3 Essential "E"s For Leaders... Engage, Empower, Encourage!!

"Enflamed with the study of learning and the admiration of virtue; stirred up with high hopes of living to be brave... and worthy..., dear to God, and famous to all ages." - John Milton

Leaders are by definition "stewards" of the trust, hope and beliefs of others. To perform their acts of stewardship, leaders must practice and master three essential tasks:

=> Engage people
=> Empower people
=> Encourage people

Many leaders have a problem applying those 3 "E"s to their leadership goals, actions and conversations. Here are a few strategic ideas you can use to inject the three "E"s into your leadership styles and behaviors.

Engage the Hearts, Minds & Wills of People!
"No seed shall perish which the soul hath sown." - John Addington Symonds.
When you plant a positive vision into the fertile fields of their hearts, minds, wills and emotions, your venture is sure to succeed.
Your task is to help your partners, associates, peers and constituents or clients to

=> Connect with,
=> Believe in,
=> Commit to,
=> Organize for

performing that mission-critical activity, reaching for a desired objective or completing some specific task.
The intent, consistency and integrity of your leadership style, behaviors and attitudes must demonstrate the worthiness of your visionary ideal or principles.
In a word, you use your dreams or ideals to motivate and inspire the confidence and commitment of others.

Empower the Skills, Performance & Competencies of People!

Empowering people means
-> linking them with the knowledge, resources, assets and processes they need,
- preparing them for the tasks, activities, objectives, challenges and problems they will work through,
- directing them to the sources of tools or materials, supplies and resources, specialists or networks to enable their efforts,
- guiding them in identifying, classifying, mapping or modeling, learning, analyzing, evaluating, innovating and creating, managing, venturing and leading for any situation.
By empowering, we mean facilitating the supply of energy, mass and capability to perform the work at hand. To provide people with the energy of a belief, competence or meaning.

"True hope is swift, and flies with swallow's wings; Kings it makes gods, and meaner creatures kings." - William Shakespeare

Leaders encourage us to have hope, we use that hope to add speed and give flight to our dreams, our hope transforms our lives into the lofty desires of kingly beings, and transmutes our efforts into a reality of kingly treasures.

Encourage the Endeavors, Strengths & Confidence of People!

When you lead by encouraging people, you give them a:

=> purpose for being, for their inclusion, for making a difference and contribution, for reaching upwards or towards a higher plateau
=> obligation to the mission, to help others, to fulfill an ideal, to belong, to a higher power or greater good
=> trust in the common purpose, in goodness of others, love and mercy of God, in a promising potential for the venture,
=> affinity with a noble or worthy enterprise, with other positive or success-oriented people, with a great and righteous goal
You encourage people because you realize they will become transformed by the hope of a positive image or possibility.
"None without hope e'er lov'd the brightest fair, But love can hope where reason would despair." - Lord Lyttleton.

LOVE is an act of the will, to love is a willful decision to show a loving concern, care and compassion for another - love gives hope the solid support of a strong foundation.

"Growth is the only evidence of life." - John Henry Newman

If it is possible to encourage an energizing yet positive growth of people, then you are engaged in a worthwhile endeavor.

When we analyze the styles and behaviors of our greatest leaders like , Gandhi, King, Churchill, Tolstoy and Mother Theresa, they share a common trait - they applied all three "E"s to their practice of leadership.

Leaders in government, business and public services can easily find ways to use one or more of these key actions -

1) They can engage the hearts or minds of people through compelling ideas or inspiring principles;
2) They can empower the ability and desires of people by connecting or educating them through applied energy;
3) They can encourage the commitment and heroism of people by showing them the hope or belief in a better reality.
Try out these concepts - when you do, you'll see a real improvement in your leadership effectiveness!

"We have two lives about us, Two worlds in which we dwell, Within us and without us, Alternate Heaven and Hell: Without, the somber Real, Within, our hearts of hearts, the beautiful Ideal." - Richard Henry Stoddard.

It's up to you to decide, do you believe there are 3 "E"s in "leadership"? Stretch forth your hope and see the possibility - engage, empower, encourage your people to win!


By Bill Thomas

Awaken the Leader in You -10 easy steps to developing your leadership skills !!

"The miracle power that elevates the few is to be found in their industry, application, and perseverance, under the promptings of a brave determined spirit." - Mark Twain

Many motivational experts like to say that leaders are made, not born. I would argue the exact opposite. I believe we are all natural born leaders, but have been deprogrammed along the way.

As children, we were natural leaders - curious and humble, always hungry and thirsty for knowledge, with an incredibly vivid imagination; we knew exactly what we wanted, were persistent and determined in getting what we wanted, and had the ability to motivate, inspire, and influence everyone around us to help us in accomplishing our mission.

