The Law of Empowerment (12)

Only Secure Leaders Give Power To Others

If leaders want to be successful, they have to be willing to empower others.

The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint enough to keep from meddling with them while they do it.
Theodore Roosevelt

To lead others well, we must help them to reach their potential.  Scarcity mindset is one in which we feel a need to fight others to make it to the top.  In reality, if you give some of your power away to others, there is still plenty to go around.

Leading well is not only about enriching yourself - its about empowering others.  We have to shift leadership models away from 'position power' to 'people power' which is giving people leadership roles so that can contribute to their fullest capacity.  When you don't empower others, you are creating a barrier that, if it remains long enough, the people will give up and stop trying, or they will leave.

3 Barriers To Empowering Leaders

1 - Desire For Job Security
When you empower great leaders under you, you will develop a pattern of achievement, excellence, and leadership that will be recognized and rewarded.  If the teams you lead always seem to succeed, people will figure out that you are leading them well.

2 - Resistance To Change
Change is a price of progress

3 - Lack of Self-Worth
The best leaders have a strong sense of self-worth.  To those who have confidence in themselves, change is a stimulus because they believe one person can make a difference and influence what goes on around them.  These people are the doers and motivators

Great thing happen when you don't care who gets the credit.  The greatest things happen only when you give others the credit.

"Leadership must be based on goodwill ... It means obvious and wholehearted commitment to helping followers ... What we need for helpful that they, in effect, do away with the need of their jobs.  But leaders like that are never out of a job, never out of followers.  Strange as it sounds, great leaders gain authority by giving it away."

Admiral James B. Stockdale

THE PRESIDENT OF EMPOWERMENT

Abraham Lincoln was known for his humility and willingness to give his power and authority to others.  One Lincoln biographer said this of his method:

The main ingredient for empowering others is a high belief in people.  If you believe in others, they will believe in themselves. 

Enlarging others makes you larger.

Applying The Law of Empowerment

1 - Gauge your level of self-worth, confidence, and value.  Work to and take positive steps to add value to yourself.

2- Make a list of the people who work with you and rate each person's potential.  If the number's are low, check how you value others.  Begin dwelling on people's positive qualities and characteristics.  Look for people's greatest strengths and envision how they could leverage those strengths to achieve significant things.  Imagine what individuals could become if they made the most of their gifts and opportunities.  Then help them to do so.

3 - Make sure that you are doing everything that you can to empower others.  Select great people and do everything you can to set them up for success.  Train them, give them resources, and help them set accomplishable goals that will help you, them, and the organization.  Then give them the responsibility and authority to follow through.  And if they at first fail, help them keep trying until they succeed.  Once you experience the joy and organizational effectiveness of empowering others, you will have a hard time not giving your power away.

The Law Of Inner Circle (10)

A Leader's Potential Is Determined By Those Closest To Him

Nobody does anything great alone.  
No leader can do everything great, so its important to have great people around you who can compliment you.  Mother Theresa once said, "You can do what I cannot do.  I can do what you cannot do.  Together we can do great things."

The leader finds greatness in the group, and he or she helps the members find it in themselves.

Warren Bennis

1 - Do they have influence with others?
2 - Do they bring a complimentary gift to the table?
3 - Do they hold a strategic position in the organization?
4 - Do they add value to me and to the organization
5 - Do they positively impact other inner circle members?

There are three kinds of people in an organization when it comes to leadership: 1 - those who get it almost immediately and they're off and running with it; 2 - those who are skeptical and not sure what to do with it; and 3 - another third who start out negative and hope it will go away.  Don't spend all of your time with those who are the most negative trying to convince them to change.  Spend your time with the people in the first group.  Invest in your best assets.

Success comes not from what you know but from who you know and how you present yourself to each of those people.  Your first step is always to become the best leader you can.  They next is to surround yourself with the best leaders you can find.

Applying The Law of Connection
1 - Identify the people in your inner circle, their strengths and weaknesses, and what specifically they bring to the table.  If they don't have a clear role or function, then write what you believe they have the potential to contribute.  

