Choose to be a leader worth following

30 Sep, 2018 - 00:09 0 Views

The Sunday Mail

You are a leader! Make no mistake and do not doubt this important fact.

You do not have to climb some lofty mountain and do the impossible to feel like one. The leadership challenge stands at your doorstep, sits at your desk and knocks on your door daily.

Someone is waiting for you to stop thinking like a victim, rise up and lead. Someone values your insights, and socks into your energy. Let your energy be positive and inspiring, not toxic and dispiriting. Inspire and infuse those around you with hope, positive energy and worthy ideas.

Let your thoughts reveal your leadership and your dream be big and inspiring. Let your worth and words speak to your leadership greatness. Let your ideas be worth recording and your path worth following. Leadership is a choice that you make, choose to be worth following. The opportunities to lead and add value are everywhere. Wherever you see something broken, there is room for leadership. Wherever you see chaos, there is a leadership job to do. Wherever people are obsessed with little things, there you can lead and infuse big vision. Wherever you witness disorder, there your leadership can make a difference.

Leaders do not run away from reality or delegate the cleaning job to others. Leaders are willing to fix things and not just waiting to get into a humming machine. Leaders face the brutal facts of their reality and work to find solutions, learn as they go and inspire vision, restoring hope and charting new paths.

Bloom wherever you are planted. Do not look for the big stage because where you stand at this time is a wide stage for you to play and make a difference. It is for a purpose that you are here. Add value for you to be valuable. Make a difference for anything to be different. Wherever you are planted, plant something positive that will shelter others and outlive you. Leadership is a daily walk, and an ever-present challenge. Are you willing to take it? Taking responsibility is a choice. Taking extreme ownership is a worthy leadership decision.

Many look, jeer, scoff, scorn and pout ceaseless complaints. That is not leadership, it is just mere fallacy. Others just stare and complain, that is not leadership either. Leaders, like you, take the challenge of leadership as a call of destiny. They choose to model the way and walk the path of leadership. Someone is looking at you right now as a model and example. Leaders see beyond the present and paint a positive and penetrating picture deep into the future. It is those who see the future who study the maps to take them there. Leaders see beyond their noses, and think beyond the present challenges. Someone is looking to you for a signal and sense of the future and what it might hold. Do not disappoint them through blind words, and a lame faith but inspire vision. Someone is tired of what things have been and wants tangible change. Be the change and challenge the process, think differently and innovate. Disrupt yourself and dump what no longer works. Leaders do not park at a “No Road” sign but they steer things and blaze new paths. Someone is feeling held back and cornered by circumstances. Leaders enable others to act by liberating talent and giving others worthy challenges and ideals to live up to. Someone is feeling discouraged, disillusions and disappointed. Leaders encourage the heart, inspire hope and give meaning to work. What things are today is not what they will always be. The obstacles you see today, will not be there forever. The biggest factor in change is the quality of leadership. Lead, learn and leverage your daily efforts on the leadership path. You do not have the luxury of a purposeless wait and pointless delays.

Mathematics of leadership

I find mathematics fascinating, beautiful and filling all things. Leadership is a lot like mathematics. Everything that works is mathematical and everything is leadership at work. Some mathematical operations are simple, while others are complex. So is the leadership task. Some tasks are simple and mundane; while others are tough, complex and rigorous. Some mathematical operations and symbols are easy to understand, while others look strange, represent complex ideas and models; yet they help us understand the world better and turn the complex into every usage. Leadership is an exercise in simplifying the complex to enable people to act with boldness, courage and conviction.

Mathematics is a lifetime study and exploration of the world and its wonders. The more you study it, the higher the realms of understanding you reach and the insights you get. So it is with leadership – it is a lifetime study. The journey of leadership can only start but it can never end. The call of leadership is to learn and lead daily. When you stop learning, you abandon your leadership cloak.

Every mathematical function and symbol has value and use but not in every situation. Nothing is ever neutral, it has some effect. As a leader affect the things in your world. Choose to be the positive difference and influence. Some of the effects are simple, do not shy away from simple challenges. Some leaders affect people in complex ways, do not run away from leadership challenges that call for depth, skill and competence. You are most valuable as a leader when you add value to people and you make a difference.  Perhaps the most important things about leadership is what we all learn in elementary mathematics: adding and subtracting, multiplying and dividing. Good leaders add momentum; bad ones subtract energy. Choose to be an adding leader, not a subtracting one. Good leaders are multipliers – they liberate talent, amplify potential, face big challenges, rent brains that are bigger than theirs, leverage capabilities, listen, learn and let people be brilliant around them.

Fire of leadership

Good leaders do not just shoot at random and fire people without thinking. That is for subtracting leaders who play the game of musical chairs. The game of musical chairs is one where you set up chairs in a circle, with one chair short of the number of people in the room. You then play the music and when you stop everyone must scramble for a chair. The person without a chair is eliminated from the game and a chair is removed. You keep removing chairs and eliminating people. Bad leaders play the game of musical chairs.

Great leaders instead of firing people get people fired up, inspired and motivated. Inspire the people around you to be their best and to give their best. Liberate talent and the fire within people. Do not leave people’s capabilities on the table or let their talent languish. Lead and grow people. Connect people with opportunities and shine the spotlight on them. Never let any talent in the team be idle. Good leaders fire people up. Do you fire people up or put out the fire in people?

Milton Kamwendo is a leading international transformational and motivational speaker, author, and executive coach. His life purpose is to inspire and promote greatness. He can be reached at: [email protected] and Twitter: @MiltonKamwendo or WhatsApp at: 0772422634. His website is: www.miltonkamwendo.com

 

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