The alchemy of good leadership leads to many products. Among them is loyalty, which is a topic we have mentioned before in terms of its relationship to high performing teams. The crux of that discussion was the hopeful intent of fostering that quality in the teams you lead and ones of which you are a […]
Tag Archives: trust
March
06
The Art of Getting Stuff Done – 4 Things Leaders Should Know
posted by Jeffrey Thomason
A review of contemporary literature on business success (or success in any endeavor involving the joint efforts of two or more people) often breaks down success into a couple of principles. Leadership and management are often discussed in the same conversation as if they are two separate end states which will sometimes run at cross-purposes […]
September
28
Loyalty And The Team
posted by Jeffrey Thomason
The history of literature and art in Western civilization is expressed in a number of recurrent themes. Some are positive, like love, loyalty, struggle and triumph, sacrifice, friendship, and family. Others are the shadow traits of each of these, such as hate, treachery, cheating, cowardice, and forsaking the team for the loneliness of the selfish act. All are, […]
June
11
People You Should Know – Admiral William McRaven
posted by Jeffrey Thomason
Last month, the graduates of the University of Texas got a special commencement address from someone who has spent the majority of his life avoiding any type of public event such as a graduation speech. Admiral William McRaven returned to his alma mater to address the class of 2014 and provide a little life advice […]
May
26
What’s In A Day?
posted by Jeffrey Thomason
The origins of Memorial Day as a federal holiday date back to the end of the Civil War and the spontaneous events and memorials that sprang up in the aftermath of such a cataclysmic event that cost the young nation almost a million souls. Over the next century, the occasion of marking remembrance to the […]
May
05
Exercising Good Judgment
posted by Jeffrey Thomason
One of my new favorite blogs had a definition yesterday that really resonated with what can be the core of a leader’s daily responsibility. “Leadership….is nothing less than the repetitive exercise of discretionary judgment…”. Which leads one to think, is there a judgment muscle that can be trained or exercised or enhanced through the proper […]
April
28
First Rule of Bossing – Do No Harm
posted by Jeffrey Thomason
Stanford professor Robert Sutton is well known for his theories on management and business, with over a dozen books to his credit. His most popular work is about being civil in the workplace, which at its core is about the Golden Rule. It is unfortunate that in any conversation about workplace jerks, the buck stops pretty squarely […]
April
26
The Green Eyed Monster
posted by Jeffrey Thomason
Shakespeare’s use of jealousy, in families and governments, was a constant theme throughout his works. His use of this theme was consistent with the era and the predominance of the Catholic Church in those times. Envy was identified as one of the seven deadly sins by Pope Gregory and then used by Dante in his “Divine […]
April
10
Attitude is Every Day
posted by Jeffrey Thomason
For those of you who just took a chewing from the boss, or experienced a spectacular fail, or got crushed under a huge Rock Of Unrealistically High Expectations, coming in to work the next day (or the next minute, depending on the circumstances) can be an ordeal. Sometimes, it’s even worse if you have had […]
April
05
The Secret To Leadership Isn’t A Secret
posted by Jeffrey Thomason
There is a saying that goes “Three can keep a secret if two of them are dead”. While this may be the creed of the professional intelligence officer, in the world of the leadership of human beings by other human beings, the goal is the opposite. The temptation to keep secrets can often be the undoing of […]
February
26
Competence vs. Character – The Army Dilemma
posted by Jeffrey Thomason
Recently, the top two generals in the United States Army, Chief of Staff Ray Odierno, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Martin Dempsey, told the Associated Press that the Army has suffered from a loss of focus and a failure to balance character with competence ….Sometimes in the past we’ve overlooked character issues […]
February
14
Captain Miller’s Rule – Gripes Go Up
posted by Jeffrey Thomason
War movies are sort of a cliche for finding leadership material. For one, they are not everyone’s favorite genre’, so a respectable portion of aspirant leaders may not read any farther when someone starts quoting their favorite scenes. On the other hand, the topic of leadership is something endemic to the military, especially due to the […]
January
13
What Kind Of Follower Are You?
posted by Jeffrey Thomason
This blog is about the art of leadership, and as I have said on several occasions, is aimed at the leader, the aspiring leader, and those who are led. Many of the topics I have covered thus far focus in on the perspective of those first two groups. The last group, the led, are known by another […]
The Truth, and Other Things
posted by Jeffrey Thomason
There are two possibilities about your team that you can contemplate from your position of leader. The first possibility is that they will follow you because they want to. Or, they will follow you because they have to. Despite the apparent differences that each of these realities suggest, there is one important similarity. You have […]
When Change Hurts
posted by Jeffrey Thomason
If you take the King’s shilling, as the quote goes, “you do the King’s bidding”. When the King starts to run out of shillings, things start to happen. One of the likely and predictable consequences of having a lesser number of shillings is the possibility that there might need to be a smaller organization in […]
When Leaders Make Mistakes – Leading With Maturity
posted by Jeffrey Thomason
The art of the apology is one that has had a lifetime of practice given that it has a well stocked and steady stream of imperfect humans making error after error. The relationships of family, marriage, work, business, and society provide numerous opportunities to offend, enrage, sadden, or otherwise damage the connection. It could be between a business […]
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