2 - Great inner circles don't happen by chance or accident.  You have to cultivate and grown it.
- Spend extra time together to mentor and develop relationships
- Give extra responsibility and place higher expectations on them
- Give them more credit when things go well and hold them accountable when they don't

The Law of Connection (10)

Leaders Touch A Heart Before They Ask For A Hand

When it comes to working with people, you have to engage them on a human level - to make a connection with them.  The heart comes before the head.  You can't move people to action unless you first move them with emotion.  

Great leaders work at connecting with others all of the time, whether they are communicating to an entire organization or working with a single individual.  The stronger the relationship you form with followers, the greater the connection you forge - the more likely those followers will be to want to help you.

"People don't care how much you know until they know how much you care."

Even in a group, you have to relate to people as individuals.  

"I have seen competent leaders who stood in front of a platoon and all they saw was a platoon. But great leaders stand in front of a platoon and see it as forty-four individuals, each of whom has aspirations, each of whom wants to live, each of whom want to do good." - General Norman Shwarzkopf

Even in a large group, it important to talk to each one person.  

1 - Connect With Yourself - Be confident and be yourself
2 - Communicate With Openness and Sincerity
3 - Know Your Audience - Speak to what they care about, not what you care about
4 - Live Your Message - Practice what you preach
5 - Go To Where They Are - Speak their language
6 - Focus On Them, Not Yourself - You will always connect faster when your focus is not on yourself
7 - Believe In Them - Believe in the value of others - People's opinion of us has less to do with what they see in us than it does with what we can help them see in themselves

It's always the leader's job to take the first step in connecting and in building the relationship.  And in doing so, don't try to convince them - connect wiht them.

Is is said that Napoleon made it a practice to know every one of his officers by name and to remember where they lived and which battles they had fought with him.  Robert E. Lee was known to visit the men at their campsites the night before any major battle.  Its important to find times to make yourself available to people.  Learn their names.  Tell them how much you appreciate them.  Find out how they are doing.  And most important - listen.

When a leader truly has done the work to connect with his people, you can see it in the way the organization function.  Employees exhimit loyalty and a strong work ethic.  The vision of the leader becomes the aspiration of the people.  The impact is incredible.  

"To lead yourself, use your head.  To lead others, use your heart."

Applying The Law of Connection

1 - You have to start with knowing and liking who you are.  Start by measuring your level of self-awareness.

- How would I describe my personality?

- What is my greatest character strength?

- What is my greatest character weakness?

- What is my single greatest asset?

- What is my single greatest deficit?

- How well do I relate to others (1-100)?

- How well do i communicate with others (1-10)?

- How likable am I (1-10)?

2 - Learn to walk slowly through the crowd and connect before you get to business.  Taking a few minutes each day will pay huge dividends in the future.  

3 - Work everyday on how well you communicate with others at every level.

The Law of Magnetism (9)

Who You Are Is Who You Attract

Who you attract is not determined by what you want.  It's determined by who you are.  You draw people to you who posses the same qualities you do.  

Its important to identify important qualities that you would like in the people on your team.

My People Would Have These Qualities:
-  Energy and enthusiasm
-  Passion
-  Competitive
-  Visionary
-  Appreciate 'The Law of Process'
-  Desire to grow

Then, identify which of these qualities that you possess.  If you possess theses qualities, then you will continue to attract these kinds of people.  If there is a disparity between these qualities and who you are, you know where you need to begin to work to improve the type of people you are attracting.

Attitude is one of the most contagious qualities a human being possesses.  People with great attitudes tend to make people around them feel more positive, while people with negative attitudes tend to bring those around them down with them.

Al McGuire, a former basketball coach for Marquette University, once said, "A team should be an extension of the coach's personality.  My teams were arrogant and obnoxious."  Maxwell says that it's more than a matter of 'should be' - teams cannot help being an extension of their leader's personality.

