Are You Effective in Leadership Style?

Numerous styles of have been shared over the course of time. In my research, I have decided to share two very specific theories which describe behaviors that demonstrate how effective or ineffective a leader can be.

In the 1930's, Dr. Levin, a psychologist, led a group of researchers in a study which established 3 types of leadership - Authoritarian, Delegative, and Participative.

• Authoritarian, also known as autocratic, was a style where the leader tells you how to think and act. It's the leader's way or the highway. A tremendous amount of distinction between the boss and the underlings and never the twain shall meet.
• Delegative, also known as laissez-faire, was a style where the leader offers little or no guidance and leaves the decisions up to the group.
  
• Participative, also know as democratic, was a style where the leader offers support and guidance. This leader actively seeks input and actually listens and responds to suggestions. In this type of leadership, the leader actually actively engages and participates within their team.

In the 1990's to the present, Dr. Paul Taffinder, an world renowned expert in leadership has been researching and publishing about seven styles of leadership. In 2006, Dr. Taffinder published these interesting styles of leadership in the book entitled, The Leadership Crash Course.

• The Transformational Leader is a style that transforms commitment and levels of performance, highly goal directed and willing to go against traditional approaches.
• The Enforcer is a style that are cautiously optimistic while driving towards very specific, defined objectives.
  
• The Deal Maker is a style that attracts followers because of the energy, enthusiasm and interest in the new and exciting.
  
• The Administrator is a style clear in what needs to be achieved and ruthlessly follow through.
• The Visionary is a style that inspires people to dream of greatness but fail to follow through.
• The Serial Entrepreneur is a style that is imaginative, but calculating, gamblers, displaying huge energy and commitment and sweeping people along with them because they make seemingly impossible challenges achievable
• The Spin Doctor is a style that seems to be everything a leader should be, but their behavior is inconsistent and self-serving.

These are two different approaches to defining styles of leadership. Both experts researched and identified traits and abilities that demonstrate varying degrees of effectiveness as a leader. At any given time, people will demonstrate any and all of these leadership styles. The question now becomes, how can we aspire to become like the traditional style from Dr. Levin's research, participative leader? And the next question, which in my mind now becomes imperative in this time of indecision, ineffective decisions, entrenched styles of leadership become truly transformational as Dr. Taffinder recommends?

I'm interested in your thoughts.

Capture the Loveliness

A few days ago, the east coast of the United States was beyond dreary and gray. For what seemed like endless hours, the landscape was battered by rain, sleet and snow. Life couldn't have looked or felt more ugly. The next morning traveling was difficult, if not impossible. Meetings canceled, I was faced with the drudgery of playing cleanup in the office.

Fortunately, I received a call and an excited voice on the other end asked, "Are you looking outside? It's glorious. The sun and ice on the trees looks like thousands of diamonds." I could almost see her smile and I definitely felt the joy in her voice. My eyes moved to the window. She was so right - there were diamonds everywhere.

A simple call, a wonderful gesture caused me to stop being upset and negative about having to change my plans for the day. My energy lifted and I found myself cleaning up, clearing up and revamping some of my business plans. The call also brought to mind the poem by Sara Teasdale called Barter.

Life has loveliness to sell,
All beautiful and splendid things;
Blue waves whitened on a cliff,
Soaring fire that sways and sings,
And children’s faces looking up,
Holding wonder like a cup.

Life has loveliness to sell;
Music like a curve of gold,
Scent of pine trees in the rain,
Eyes that love you, arms that hold,
And, for the Spirit’s still delight,
Holy thoughts that star the night.

Give all you have for loveliness;
Buy it, and never count the cost!
For one white, singing hour of peace
Count many a year of strife well lost;
And for a breath of ecstasy,
Give all you have been, or could be.

The call, the poem and taking time to reflect has caused me to re-focus and re-charge my thinking, my attitude and my actions. Wonderful, positive gifts from others and myself to see thousands of diamonds and capture the loveliness of work and life.

