LEADERSHIP: THE SEEDS OF FAILURE

Published: 2007-03-12   please add a comment below

Think of big corporate disasters you've known or read about.  What was the cause?  Bad strategy, wrong business model, inefficiency, bad luck?  Not in my experience.  Most often, the core issue is flawed human beings - and, at the top. 

I'm no goodie-goodie.  I've done things I regret.  I've failed to make decisions I should have made.  I've failed to speak up on issues, where objection was the right course.  So, I'm not going to preach.  But, I will issue a warning.  The seeds of failure are easily sown; and, the resulting weeds grow fast - and noxious.

The simplest leadership failure (often unintentional) is lack of objectivity or self-awareness.  Not seeing our leadership actions as others experience them.  This damages morale.  The next level includes more obvious self-indulgence like conceit, pomposity or unwarranted self-belief.  This can lead to bad decisions - and people failing to speak up.  At a higher level are leadership decisions and actions, which further our own interests or those of friends and family.  Things like favouritism and nepotism.  And, at the top are moral failures like conscious dishonesty, bullying, threats, exploitation or harassment.

An irony of such failures is that they often follow on from proven and legitimate success.  There's nothing so disorienting to the moral compass as the desire to stay on top and keep hearing the adulation.  And business life isn't the only breeding ground.  It happens to scientists, sportspeople and professionals of all kinds.

So what can we do?  A first step is thinking through our leadership actions not from our own perspective but from the position of those being led.  How do they see things?  What would they recommend I do?  In sum, put myself in their shoes.

Avoid unnecessary failure!

Dr. Timothy Pascoe AM
PhD (Cambridge), MBA (Harvard), BE & BEc (Adelaide)
Creator, V|E|C|T|O|R Leadership^®