Think Like a Leader
Should leaders be patient or impatient? Do you find yourself sometimes accepting when you should be challenging or challenging when you should be accepting? How we think about patience will have a direct impact on the approaches we adopt to the paradox of patience and impatience. The reality is there's a time for both – so think about when you react – or don’t.
|
|
|
Feel Like a Leader
Managing our feelings is a key element of how the successful leader matures over time and many find that getting the balance right between patience and impatience is a struggle for most leaders. The best thing leaders can do is take some time to reflect on episodes where they have been over-patient or too quick to respond. Understanding your own triggers or inaction will help you move to a better balance.
|
|
|
Act Like a Leader
Patience and impatience can’t be hidden from your colleagues. Do people see you acting with maturity? Do they understand when and why you correctly are patient or impatient with them? Can you take the time to explain to them why?
|
|
|
|
Podcasts bring the opportunity to hear from leaders from many different backgrounds and industries. This is a first for the newsletter – one from the aviation sector. Tim Bonnell Jnr believes patience is an essential leadership attribute. In this 10-minute podcast he explains why.
|
|
Gary Burnison, Chief Executive of Korn Ferry, is one of my favourite contemporary business writers who has a great knack of being able to articulate the key issues business leaders encounter day-to-day. This short extract is a taster; click through for the full text.
'In this push-pull world, the answers are often found in the paradoxes and opposites. It’s time for ‘impatient patience’. Or, in the words of Emperor Augustus, “festina lente” — make haste slowly.
On the one hand, we must be impatient in response to the urgency of achieving what’s most important. On the other hand, we need to be patient to make sure we never move faster than the organization can handle. After all, patience is participatory.
It’s a constant balance. Perform and transform. Results and resilience. Ambiguity and exactness. Accountability and compassion. Quite candidly, it can be exhausting for people. The alternative, though, is to slide into mediocrity—and complacency is a killer.'
|
|
|
Another TEdX, this time from Gabe de Jong who believes the most important leadership quality is patience. In this short video-clip he explains why.
|
|
|
This week’s view comes from Elgin, the ‘Biblical Garden, adjacent to Elgin Cathedral. The themed garden was the inspiration of a council employee to create a training garden at their own nursery. Today, students from the University of the Highlands and Islands maintain the garden as part of their studies. The sowing of seeds represents patience in action – as indeed does most gardening.
|
|
Late Bloomers, The Power of Patience in a World Obsessed with Early Achievement (also titled in paperback, The Hidden Strengths of Learning and Succeeding at Your Own Pace) is written by Rich Karlgaard and was published by Currency, 2019.
This book offers relief of the pressure late bloomers may feel, plus actionable steps toward blooming at your own speed. Karlgaard cites case studies, quotes experts, and details his own experience as a late bloomer.
Unrealized potential is “like a black eye”, the author says, ”easily forgotten but visible to everyone else, and painful when pushed.” He quotes Oprah Winfrey as saying, “Everyone has a supreme destiny,” and writes that late bloomers “are those who find their supreme destiny on their own schedule, in their own way.” Difficult-to-measure strengths like “curiosity, compassion, resilience, equanimity, insight and wisdom” also bloom at later ages. Late bloomers, according to Karlgaard, develop the wisdom and self-compassion to handle setbacks with equanimity and are more likely to approach setbacks with realistic “self-appraisal” and to recognize their culpability without sinking into self-loathing. The message? Be patient with yourself.
|
|
|
...without a little reflection, there is no Insight Added.
"Have patience – all things are difficult before they become easy."
Saadi
|
|
|
Lead well
Graham and Lesley
|
|
This email is brought to you by The Leader (Scotland). It encourages leaders at any age or stage, in all sectors, to deliberately improve their leadership.
The Leader also provides confidential support, learning and development for leaders.
Find out more at
|
|
|
|
