Too many leaders are so caught up in the momentum of work that they lose sight of the opportunity to connect with people. I discovered that the more fully present I was with other people, the more fully present they were with me, and the more productive our relationship became over time.
Interpretation
Leaders should prioritize genuine connections with people over merely focusing on work tasks.
This quote highlights the importance of presence and connection in leadership. Douglas Conant emphasizes that effective leadership is not solely about managing tasks and maintaining momentum but also about fostering meaningful relationships with team members. By being genuinely present, leaders can enhance their interactions, leading to more productive collaborations and stronger connections over time.
In practice
In a leadership seminar to illustrate the importance of connection.
Most people think of leaders as being these outgoing, very visible, and charismatic people, which I find to be a very narrow perception. The key challenge for managers today is to get beyond the surface of your colleagues. You might just find that you have introverts embedded within your organization who are natural-born leaders.
You have to talk about mistakes and then talk about what you have learned and how to move forward. You acknowledge missteps right away, you deal with them, and you move ahead.
Trust gives you the permission to give people direction, get everyone aligned, and give them the energy to go get the job done. Trust enables you to execute with excellence and produce extraordinary results. As you execute with excellence and deliver on your commitments, trust becomes easier to inspire, creating a flywheel of performance.
Often leaders have the best intentions, but people cannot read their minds. That's why it's important to declare yourself: Tell people why you choose to lead and the code you live by.
The time to build a network is always before you need one.
It would be counterproductive to tell people exactly what they are supposed to do and exactly how they are supposed to do it to a point where they become more concerned about your expectations than about completing their work in a quality way.
He who takes the oath today to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States only assumes the solemn obligation which every patriotic citizen . . . should share with him. . . . Your every voter, as surely as your Chief Magistrate, under the same high sanction, though in a different sphere, exercises a public trust.
When women apply for a job, we ask ourselves, 'Am I qualified? Do I have the experience? Do I have the education? Do I have the abilities?' When a man looks at that job, he thinks, 'How much does it pay?' We need to stop second-guessing our abilities. We need to stand up and make ourselves heard.
Imagine the privilege the Lord has given us of sustaining His prophet, whose counsel will be untainted, unvarnished, unmotivated by any personal aspiration, and utterly true!
You cannot govern, you cannot administrate, with an ignoramus.
You see that even the enemy did not dare to declare war against us till they had seized our generals, for they were sensible that, while we had commanders and yielded obedience to them, we were able to conquer them; but, having seized our commanders, they concluded that we should, from a want of command and discipline, be destroyed.
Leaders lead but in the end it's the people who deliver.
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