The Leadership Equation, L=2S

At some point in your life, you will probably need to apply leadership principles.  Maybe this will be through work in a management role.  Maybe this will be in church, through a volunteer position.  Or maybe, this will be at home as you become a leader to your children.

Many people see the fame and power associated to leadership roles and for this reason want to lead a team or an organization.

However, people in leadership roles have earned the respect and trust to obtain that leadership position.  How, was this respect and trust built up?  What did the leader do over time to demonstrate their value to others?  Remember that the amount we get paid is directly proportional to the value we bring to the table.

Some people think that a leader earned this respect and trust through service.  That is true, this is the first piece of the puzzle.  A leader spends their time serving others because through service, they provide the most value to solve other people's most pressing problems.  However, this is not all.  People will not just follow a leader who is a great servant.  There is one other important piece of the puzzle.

That is the other 'S' word, skill.  Leadership is service plus skill.  A leader can not just dictate and tell other people what to do.  People do not like to be told what to do.  They might take the advice and recommendations of a leader based on respect and trust.  However, the leader must also be constantly growing and improving strengths to hone a particular skill.  That skill may be being able to identify or relate to people.  That skill may be working with software.  That skill may be the ability to find and cultivate the skills of others.

What do you think?  Is it possible to create wealth without leadership?  What have you done in the past week to improve your leadership skills?

This post was reposted from http://finlit.biz/business/the-leadership-equation-l2s/, originally written on February 22nd, 2013.

From Eric Silverman...

This is topic near and dear to my heart.

You’ve touched on something that a lot of people don’t understand: the difference between a manager and a leader. The prior comes for a title, and can be gotten via different avenues; only one of which is moral and ethical behavior. The latter cannot be given, only earned. Another way to think of it is the difference between pride and honor. Pride is something we tend to bestow on ourselves, e.g., “Southern Pride”, “Black Pride”, or pride in our workmanship; whereas honor is an attribute that a person earns, and is then considered to be “an honorable person.” In this analogy Pride is to Manager as Honor is to Leader. (Sorry for the SAT exam flashback.)

My point is, as with honor, being considered to be a leader is something that must be earned. And it is the derivative of a Skills (“S”) that has been obtained during the way, and the correct Application (“A”) of those skills. As such I would initially have written the equation as L=A+S. But that seems too simple. If it was that easy, we would have many more leaders amongst us. There’s something missing. And to be honest, I haven’t a clue as to what it is; but I do know that it raise the value of A+S to a level that the two combine would never obtain.

My final equation would then look more like this, L = (A+S)^x.