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Intentional Leadership — Month 6 — Perseverance

The reality of leadership is that it requires hard work and regular investments of energy and sweat!

As a leader, there will be times when you encounter resistance. There will be times when you question whether the time, energy, and effort are worth it. There will be times when you feel like giving up. What you choose to do in your darkest moments will define you as a leader. When adversity comes to call, will you fade into the background or will you persist in fighting to move forward?

The truth is, nobody advances in leadership by coasting to the top. Leaders are distinguished by struggling upward through the daily grind.

Consider the story of Nelson Mandela. He was convicted of treason and sentenced to a life of hard labor in prison for his anti-apartheid convictions. For 18 years, he lived in a cramped cell and toiled in a rock quarry. Each year, he was allowed 30 minutes with a visitor and could receive and send only two letters. These were his only opportunities to communicate with the outside world.

It’s reasonable for you to assume that since I’m telling you his story as a lesson in perseverance, you already know what choices he made with respect to fading away — allowing some pretty depressing circumstances to alter the course of his life — or choosing to persist.

His perseverance and strength of character over those 18 years he was incarcerated earned him the respect of everyone, including his prison guards! Rather than drifting into obscurity while in prison, Mandela boosted his image while in prison. When he was released, he emerged with a higher profile than ever and leveraged his influence to bring about liberty and a democratic South Africa.

No small feats, indeed!

As we move into month six on our Intentional Leadership journey, take a few minutes to consider your responses to the following questions:

What unfavorable conditions are making your leadership difficult?

What steps can you take to remove or neutralize the sources of resistance on the job?

How might you grow stronger by enduring these hard times?

What rewards might you receive if you persevere through the toughest aspects of your job?

We will be digging deeper into these thoughts in the coming weeks. I’m looking forward to working through them with you.

In the meantime, have an intentional day!

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Intentional Leadership — D1, W4, M5 — Passion

Passion is contagious.

Are you familiar with the story behind the Susan G. Komen Foundation? Yes, the one focused on finding a cure for breast cancer.

More than 25 years ago, Nancy Brinker promised her dying sister she would devote herself to fighting breast cancer, and she did. She named the foundation after her sister, and set forth the vision of raising awareness of the disease and supporting research towards a cure. As you know, the non-profit resonated with the population and quickly grew. Brinker’s passion and focus attracted survivors, supporters, researchers, and more.

Two years after she formed the foundation, Brinker was diagnosed with breast cancer herself; she refused to allow her condition to keep her from advancing the cause of the Susan G. Komen Foundation. She continued to host fundraising events and secured corporate sponsorships, as she was winning her own battle with cancer.

Her passion was contagious…it lit the fires of so many others and the foundation grew by leaps and bounds. Passion is similar to lighting one candle with another; Brinker’s passion sparked the passion of those she touched on her journey. By 2008, the SGK Foundation had donated over $1.2 billion to research a cure for breast cancer and to promote education about the disease.

It’s fair to say, largely due to the Foundation’s efforts, the five-year survival rate of women with breast cancer has increased from 74 to 98 percent, and more women than ever are having regular mammograms.

Is your passion tied to a core belief or commitment in your life?

At what cost are you willing to pursue your passion?

What would be the impact if you pursued your passion?

What will be the impact if you allow your passion to dim and fade away?

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Intentional Leadership — D1, W3, M4 — Focus

Wow! We’re already into week three of our fourth month on this journey! Time flies…

What does clear focus do for you and your team? When I work with teams, I begin with team building (have to have a foundation of trust before anything else of significant value will happen), and once we have that foundation, we work on where the team is headed — defining and clarifying what their vision is. Then I walk them through plotting out the steps they will need to take to achieve their vision, how they will measure their progress along the way, and how will they hold themselves and each other accountable for their individual and team commitments.

As they begin to move forward, they will develop momentum, but they will also be dealing with the rest of their lives, which creates some distractions, both at home and at work. It’s critical they remain focused on the end game. Clear focus eliminates distractions, unifies activity, and guides decision-making.

When your focus is diverted, all kinds of things will come into your path to get you and keep you off track. You will find competing goals and your team mates will be pulled in other directions. As the leader, you must be the reminder, relentlessly keeping the team focused on your shared vision, championing that vision, and celebrating the work your team is doing and the milestones it is achieving along the way.

Think back to the Cold War. There were several different schools of thought about the approach we should take with the USSR: Befriend them and seek common ground; divvy up territories — giving them control of Eastern Europe and parts of Asia; others said they must be defeated at all costs.

Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher agreed with the final approach — defeat them at all costs. Our leaders had determined that the USSR having any significant control beyond its own borders was not an option that would be good for the rest of the globe. Each took a specific approach. Reagan framed it as a struggle between liberty and suppression. Thatcher focused on unraveling socialist policies at home and abroad. Together, they focused the resources and willpower of half the globe toward crushing communism.

What do you think would have happened if they didn’t have a laser-sharp focus on these issues?

What distractions threaten to sway the focus of your team?

What can you do — daily — to unify your team’s attention and activities?

Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work at hand. The sun’s rays do not burn until brought to a focus.   ~Alexander Graham Bell

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