January 2008
In this Issue:
Can Leadership Be Learned?
By Tasmin Ansary
Certainly leadership can be taught, says Thomas Cronin. And he should know: He taught the subject for many years as a professor of political science at Colorado College. "You're not born to be a leader any more than you're born to be an architect or a doctor," says Cronin.
Most of our political leaders, for example, have received extensive leadership training, even though we may not think of it as such. "In fact, training for political leadership is very much like training to be a doctor. You might go to law school first to get the informational base, then do an internship by assisting a congressperson or some such; then you might run for a small office, which is like a residency--and in the process of all this, you learn things like accountability, like compromise, like how to build coalitions--a whole range of skills."
"Of course genetics plays a part, too. Most people are not cut out for leadership, because they abhor conflict. They run from conflict, but leaders have to confront conflict, move to it, engage with it, handle it, use it." What you're born with will not make you a leader, Cronin says, unless it's developed. That's what schools can do. "West Point is a leadership training institute. They say, Give us four years and we'll give you a general. It doesn't happen overnight, but it happens. When you get an MBA, you're going to a finishing school for leadership." True. But students who go to West Point see a general inside themselves already. Those who go into high-end MBA programs already have the traits of a leader--drive, ambition, a willingness to sacrifice for goals. Schooling doesn't turn them into leaders. It gives them tools to be better leaders.
All the skills converge
If we don't have medical schools, we won't have doctors, but if we don't have leadership schools, we'll still have leaders. Humans clump into groups and follow someone; that's our nature. They won't necessarily be good leaders, though. That's why society has an urgent stake in leadership training.
Such training, however, deals mostly with content. Every field has its own database of necessary information. You must know certain things to run a city, other things to run an army, still others to run a church. If you don't master the relevant data, you'll probably fail as a leader. If you do master the data, however, you're not guaranteed to succeed, because there is something mysteriously more to leadership.
In fact, Ed Everett, city manager of Redwood City (a town near San Francisco) tells me specific knowledge becomes less important as you go higher. Everett, who sees himself as a leader (rather than a manager), declared: "I don't need to know about sewage treatment, bus lines, or how to fight crime. I hire managers who know that stuff. My job is to make all the departments mesh toward something bigger. We're not just out to run an efficient city. We aim to build a community." If Everett is right, there's finally no difference between leading a city and leading a university. At the highest level, the skills converge: Leadership is leadership.
The corporate world bristles with seminars and workshops that purport to teach this essence of leadership itself, but most of these are about management, actually, not leadership.
A leader gets many to work as one by articulating a vision that strikes a chord. All the specific mechanisms of leadership may go into this: charisma, favorable personality traits, a conducive situation. And a leader puts events into action, allowing an observer to record and measure what a leader does after the fact.
Before the fact, however, if an aspiring leader were to ask a teacher how to forge that vague milling mass of separate individuals over there into a cohesive group united by a great purpose, the answer would reside in a vision yet to be articulated.
In that sense, leadership is like poetry. Can you teach people to be poets? Sort of. You can improve their language skills, build their vocabulary, teach them about rhythm, rhyme, and alliteration, and show them great poems others have written. These will enable the poet inside them to emerge and shine--that is, if they have a poet inside them.
I'm guessing leadership study boils down to something similar. If you want to be a leader, schooling can give you the bones, flesh, and skin of leadership, but you have to bring the spirit.
top
The Art of Being Assertive
Your Job Advancement May Depend on It
Denene Brox, for Yahoo! HotJobs
There are many factors that contribute to your career success, but one that's often overlooked is the art of being an assertive employee. If your idea of standing out as a good employee is to simply show up everyday and do the work put in front of you, you are losing out on many opportunities to advance your career and earnings potential.
"Assertiveness is the balance between being mousy and being aggressive," says career coach Cheryl Palmer. "It is standing up for yourself, but not at the expense of others."
For some, striking that balance may mean not being so harsh and bold. For others, it means stepping up and asking for what you want. Palmer says that taking an honest, introspective look at yourself is the first step to measuring your level of assertive self-expression.
So in what areas of your career is it crucial to become assertive? Following are three key areas where assertiveness pays.