Feasibility - Look Before Leaping

A feasibility study can mitigate risks if conducted as one of the first steps before leaping into a venture, a relationship, a project, a job or a change.

Why would an individual or company research feasibility?

The following simple definitions are a great start for building the case for investing time, money, resources and talent...

• "The quality of being doable" (wordnetweb.princeton.edu)

• "Doable, possible, achievable, workable" (en.wiktionary.org/wiki)

• "A determination that a process, design, procedure, or plan can be successfully accomplished in the required time frame."thequalityportal.com/glossary/f.htm

What are the elements for a successful feasibility study?

There are six basic elements for determine feasibility...

1. Identify Market/Customer Needs.
   

• What are the past, present and future needs of the market or client base?
  
• What are the services or products they have used, are currently using or would like to use?

2. Identify the Present Benefits and Results.

• What are the benefits that the products or services will bring?
• What results will the market or client base receive from this product or service?

3. Identify the Future Benefits and Results.

• What are the future needs of this endeavor to ensure sustained success?
• What will it take to ensure that these needs are met?
  

4. Identify the Resources, Costs, Investments.

• What will it cost to deliver the product or service?
• What resources are available to support this endeavor?
• What are the other investments that are required to make this effort possible?

5. Identify the Alternative Source of Supply or Service, A.K.A. competitive analysis.

• What sources are currently providing this product or service?
• How customer friendly are these current competitors?
• What are the current challenges that the alternative sources of supply are encountering?
  

6. Identify the Strategy and Financial Plan.

• What is the purpose of this endeavor?
• What is the vision and mission of this venture?
• What are the values required to support this product or service?
  
• What are the financial projections for a successful venture?

A feasibility study is not an exercise to delay to the start of a project or change. It is an investment in time, money, and resources to ensure that thoughtful business and life decisions are made. The ultimate benefits and results - leaping into deep water and finding that when you leap you can and will swim and sustain success.

The Power of the Vision

"In great deed, sometimes abide.
On great fields, something stays.
Forms change and pass, bodies disappear
but spirits linger to consecrate ground for the vision place of the soul.
And reverent men and women from afar
and generations that know us not
and that we know not of,
shall come here to ponder and to dream
and the power of the vision
shall pass into their soul."
Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain

Life can be a pointless stroll or a purposeful adventure. When we have a powerful vision in front of us, we find motivation and energy. When we lack purpose and strategy, we often miss opportunities to enjoy life and fully actualize our skills, talents and existence.

The leader, whether a parent, a partner, an employer or employee, that instills vision surrounded by clear, healthy, positive values creates a environment of pondering and dreaming. And, once that vision is been embraced, great actions are taken and astonishing results are achieved.

A few questions to consider...

What vision(s) are you pondering and dreaming about?
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What vision are you putting out there today?
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What actions will you take today to achieve that vision?
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I'd love to hear your thoughts, ideas and visions.

Day 3 - Look for the Derailers

I once had a great mentor and coach who said to me, “Any CEO that reads the Wall Street Journal should not be surprised when and if their company slips, falls or fails.” John, my mentor, said that ever challenge, situation, strategy, approach can be found well defined and described in the news. It doesn’t matter the size of the business, relationship or community, it’s up to each of us to pay attention, look for the corollaries or trends that are happening in today’s world. Most often, they are happening, or about to happen in our own world, work or life. His preference - The Wall Street Journal.

Here are some common derailers that I have found show up over the course of time.

These are the obvious:

 Lack of vision.
 Knowing the vision and failing to focus.
 Not knowing our attributes, interests, motivators, talents and strengths
 Knowing those talents, strengths and attributes and failing to leverage them

Now let's go deeper:

 Not having a strategic plan
 Having a plan and not following that plan
 Not being clear on our core values
 Knowing those values and not living up to those values
 Not knowing what is critical to the success of our work, our life, our community
 Knowing what is critical to our success and ignoring them
 Not setting goals or actions plans
 Having goals but not taking action
 Not knowing our resources
 Inappropriately using those resources
 Not understanding accountability
 Understanding and choosing not to assume accountability


These derailers are pretty generic and yet I have seen them and others crop up over the course of my life. Expand your sources, I know I have and still do. There are a plethora of opportunities to help us find the derailers to our success.

