Send to KindleThe Importance of Basic Leadership
A couple of years ago, I submitted an article for publication in a magazine. It was rejected. Rejection isn’t that big a deal. Yes, it dings the ego for a little while, but it happens and is part of the business. What has really stuck with me was the reason. The editor said that my article didn’t present anything new.
He was absolutely correct! The thing is, I didn’t intend to present anything new. That’s because I’ve found through a lot of years of experience, that when leaders search out the newest concept in leadership theory, they usually do so at the expense of the basic leadership techniques that really work.
In my military career I experienced the constant march of new management and leadership theories. I’ve seen MBO, TQM, Quality Circles, and most recently, several iterations of lean. Each had its own good points and I learned from them all, but I also saw how each attempt to keep up with the management Joneses, so to speak, created a lot of confusion. I began to notice that no matter what was tried there was a decrease in productivity, followed by an increase of varying degrees. But then, things would settle down and productivity would usually return to a normal level. That level seemed to have less to do with the current flavor of the month than it did with the competency of those leading the effort.
The reason is that the military has a very good, and very basic, leadership development process. At least in my experience in the Air Force, that process continued to develop the basics of good leadership. It was the more junior and mid-grade leaders who kept things moving using proven leadership techniques.
So, when the editor said I hadn’t presented anything new, I said exactly! Good leaders apply basic leadership techniques. Unfortunately, and I believe this is one reason there is a constant search for new ideas, too few supervisors and managers are taught those basic techniques.