Salary
"Being assertive can earn you more money throughout your career," says Palmer. "I have seen many clients lose thousands of dollars because they are not assertive enough to negotiate salary or speak up and ask for a raise. Women in particular tend to have issues with assertiveness when it comes to money."
Career coaches agree that if you're waiting for your boss to notice your contributions and reward you with higher pay, you're losing out. Dee C. Marshall, a career and life coach says to put your request for a raise in writing, outlining all of your achievements, and ask for a meeting with your boss to discuss. "You must go confidently and ask. No one is going to hand you anything," says Marshall.
Meetings
"Meetings are the perfect situation to be assertive," says career coach Rebecca Kiki Weingarten. "It can be an opportunity for you to shine and show your stuff."
Using meetings to share your creative ideas and solutions to problems will help you stand out in front of key leaders. Weingarten points out that even asking the right questions in a meeting is being assertive.
"One of my clients was promoted to vice president of the company just because he contributed in meetings," says Palmer. "He had been at a much lower level in the organization, but his contributions were so salient that upper management saw his potential and promoted him. He ended up making six figures."
Setting Boundaries
If your coworkers are driving you crazy or bullying you around, it's time to put good boundaries in place. Palmer says that there are a lot of workplace bullies, and being assertive allows you to set limits without being becoming a bully yourself.
Learning to say "No" to projects when your own workload is full is an important skill for employees at all levels. Saying "No" is the hardest mode of assertiveness for some people, says Palmer.
"Assertiveness training can be beneficial not only for people's careers, but in their personal lives as well," she concludes "People who want to feel good about themselves and their work need to be assertive."
top
Survivng Your Worst Meeting Nightmares
By Cyrus Farivar, BNET Copyright 2007 CNET Networks, Inc.
Career advice from BNET: When you lead a meeting, you're responsible for your coworkers' teamwork, their decisions, and their behavior. That means you should also be ready for potential hazards such as differences of opinion, personality conflicts, or even brash and outlandish remarks. Here's what to do when your meeting devolves into a worst-case scenario.
"If you disagree with a colleague's idea, you should..."
Propose a constructive alternative without being immediately dismissive. Mildred S. Myers, professor of management communication at Carnegie Mellon University, recommends the "sandwich technique": put a piece of constructive criticism (the meat) between two innocuous statements (the bread). For example, "I see that this is an idea with a lot of potential. One thing we'd have to address is this other thing. But I think we both can agree that we should look into your idea because we want to make sure that it succeeds."
As facilitator, be sure to relate all critiques -- be they yours or those given by other attendees -- to the stated goal of the meeting.
"If a shouting match erupts, you should..."
Attempt to calm people down and, if necessary, suggest they leave the room to take a breather.
"It's the role of the person who's leading the meeting to keep things on track and to keep passion out of it," says Catherine Smith, a spokeswoman for Linden Lab, makers of the online virtual world Second Life. "There's a way to express how you feel without getting crazy about it."
If conflict between two employees becomes a repeat occurrence, talk to them individually or involve your company's HR department to see if they can't get their personal differences resolved.
"If someone makes a horribly racist/sexist/whatever-ist comment, you should..."
Depending on the severity of the comment, it may suffice to simply move on to the next item on the agenda. Richard Arnoldi, executive chef at the Ritz Carlton Washington, D.C., recommends saying, "Let's discuss that one-on-one," or "We can discuss that more later."
If the remark is substantially offensive, you may want to directly address the person during the meeting and let them know that what they said was inappropriate. J.S. O'Rourke, a professor of management at Notre Dame University, warns that allowing comments like this to happen more than once could open the organization to potential litigation for creating a hostile work environment.
He suggests that a leader should say something like, "That's not how we see it here. I want everyone in the room to understand that I disagree with what's just been said, and that as an organization we have an obligation to do better." Leave it at that and move on to the next topic.
"If someone falls asleep, you should..."
If a person is nodding in and out of sleep, it's probably best just to leave them alone - they'll likely come to on their own anyway. However, if someone starts snoring, go ahead and wake them up. It's not necessary to scold them; the fact that you woke them up will be embarrassing enough. If it bothers you enough, after the meeting you may want to make a private remark to indicate that the behavior was noticed. Professor Irv Schenkler, director of management communication at the Stern School of Business at New York University, suggests something like, "It must have been a hard night for you. I know I had one, too."
top |
"