Look for your derailers and discover what is preventing you from being that extraordinary CEO in your work and life. I'd love to hear more derailers - this is only the short list.

Day 4 - Set Your Strategy

Day 2 – Create Your Focus and Display Your Attributes

Interestingly enough, individuals are hired, get into relationships, and acquire contracts because of their attributes. Think about when you creating your resume, responding to a proposal or getting into a new or expanded relationship. We all show with a best foot forward. We work really hard to display our attributes to ensure others that we are what they want in their company, their world or their life.

That’s not a bad thing, if we keep in mind yesterday’s theme for capitalizing on our interests and motivators. We spend more time setting aside the very attributes that support success with our power, people and purpose. Suddenly, we are willing to compromise with our soul and spirit in order to fit in or be accepted. When in reality, it is our very attributes are what is attracting us to the external world.

When we fully understand and create our focus – we can feature and display those attributes that put us into the job, relationship or role to begin with. Conversely, when we start to compromise and settle because subconsciously we feel that we are changing our focus – we get into serious trouble. This, in my opinion, is the greatest problem that employers, employees, mothers, father, community members, human beings face every day. We lose our focus rather than finding the connections with our attributes and our personal focus – also known as our personal vision.

3 Tips to create focus and display your attributes

1. Reminder from yesterday, review your interests and motivators that you have journaled and captured over at least a week, a month or a lifetime. Distill that laundry list down into a very specific focus – For example, my focus is “Leading People and Companies Back to Health and Wealth.”

2. Next look at your attributes. Those attributes, also known as strengths and talents, that will help you in relationships, work and life to totally support your focus.

3. This is the biggest tip – Actively connect your focus and attributes to the situations, roles, jobs, relationships, that you encounter. This tip is no secret, but is the most overlooked. When we know our focus – WHY we are motivated to do what we want to do And then, know our Attributes- HOW we do what we want to do. The WHAT to do becomes so much easier.

Three simple tips. When you create you focus, display your attributes and then connect them to your work and life – Magic happens.

Get ready for Day 3, Look For the Derailers

Free Imagination and Vision

“We were sitting there watching the coffin being nailed shut, and what was inside was imagination and vision.

Bruce Murray

What has caused us to "watch the coffin being nail shut" on imagination and vision?

Think about a black board without writing, a canvas without any drawing, or a field of dirt.. Imagine going to your job only to do repetitive, boring work. Imagine your life without dreams and ideas.

Imagination and vision infuses our world with purpose and passion, vibrant colors and uplifting energy. It adds to the heart and soul of any business or even life endeavors. Yet, every day more and more, there are less and less ideas being shared. We think , "That dream is too unrealistic." "I can't share this idea someone else might steal it." "I'm too tired to do anything more." "I don't see any hope."

Any thoughts come to mind regarding what is causing you to lose your imagination and vision?

Sitting by any coffin is sad enough when there is the demise of a company, a concept or especially a person. What is really a tragedy, is when imagination and vision have been nailed in years before and some form of existence continues.

Grab the crowbar and open the coffin. Free imagination and vision.

Focused Yet Flexible

“Our thoughts create our reality --

where we put our focus is the direction

we tend to go."

Peter McWilliams

Author of Life 101

As I continue to research human behavior, I am once again impressed with the power of the human spirit. Each day, sometimes, each hour, we are faced with challenges - I am blessed with great health, great family and a great community. I realize that my attitude does help me a great deal, however, I'm not currently confronted with a life threatening illness, poverty, danger, downsizing. You can keep adding to the list. And, my situation could change in an instant.

