9 Thoughts to Craft The Leader In You

Though much of the art and science of leadership remains unchanged over time, it needs to be crafted to suit the needs of the current environment. The following stories of contemporary leaders and views of leadership gurus, should give you food for thought to craft your individual leadership style and craft it to suit your time and context.. 

1.Reinvent Yourself  

"Companies fail or are successful because they either get or miss market transitions", says John Chambers, CEO and Chairman of Cisco. ..."What Cisco has done is that we compete on market transitions, not against competitors...We have reinvented ourselves five times"

Reinventing is not a necessary evil to be undertaken to undertake to survive. Being inquisitive - a hankering to learn new things, can lead to seeing the world of work as an opportunity and make it easier to adapt - a quality essential in the present times.

2 Give your people permission to fail

"One of the saddest things that happen with creativity...I think sometimes it isn't expressed because of fear," says Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel. "Everyone is born very very creative. But at some point it can be scary to do something new." To overcome this fear, Snapchat encourages the idea of 'failing fast', since it's better that those failures happen in private before being released on users.

3.Play for Win-Win

Unlike Steve Ballmer, Satya Nadella is clear that times have changed and he is taking tough decisions. For him,  competition is not a zero sum game. Just because Android wins does not mean Microsoft loses.  If Android wins great. I'll also put Office 365 on Android so it can be a win - win,  it doesn't have to be a win - lose.

3. Make the right life choices

"There is nothing like work-life balance, there is only one life", believes Padmasree Warrior, former CTSO of Cisco. Bhaskar Pramanik, Chairman Of Microsoft India, agrees with her wholeheartedly. "You live life the way you want it. Life is about choices," he say

4.Practice brevity in communication

A Microsoft research reports that the average person's attention span is just 8 seconds, a second less than that of a goldfish.  For humans it used to be 12 seconds in 2000. Abundant reason why CEOs and you and me, need to communicate well internally and externally in the most effective manner.

5. Surround yourself with the best people

Leslie Gaines-Ross, Chief Reputation Strategist usually gets involved worn CEOS in their first 100 days  that they  build up their credibility quickly. And this what she tells them, in that order - listen to customers, surround yourself with the best senior management and communicate with the board.

6. Make your knowledge 'future ready'
"Half-life of knowledge is getting shorter and shorter with new breakthrough technologies and discoveries," says Management Guru Jagdish Seth, Management guru.."Therefore old perspectives and evidence are no longer relevant.We need to develop or discover new perspectives which are suitable for tomorrow's world"

7. Tailor your communication to the audience

Mythologist Devdutt Pattanaik explains how in the Gita, there is a three way communication between Krishna the speaker, and three receivers; Arjuna, the seeker of knowledge, Sanjay the transmitter of the knowledge  and Dhritirashtra, who is eager to know only the fate of his sons. This, Devdutt observes, is aimed to draw attention to the complexity of any communication. Are people around you interested in what you are saying (Arjuna),  are they merely memorising (Sanjay), or are they just disinterested or even suspicious (Dhritirashtra)? 

Tailor your communication accordingly.

8. Be Considerate of your people

On his last journey from Guwahati to Shillong for a speaking engagement, the late president's car was being escorted in front by three soldiers travelling in a Gypsy. Seeing one of them standing throughout the journey, Kalam repeatedly asked his aide to request him to sit down, but his aide was not able to get him on the phone. At the end of the journey, Kalam invited the soldier to his room, shook hands with him, thanked him and enquired whether he had eaten.

9. Appreciate - Motivate

Debutant Actress Ruhi Singh says, "When you enter the sets of (film director) Madhur Bhandarkar's film, you hear words like 'jalwa' (charisma/luster/ splendor) and 'aag laga de' (be on fire) which is a driving force for us. I had to shoot a waterfall sequence in the night, and it was freezing cold. But I could only do it because (Madhur) makes sure everyone feels comfortable before filming." 


Call To Action
Time to craft your own leadership recipe? Set the fire going!