As you start to look at those around you and their personalities and their character, and if they match what you want, then you are on track with your personality and your character.  If you see people around you who do not match what you want - negative, unreliable, and unfocused - then you need to reexamine your personality and character, and you need to embrace the Law of Process and work to grown yourself.  

The better leader that you are, the better the people you will begin to attract.  If you want to attract better people, become the type of person you desire to attract.

Applying The Law of Magnetism

1 - Identify the characteristics and qualities you desire in the people around you, and think about why.  Then, think about whether you are describing people who are like you or who are different from you.  If there is disparity, you need to embrace the Law of Process, and find ways to grow as a person and as a leader.

2 - If you are already attracting the kinds of people you desire, then its time to take your leadership to the next level by working at staffing your weaknesses and recruiting people who all complement your leadership in the area of skills.  Be able to identify your strengths and weaknesses.

The Law of Intuition (8)

The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership - John Maxwell Chapter 8 - The Law of Intuition

Leaders Evaluate Everything With a  Leadership Bias

Leaders know have to read their instincts and follow their intuition in making decisions.  Sure, they pull together facts and do their research, but at the end of the day, they always trust their instincts in their areas of strength. 

Leaders look at things differently than others do - they look at everything through a leadership bias.  

People are intuitive in their area of strength.

Leaders make decision based on their instincts and intuition.  They make decisions based on facts plus instinct plus other intangible factors, such as employee morale, organizational momentum, and relational dynamics.  

Colin Powell says that his practice is to make a leadership decision after gathering only 40 to 60 percent of the information has been obtained, and then he uses his experience to make up the difference.  He bases his leadership decisions as much on intuition as on facts.  

Who you are dictates what you see.  How you see the world around you is determined by who you are.\

Leadership intuition is the ability to read what's going on.  Intuition comes from two things: the combination of natural ability, which comes in a person's areas of strength, and learned skills.  

You must be able to read:

- The situation - must be know what your current situation is, the good, the bad, and the ugly

- Trends - must be able to see the bigger picture and understand where your field is going

- Resources - must know what you have and how to maximize your assets

- People - must know who you are leading and influencing to know how to get the best out of them

- Themselves - 'No one can produce great things who is not thoroughly sincere in dealing with himself.'

Three Levels Of Leadership Intuition

1 - Those who naturally understand leadership

2 - Those who can be nurtured to understand leadership

3 - Those who will never understand leadership

A leader has to read the situation and know instinctively what play to call.

The Law Of Respect (7)

The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership - John Maxwell Chapter 7 -  The Law of Respect

People Naturally Follow Leaders Stronger Than Themsleves

Followers are more attracted to leaders who are better leaders than themselves.  Leaders think in terms of the direction they desire to go and who they want to take with them.  Followers can sense a strong sense of conviction from a leader and are attracted to that.  

To become a leader of leaders, you must gain respect.

Ways You Can Gain Respect

1 - Natural leadership ability

2 - Respect for others

3 - Courage

4 - Have success

5 - Loyalty

6 - Add value

An easy way to measure your level of respect is to look at who you attract.

"One measure of leadership is the caliber of people who choose to follow you."

- Dennis A. Peer -  

You should also see how your people respond when you ask for commitment or change.

When people respect you as a person, they admire you.

When they respect you as a friend, they love you.

When they respect you as a leader, the follow you.

"The leader must know, must know he knows, and must be able to make it abundantly clear to those about him that he knows."

- Clarence B. Randall -

The more you grow as a leader, the better the people you will attract because people naturally follow leaders stronger than themselves.

Applying the Law Of Respect

1 - Think about the last to you asked followers for a commitment to something or the last time you tried to initiate change.  What was their response?  How readily do people rally to you? That is an accurate gauge of your leadership level

2 - Evaluate yourself on each of the following qualities that help a leader gain respect:

Natural Leadership Ability

Respect for Others

Courage

Success Record

Loyalty

Value Added to Others

In one sentence for each area in which you need to improve, write a practice, habit or goal that will help you improve.