activities, the Workbook supports your success in three ways: 1. We want you to think about how you approach leadership. The questions we pose are designed to challenge your thinking and help you become more conscious about how well you engage in each of the Practices. Contrary to myths about leader- ship that assume you either have it or you do not, we know from our research that the very best leaders spend time examining what they have done and are planning to do. We want you to apply the practices and commitments to your project.
To do that, we provide exercises that help put The Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership to work. In some cases you will do this application alone. In other cases, you will go out to talk to your team members and engage them in an activity. As a result of your reflections and applications, you will learn about your- self, your team, your organization, and your project. At the end of each chapter, we ask you to jot down the implications of what you have learned about leadership. On a practical level, that may not be possible.
The way you use the Workbook depends on the nature of your project and your situation. Then go back and start with those worksheets that address immediate concerns. For example, your team may have been working long hours and has not taken a break. You believe that they need some recognition and celebration. In that case, start with Chapter 8, Encourage the Heart. Or you may feel that conflicts have arisen because there is not con- sensus around shared values. In that instance, begin with Chapter 4 on Model the Way. However, make sure you address all of The Five Practices and complete all activities as soon as you can.
They are all designed to improve the way you lead.
The Leadership Challenge Workbook (PDF),0 Comments
WebThe Leadership Challenge helps you stay current, relevant, and effective in the modern workplace. Read less. The Leadership Challenge 6Th Edition PDF Book Details. WebMar 14, · The Leadership Challenge Workbook - Free PDF Download - pages - year: Home. Printed in the United States of America first edition ISBN WebMay 24, · The The Leadership Challenge 6Th Edition Free Pdf is a great read for those who love information and learning new things. When you get your hands on The WebThe Leadership Challenge 6th Edition Pdf Free Download is the gold-standard manual for effective leadership, grounded in research and written by the premier authorities in WebTHE LEADERSHIP CHALLENGE 6/3/07 PM Page 55 cate that personal values clarity makes a significant difference in behavior at work. Figure shows what we discovered WebOct 2, · Download The Leadership Challenge Book in PDF, Epub and Kindle. The most trusted source of leadership wisdom, updated to address today's realities The ... read more
Reading the book feels like speaking to a mentor on leadership. Leaders venture out. The task of each reader was to look for articles that had implications for their business in the future and then to write one-page summaries of the trends and their implications for the business. When they are doing their best, leaders exhibit certain distinct practices, which vary little from industry to industry, profession to profession, community to community, and country to country. The questions we pose are designed to challenge your thinking and help you become more conscious about how well you engage in each of the Practices. These stories get repeated, and the lessons of the stories get spread far and wide.
We asked constituents to tell us what they look for in a person that they would be willing to follow, someone who had the personal traits, characteristics, the leadership challenge 6th edition pdf free download, and attributes they wanted in a leader. What made them meaningful, energizing, enriching, and fun? This process of continually scanning the horizon for emerging trends helped the team stay ahead of the curve. Say that you are going to ask them to think outside the box—literally! Whether they believe their leaders are true to these values is another matter, but what they would like from them has remained constant.
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