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Momentum Is a Leader’s Best Friend
All leaders face the challenge of creating changes in an organization. The key to succeeding is momentum, what John Maxwell called the Big Mo.
Just as every sailor knows that you can’t steer a ship that isn’t moving forward. Strong leaders understand that to change direction you first have to create forward progress, and that takes the law of the big mo. Only a leader can create momentum. Followers catch it. Managers are able to continue it once it has begun. But creating it requires someone who can motivate others, not who needs to be motivated. Henry Truman once said, ‘If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.’ But for leaders, that statement should be changed to read ’If you can’t make them heat, get out of the kitchen.’
Momentum really is a leader’s best friend. Sometimes it’s the only difference between losing and winning. That’s why in basketball games, for instance, when the opposing team scores a lot of unanswered points and starts to develop too much momentum, a good opposing coach will call a time out, he knows that if the other team’s momentum gets too strong, his team is likely to lose the game.
Momentum makes a huge difference in an organization. If you have no momentum, even the simplest task can seem to be insurmountable problems. But if you have the momentum on your side, the future looks bright, obstacle appears small, and trouble seems temporary.
Momentum does many things for you. E.g. It makes leaders look better than they are. It helps followers perform better than they are.
Though hard to start, momentum makes it easier to steer an organization. Momentum creates an environment where the leader can most effectively act as a change age.
If your desire is to do great things with your organization, never overlook the power of momentum. It truly is a leader’s best friend. If you can develop it, you can do almost anything. That’s the power of the Big Mo.
Leaders Find a Way for the Team to Win
Victorious leaders share one quality, the complete inability to accept defeat. The alternative to winning is totally unacceptable to them. So they figure out what must be done to achieve victory, then they go after with everything at their disposal.
Victory is possible as long as it has 3 components.
No.1: Unity of vision. Team succeeds only when the players have a unified vision no matter how much talent or potential there is.
No.2: Diversity of skills. It almost goes without saying that a team needs diversity of skills. Can you imagine that a football team of quarter-backs? In the same way organizations require diverse talent to succeed, each player taking his part.
No.3: A leader dedicated to victory and raising players to their potential. Unity of vision doesn’t happen spontaneously; the right players with proper diversity of talent don’t come together on their own. It takes a leader to make these things happen. It takes a leader to provide the motivation, empowerment and direction required to win.
Leaders who practice The Law of Victory believe that anything less than success is unacceptable. Because of that, they have no Plan B. That’s what keeps them fighting.
What is your level of expectation when it comes to succeeding for your organization? How dedicated are you to winning your game? Are you going to have the law of victory in your corner as you fight? Or when times get difficult, are you going to throw in the towel? Your answer to that question may determine whether you automatically are going to succeed or fail as a leader.
People Buy into the Leader, Then the Vision
Many people who approach the area of vision and leadership have it all backward, they believe if the cause is good enough people will automatically buy into it and follow. But that’s not how leadership really works. People don’t start out following worthy causes, they follow worthy leaders to promote worthy causes. People buy into the leader first, then the leader’s vision. Having and understanding that changes your whole approach to leading people.
People who need others to follow his vision should ask himself question like this:
Have I given my people reasons to buy into me?
If a person hasn’t built his credibility with his people, it really doesn’t matter how great his vision is,
Once people have bought into someone, they are willing to give his vision a chance. People want to go along with people they get along with. You cannot separate the leader from the cause he promotes, it just can’t be done no matter how hard you try. It’s not an either-or proposition, the two always go together.
What happens with followers depending on their attitude towards the leader and his cause?
When followers don’t like the leader or the vision, they look for another leader;
When followers don’t like the leader but they do like the vision, they still look for another leader;
When followers like the leader but not the vision, they change the vision;
When followers like the leader and the vision, they get behind both.
If in the past you tried to get your people to act on your vision, but weren’t able to make it happen, you probably came up against the law of buy in, maybe even without knowing it.