Everyday I read about or talk with people who in spite of tremendous physical, mental, emotional and environmental challenges stay the course. These courageous spirits deal with the raging winds that attack their bodies, ravage their business, community and/or family and yet they still move forward.

I had a friend many years ago diagnosed with cancer. A lovely nurse with two small children. She worked night shift so that she could be home with her children during the day. She continued to work as an amazing RN - patient loved her. Loving her family- she made their Halloween costumes and decorated for the holiday every year - she made their costumes a little early the year she died - energy and life were rapidly draining away. She enjoyed October 31 her last year of life preparing her children to venture out in the neighbor hood. They didn't know this would be their mother's last time with them. She died November 14 of that same year.

Always flexible with the devastating changes, she focused on love, living and service. I do hope that presented with similar challenges that I will stay my course.

Strategies for Buidling Positive Personal Power - Promoting Health and Wealth

`Creating a system that will help us to live the life of our dreams may at first seem like too much work and yet, in reality the more strategic we become in our thoughts. goals and actions, the more likely we will be to achieve personal and professional success. Over the years, I have almost made a game out of building positive personal power and I would like to share some of those strategies now.

Strategy #1- Identify what is important to YOU. When we identify what is important to us individually, it is much easier to choose a career, a partner, a life style, even an income. Review your dreams and ideas. Share with others, like minded and even those who are not so like minded and really challenge you. I learned a long time ago, my life is my life. I am the author of this particular book. Identifying how important it is to me to help others become full actualized and able to tap into their potential, actually helps me access my own positive personal power.

Strategy #2 - Define a positive personal vision. Establishing a clear and positive vision helps me stay focused and on purpose. My grandmother introduced me to a wonderful book called The Power of Positive Thinking written by Norman Vincent Peale, hence, my company's name of Positive Power Strategies, Inc. Dr. Peale was a man that because he defined his personal vision was able to influence countless individuals around the world.

If you paint in your mind a picture of bright and happy expectations, you put yourself into a condition conducive to your goal.
Norman Vincent Peale

Strategy #3 - Treat your strengths and talents like muscles. Our strengths and talents, just like any muscle becomes stronger and more pronounce with repetitive exercise. When we slack off, those muscles atrophy and become wasted.

Strategy #4 - Set significant goals and take positive action. I like to treat even the smallest activity as if it were a goal, this mindset helps me to take positive action. When I feel like stopping, I review my daily to-do list (which in reality is short term goals) I am amazed with how much I can accomplish.

Strategy #5 - Seek resources and acknowledge support. No one can do it alone. I have been blessed by wonderful family, friends, mentors, colleagues, clients and acquaintances. I travel extensively and every single day I am continually impressed with how much assistance and service I receive. I now make it a personal goal to notice how a person contributes to making my day better - yes even the person that cuts me off in traffic - I then slow down and pay more attention.

These are just a few strategies that I thought might help you on your journey.

All the best in health and wealth,

Laura

Promoting Health & Wealth - From Dreaming to Goals

All men dream: but not equally, Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes, to make it possible. This I did.

* T. E. Lawrence, Seven Pillars of Wisdom (1922)


As I continue to study and research, I found the above quote by Lawrence of Arabia. What makes these dreamers by day dangerous? They turn their dreaming into a process. How do people become dangerous? They are the exceptional people that take a dream, clearly define what it means to them, helps them set a positive vision. A vision for greater health in communities and nations, more sensitivity to our environment and natural resources, more respect for our collective assets and talents.

As these dreams become more focused, we can use this dreaming process to establish goals and then act with deliberate purpose and passion. The bigger the dreams the more we need to appreciate our life wheels.





We need and want to keep these life wheels in balance to stay in the flow and live a health-filled, wealth-filled life. Again, let's keep writing down our dreams. Let's make them big enough to capture our talents, our passions, our resources, our values and our joys.

I filling as if today I am already getting into the flow. Dreaming is a great start. Tomorrow, we'll start with goals to build that bridge for the flow into success.

All the best in health and wealth,

Laura