Leadership: The art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it.
~Dwight D. Eisenhower

This is a fabulous leadership quote. Eisenhower seemed to understand something that most modern leaders forget. Leadership isn’t about forcing people to do things. It about showing the way in getting them to want to do it themselves. Leadership implies that you’re out in front getting people to follow you. It’s not the same as pushing from behind and forcing people to do what you want. That means that with leadership you have to focus on how to motivate people–not how to drive them.

The most successful leaders are the ones that understand this. Instead of worrying about how to make people do what they want they focus on how to get people lined with the goals of whatever the undertaking it. Their goal is to make sure that everyone understands the purpose so clearly that they will act for themselves without having to be told every single individual action.

This type of leadership is highly effective yet extremely rare. It is hard to leave like this. Most people revert to type of management where you simply try to force people to do what you want. If your leadership only comes from the fact that you are in that an authority position and can withhold some basic paycheck, fire them or otherwise coerce them into doing what you want, you are being a leader. He may be a manager. You could be a number of other things–but you definitely aren’t a leader. A leader has to get people to motivate themselves.

One of the biggest ways people fail in this regard is by not having a clear leadership purpose there they leave for the sake of leaving. They like being in charge so they lead. This is a particularly effective. A leader really needs to have a vision, a goal, and in purpose. It’s very hard to get people to want to do what needs to be done when you are clear yourself what you’re trying to accomplish.

The purpose of leaving is not simply to get other people to do your will. If not simply to be in a position where the people will obey you. The purpose of leading it took up with something. This may be one of the reasons why leadership and the military seems so effective. Not only have they spent years refining the leadership process, but the goals are generally pretty clear. When people have clear goals is much easier to lead. They know where they’re going and they know what they need to do to accomplish those goals. The leader can help things by communicating the vision clearly, setting strategy, pointing the way toward what needs to be done, but has very different than simply driving people toward an end that they don’t all agree on.

If a leader is to be effective they must focus on what the people they lead one to publish. Now that doesn’t mean they can influence this, but they have to bear in mind. True leaders are able to align the goals of what they wish to accomplish with the goals of the people who follow them. Sometimes this means modifying their goal to have a win-win situation for everybody. Sometimes it means educating the people under them so they see the value of leaders goals. Many times it means inspiring people so they understand the benefits of where they are headed. When this is done on a consistent basis people understand why they are doing what they’re doing.

In the Revolutionary war a general commented that US soldiers were very different than the soldiers yet encountered in Europe. He said in Europe recently tell soldiers to do something and they will for the most part do it. In the United States soldiers had to be told why you want them to do something. Once they understood the logic behind it in the end goal behind it they were more dedicated than their European counterparts. The reason for this is leadership. The European soldiers were simply following directions. The US soldiers were following a purpose. They were trying to cop listings because they wanted to see it done as well. They had bought into the vision and we’re striving to publish the same things that the leader was trying to accomplish.

This is the ideal situation to be in the leader. When you have people following you who understand me and goal they can think for themselves. They don’t have to be told every individual detail. They can act autonomously and make good decisions. True they may not make the same decisions as you, but it’s much. Have someone who can make decisions headed toward be in goal someone who has to be told every single detail of what they need to do. Even if they make a decision differently than you would from time to time the result is better. In many cases they may make better decisions than you would because they are closer to the problems they’re trying to solve.

Einstein’s understanding of how to lead was very important. It allowed him to see people differently than the leaders who were trying to drive people around and force their will on them. He understood that it was his job to get people to buy in to publishing the task at hand–not merely force them to do what he wanted. This type of leadership is really the most effective way and Eisenhower understood this.

It might seem that this type of leadership is easier when you’re president boring charge of an army. It is embedded is any easier. It’s just that we’ve been trained so much in business to be poor leaders that people don’t know how to use this type of leadership in the business setting.

People want to be inspired by their leaders. They want to know that the work they are doing has value that goes beyond just earning a paycheck. When people feel like what they are doing is important they can be more engaged and go the extra mile to accomplish goals. It’s kind of like the story of the person the factory. When asked what he was doing he said he was building cars. That’s a very different outlook than the person who said he was screwing bolts on screws. When people see what they do in light of the entire process and the entire Golden needs to be accomplished they can be truly lead in the right direction. When they only see their little part of what they do, it’s tough for them to be inspired about screwing a bolt on a screw.