As a leader, you don’t earn any points in failing a noble cause, you don’t get credit for just being right, your success is majored by your ability to actually take the people where they need to go. But you can do that only if the people first buy into you as a leader.
It takes a leader to raise up a leader.
John Maxwell once conducted an informal poll to find out what prompted people who attempt to become leaders. The results are as follows: 10% because of natural gifting, 5% because of crises, 85% because of the influence of another leader.
According to the origin of leaders, more than 4 out of 5 all leaders that you ever meet, have emerged as leaders because of the impact made on them by established leaders who mentored them.
If a company has poor leaders, what little leadership it has will only get works. If a company has strong leaders and they are reproducing themselves, its leadership is just getting better and better. Occasionally a company will emerge where the leadership is so strong and the development system is so deliberate that the impact not only drives your company to the highest level but also overflows into other businesses. That is the case at GE by Chairman Jack Welch.
GE has become one the best run companies in the world and it keeps developing leader upon leader. In fact it has lost more leaders capable of running organizations than most other good companies are able to produce in their lifetimes.
How was GE able to produce so many outstanding leaders?
First, leadership development is one of the company’s first priorities. It spends more than 500 million dollars a year on training and it develops leaders at its own institute in NY, often called the Harvard of corporate American. Even more important than that is the fact that the company is run by Jack Welch, a great leader.
When it comes to developing leaders, it all starts the topic because it takes a leader to raise up another leader. Followers can’t do it. Neither can institutional programs. It takes one to know one, show one, and grow one.
Only Secure Leaders Give Power to Others
Theodor Roosevelt said, the best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good man to do what he wants done, and self-restrict enough to keep from meddling with them while they do it.
Only secure leaders are willing to give themselves away.
Mark Twain once marked, the great things can happen when you don’t care who gets the credit. I believe the greatest things happen only when you give others the credit.
Empowerment is powerful, not only for the person being developed, but also for the mentor. Enlarging others makes you stronger, but to give power away to others you have to secure yourself.
A Leader’s Potential is Determined by Those Closest to Him
Every leader’s potential is determined by the people closet to him. If those people are strong, then the leader can make a huge impact. If they are weak, he can’t.
I could not work harder or smarter. Learning to work through others. I hire the best staff I can find, develop them as much as I can, and hand off everything I possibly can to them.
I know I have more potential, but I haven’t yet reached, and if I want someday to get there, I’ve got to surround myself with the best people possible.
The success comes not from what you know, but from whom you know and how you present yourself to each of these people.
Leaders Touch a Heart Before They Ask for a Hand
All great communicators recognize this true and act on it almost instinctively. You can’t move people to action unless you first move them with emotion. The heart comes before the hand.
Connecting with people isn’t something that needs to happen only when a leader’s communicating to groups; it needs to happen with individuals. People won’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. You develop credibility with people when you connect with them and show that you genuinely want to help them. The greatest leaders are able to connect on both levels: with individuals and with an audience.
Some leaders have problems with the law of connection, because they believe that connecting is the responsibilities of the followers. That is especially true for positional leaders. They often think, I’m the boss, I have the position, these are my employees, let them come to me. But successful leaders who obey the law of connection are always initiators. They take the first step with others and then make the effort continue building relationships. That is not always easy, but it’s important to the success of the organization. When a leader has done his work to connect with his people, you can see it in the way an organization functions, employees displaying incredible loyalty and a strong work ethic. The visit of the leader becomes the aspiration of the people. The impact is incredible.
Don’t ever underestimate the importance of building relational bridges between yourself and the people you lead. There’s an old saying, to lead yourself use your head, to lead others use your heart. That’s the nature of this law.
Who You Are Is Who You Attract
Who you get is not determined by who you want; it is determined by who you are. In most situations, you draw people to you who possess the same qualities that you do.
People who are different will not be attracted naturally to you; leaders draw people who are like themselves.
People who are drawn to you probably have more similarities than differences, especially in a few key areas: attitude, generation, background, values, life experience, leadership ability.
The better leader you are, the better leaders you’ll attract. That has an incredible impact on everything you do.
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