Why the Absence of Leadership on Projects?
January 3rd, 2003 by HalYesterday I claimed most projects suffer from a lack of leadership. It comes to two issues.
- We are blind to the need for specific leadership skills.
- We are indiscriminate in assigning people to the role of project manager.
Our blindness is maintained through our usual course of actions both on and off the project. We successfully go about our day performing one task after another usually without the aid of others. Others successfully go about their days. It doesn't occur to us to look for someone to 'pave the way' or set out goals for us.
When assigning project managers, today's emphasis is on people who have skills for cost and schedule control. These folks usually know scheduling approaches along with cost reporting. Little attention is given to finding someone who has demonstrated an ability to lead.
What can we do? First, we can bring leadership to our projects.
- We do that by taking an open disposition to the future and the current situation.
- We do that through inquiry…exploring options.
- We do that by looking after others on the project team.
Second, we can call for leadership from the designated leaders.
- Help leaders keep their attention on the promises of the project.
- Help leaders with their declarations, setting standards, and making expectations explicit.
- Help leaders by calling attention to good performance.
Only when people see what leadership adds to projects will we start organizing and staffing projects with leaders.
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January 6th, 2003 at 5:37 pm
From Maslow to Goleman the search to leadership still continues and we have a felling that we are completely lost.
We are tryng to create formulas of behavior to built a leaderīs archetype but I think that we are not going to find the answer on this way.
The answer is beyond what we can see, but very close.
A leadership is not based on knowledge and try to find commitment only. Is based in fellings, principles, values and faith too.
People are well informed today and you are not going to have success on them using tools of leadership, because they will adapt themselves to this situation.People acts to keep their images even knowing that they not believe on them. They need to survive, they need security.
The only way to guide people is the Leader shows them that he believes in what he is saying, and he is ready to fight for it even knowing that he can die (it means fired!). Only after that they will show him their real images and the leader can arrange them to obtain success.Installing the chaos is a good situation to really know people and this is a powerfull toll to the leader. Some of them will not support the pressure, because they are going to loose references to create their images, others will join the leader and these lasts are the good ones.
We are used to see things under a cartesian way keeping everything under control, but it does not work today. Solutions are not based only in information, data but in needs, in fellings and they are changing very fast today. The world is small and we have enormous differences of cultures and the words of action, the verbs, create different reactions among different cultures. Some words make success for a Leader but in other place these same can kill him. I think people are afraid to lead because they do not know the consequences of it. The failure is too close and the leader cannot have commitment from his team because he does not have courage to give it to them.
I am not talking about something that we can touch, and this is very difficult to understand, but we must use an holystic vision of things.
When I am leading I keep in my mind some concepts :
-I am not perfect but in am searching to be.
-People always fail.
-I can not have all the knowledge to decide.
-I must take risks.
-I can not have 100% of commitment from my team, but I will do my best to keep then closer to it.
-I cannot give 100% of my commitment all the time, and I must be alert to not let it happen.
-I do not have all the solutions and I cannot control all the constraints.
-Being lost, sometimes is the only way to find a solution.
- Use your fellings to look beyond the facts because they do not represent 100% of truth.
-Open your mind to see the signals, they can help you to decide even knowing that they will say: You are schizophrenic!
-Believe in your instincts.
- Do not use the power of the words but their meanings to make yourself understood or to find commitment.
-I must have strong values to not loose the essence myself acting like a mutant dealing with new cultures.
I think we are in a new world that is becoming small, the cultures are mixing, people are loosing their values and we do not know where are we going to, but I love this new world.
Wellcome to Chaos!!
Paulo Napolitano
January 6th, 2003 at 6:05 pm
Paulo,
Where do I start
:
We are used to see things under a cartesian way keeping everything under control, but it does not work today.
Maybe it never worked. To help other readers let’s substitute reductionist and deterministic for cartesian. Human beings, unlike bridges and buildings, cannot be understood and led by viewing them as pieces and parts. Compound that with the uncertainty of our future and we must call for an altogether different orientation for leadership.
So, if not cartesian, what?
Paulo, your prescriptions have merit. :+: Let me offer a way to hold them together while serving as a basis for inventing other actions. I see five necessary (but not sufficient) dispositions for leadership:
.. Embrace uncertainty
.. Anticipate learning (for the leader and those led)
.. Anticipate failure (if it must go right, then rethink it, because it just might go wrong)
.. Produce strength of relationships (nothing else really matters to human beings than being connected to other people)
.. Serve those being led (we get the greatest results when we take care of ourselves and the world at large)
But let’s remember…we’re just not getting enough leadership. So call for it on every project.
January 6th, 2003 at 8:37 pm
I think I follow you
Tuning is required to grasp what it is the client, the team, and you are concerned with at any moment. While we might think we are noticing the cares and concerns of others, we may only see our own concerns reflected in others’ speaking. Misunderstanding that leaves us unable to care for our clients and our team.
While the great books on leadership may describe what it is to be a leader, the process of becoming the leader is less straight forward. Take my example above. One is not in a position to ascertain for himself whether he is making a good interpretation of another’s concerns or not. Further, this is not easy to coach or teach. We each come with an individual structure of interpretation that colors or shades what it is we see. It can take quite some time to see the structure of interpretation of another. Then, we are in a position to coach. In the meantime, the situation has passed or the leader-to-be has lost interest.
Leadership doesn’t need to be complicated. Just like there are many good (effective) ways to build a building, there are many effective ways to build a team. Often the simplest of actions makes the most difference. One leadership group I’m working with started a practice of noticing and appreciating the gifts (talents) in each other. In no time the mood of the leadership team improved and it spilled over to the project team. I suppose the key is deciding what to do.