A641.1.3.RB
What
is great leadership?
I have been asked to view "What is Great
Leadership" by Dr. Richard Boyatzis. Dr. Boyatzis explains the impact most
effective leaders can have on you. I have also been asked to stop the video
when he asks me to complete his exercise. I have been asked to complete the
exercise and then watch the rest of the video. Finally, I have been asked to
write up my results as a reflection blog.
In a
27-year Army career, I have met and have been led by many ‘leaders”. Some have taught me great things to add to my
leadership tool box while others have taught me things that I will absolutely
never do. We always use to refer to the
latter as “toxic leadership”. This type
of leadership usually would come from the self-centered individual who was
trying to create a name for him or herself.
There
was also the inept leader. This person
had been promoted, for some bazaar reason, and would try to take charge. However, this person would always call upon
the existing personnel to help him or her make decisions.
In
Dr. Boyatzis’ video, he states, “You don’t convince people of things through
rational argument”. (Boyatzis, n.d.). I
completely agree. Many are driven
through personal conviction and emotions.
Boyatzis contrasts the rational against emotional, speaks of value
added, relationships between the leader and the led and how antiquated top-down
leadership is ineffective in the military and civilian leadership.
I did
the contrast leadership exercise. I will
not use names, but it is below:
Leader A Leader
B
Let’s do this! I
don’t know
I see it this way. What
should we do?
This is what needs to happen. Can we make it work?
This
is what these leaders asked/said. I was
motivated by leader A and rolled my eyes with leader B. This guy was what I would categorize as an
inept leader. He had no leadership
skills, what so ever, and those of us, under his “leadership”, would accomplish
the task and he would take the credit.
Unfortunately,
that’s the Army way. The “smartest guy
in the room” is not always the actual leader.
Sometimes it’s a group of subordinates that makes it all happen without
input from the formal leader.
I’m
reminded of the inept Platoon Leader in Band of Brothers who always had to go
to the Battalion Headquarters when something needed to happen. I’m sure that these inept leaders did
something right to achieve their rank but something got lost along the way.
In
closing, I was thumbing through Boyatzis’ and McKee’s text (Boyatzis &
McKee, 2005), “Resonant Leadership” and found notes from a former student. In chapter 4, he or she made the following
notes, “the military field grade lobotomy” and “aka…undoing my field grade
lobotomy”. This gave me a chuckle. I always would remark that the field grade
officers that I worked for must have had a lobotomy because they were out of
touch with reality and had forgotten where they had come from.
References
Boyatzis, R. (n.d.). What is great leadership? Inspiring leadership through emotional
intelligence. [Video File]. Provided.
Boyatzis, R. and McKee, A. (2005). Resonant Leadership. Harvard Business
School Press: Boston, MA
No comments:
Post a Comment