It’s much easier to take someone who feels their building high-quality cars and leave them in a way that’s beneficial for everyone than it is to take someone who sees her job as during not on bolts and get them to understand that the quality of what they do impacting product and impacts customers, and impacts the world.

People want to feel they are changing the world. They want to be inspired to understand that what they do matters. People are seeking relevance for their life. They want to know that what they are doing makes a difference. This is how leaders motivate people. They show them do what they are doing is important. They show them how to do it better. When you lead from this standpoint you’re able to take people and get them to do what needs to be done because they want to–that because you’re forcing them to do it, but because they want to do it and they see the advantage.

This is true leadership. This is the only way to lead effectively.

To be able to lead others, a man must be willing to go forward alone.
~Harry Truman

This leadership quote from Harry Truman illustrates the great need for a leadership purpose behind every great leader. How many of the current crop of untalented managers who think they are in a leadership role simply because they have some authority would be willing to do their jobs if no one reported to them?  Not many!

Without a clear leadership purpose, no one is going to continue without followers.  This is an excellent test to tell if someone is operating as a leader or simply as a boss.  If they would be unwilling to do the work themselves, then the work isn’t as important as being in charge.  If the work is truly important then they will be willing to strive toward the goal on their own if need be.

If you are in a leadership position this is an excellent way to make sure that you are moving your team toward goals that are important.  Before asking someone to do a project, stop and ask yourself if you would do the work yourself even if there was no one to delegate to.  If not, then it might be something that doesn’t really need done.

We’ve all suffered through poor leaders who ask us to do work that doesn’t really need to be done.  They assign work simply because we are available–not because the work is important and not because the work helps advance the organizational goals.  If you want to be successful however, the work you assign to others must be important.  If you give people jobs and tasks that don’t really need to be done, you aren’t leading them–you are simply managing their time.

While there may be a place for managers in this world, they aren’t going to make a positive change in their environment and won’t be remembered for their contribution. When leadership is working correctly it lowers the need for management because people with a purpose working toward a goal require less management than people doing meaningless work simply to retain the paycheck that they need to survive.

People ask the difference between a leader and a boss. . . The leader works in the open, and the boss in covert. The leader leads, and the boss drives.
~Theodore Roosevelt

Theodore Roosevelt, for all his faults, had a very strong grasp on leadership.  This leadership quote illustrates a deep understanding of the difference between someone who actually leads and someone whose authority merely comes from their position. The “boss” has authority because he can fire others.  Someone who is truly a leader doesn’t operate from just having authority.  They lead rather than drive those they are responsible for.

This isn’t to say that a leader will never have the authority to fire someone. However, their approach to getting others to do the work that needs done determines whether or not they are operating as a leader or a boss. Someone who points the way and helps people toward the organizational goals is likely functioning as a leader.  Someone who threatens and browbeats others into what they think needs to be accomplished isn’t acting as a leader. The leadership traits that help attract followers are all centered around being able to get others to willingly follow–not forcing them.

When it comes down to it, people will willingly follow a leader–even if they don’t have the ability to fire them.  People will not willingly follow someone who is just acting as a boss with no leadership qualities.  The only thing keeping them around is the paycheck or threat of losing their income.

If you want to find the best leaders, look for people who have volunteers working for them.  When people are free to follow anyone they choose, the best leaders are going to attract the best followers.  Individuals in “leadership” positions in large organizations may or may not be good leaders.  It is hard to tell because most of the people stay in those organizations because of the money.  If the money went away, how many CEO would be able to convince others to stay at their jobs?  Not many.

In the volunteer world, there are many positions, so if you don’t like working in one organization it is easy to switch to another.  If the leader in a volunteer organization is poor or is trying to lead by being “the boss”, chances are their recuits will leave and go somewhere else.

The very essence of leadership is its purpose. And the purpose of leadership is to accomplish a task. That is what leadership does–and what it does is more important than what it is or how it works.
~Colonel Dandridge M. Malone

People seem to overlook that the core aspect of leadership is having a purpose.  It matters where you want to go. So many of todays managers think they can be leaders simply for leadership sake.  You don’t lead simply to lead–you lead to get people from point A to point B.  You have to have a purpose.  You have to have somewhere that you want to take people.

Leadership fails if you don’t have a purpose.  Without a purpose there is no reason to lead.  Without a purpose you simply become a manager–keeping things running without really deciding what needs to be done, where people need to head and what needs to be accomplished.

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