So why is this so difficult to do as adults? What happened?
As children, over time, we got used to hearing, No, Don't, and Can't. No! Don't do this. Don't do that. You can't do this. You can't do that. No! Many of our parents told us to keep quiet and not disturb the adults by asking silly questions. This pattern continued into high school with our teachers telling us what we could do and couldn't do and what was possible.
Then many of us got hit with the big one institutionalized formal education known as college or university. Unfortunately, the traditional educational system doesn't teach students how to become leaders; it teaches students how to become polite order takers for the corporate world.
Instead of learning to become creative, independent, self-reliant, and think for themselves, most people learn how to obey and intelligently follow rules to keep the corporate machine humming.

Developing the Leader in you to live your highest life, then, requires a process of unlearning by self-remembering and self-honoring. Being an effective leader again will require you to be brave and unlock the door to your inner attic, where your childhood dreams lie, going inside to the heart.
Based on my over ten years research in the area of human development and leadership, here are ten easy steps you can take to awaken the Leader in you and rekindle your passion for greatness.

1. Humility. Leadership starts with humility.
To be a highly successful leader, you must first humble yourself like a little child and be willing to serve others. Nobody wants to follow someone who is arrogant.
Be humble as a child, always curious, always hungry and thirsty for knowledge. For what is excellence but knowledge plus knowledge plus knowledge - always wanting to better yourself, always improving, always growing.

When you are humble, you become genuinely interested in people because you want to learn from them. And because you want to learn and grow, you will be a far more effective listener, which is the #1 leadership communication tool.
When people sense you are genuinely interested in them, and listening to them, they will naturally be interested in you and listen to what you have to say.

2. SWOT Yourself. SWOT is an acronym for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats.
Although it's a strategic management tool taught at Stanford and Harvard Business Schools and used by large multinationals, it can just as effectively be used in your own professional development as a leader.
This is a useful key to gain access to self-knowledge, self-remembering, and self-honoring. Start by listing all your Strengths including your accomplishments. Then write down all your Weaknesses and what needs to be improved. Make sure to include any doubts, anxieties, fears, and worries that you may have. These are the demons and dragons guarding the door to your inner attic.

By bringing them to conscious awareness you can begin to slay them. Then proceed by listing all the Opportunities you see available to you for using your strengths. Finally, write down all the Threats or obstacles that are currently blocking you or that you think you will encounter along the way to achieving your dreams.

3. Follow Your Bliss.
Regardless of how busy you are, always take time to do what you love doing. Being an alive and vital person vitalizes others. When you are pursuing your passions, people around you cannot help but feel impassioned by your presence. This will make you a charismatic leader.

Whatever it is that you enjoy doing, be it writing, acting, painting, drawing, photography, sports, reading, dancing, networking, or working on entrepreneurial ventures, set aside time every week, ideally two or three hours a day, to pursue these activities.

Believe me, you'll find the time. If you were to video tape yourself for a day, you would be shocked to see how much time goes to waste!

4. Dream Big. If you want to be larger than life, you need a dream that's larger than life. Small dreams won't serve you or anyone else. It takes the same amount of time to dream small than it does to dream big.
So be Big and be Bold! Write down your One Biggest Dream. The one that excites you the most. Remember, don't be small and realistic; be bold and unrealistic! Go for the Gold, the Pulitzer, the Nobel, the Oscar, the highest you can possibly achieve in your field.

After you ve written down your dream, list every single reason why you CAN achieve your dream instead of worrying about why you can't.

5. Vision.
Without a vision, we perish. If you can't see yourself winning that award and feel the tears of triumph streaming down your face, it's unlikely you will be able to lead yourself or others to victory.

Visualize what it would be like accomplishing your dream. See it, smell it, taste it, hear it, feel it in your gut.

6. Perseverance.
Victory belongs to those who want it the most and stay in it the longest. Now that you have a dream, make sure you take consistent action every day. I recommend doing at least 5 things every day that will move you closer to your dream.

7. Honor Your Word.
Every time you break your word, you lose power. Successful leaders keep their word and their promises.
You can accumulate all the toys and riches in the world, but you only have one reputation in life. Your word is gold. Honor it.

8. Get a Mentor.
Find yourself a mentor. Preferably someone who has already achieved a high degree of success in your field. Don't be afraid to ask. You've got nothing to lose.

Mentors.ca is an excellent mentoring website and a great resource for finding local mentoring programs. They even have a free personal profile you can fill out in order to potentially find you a suitable mentor.

In addition to mentors, take time to study autobiographies of great leaders that you admire. Learn everything you can from their lives and model some of their successful behaviors.

9. Be Yourself.
Use your relationships with mentors and your research on great leaders as models or reference points to work from, but never copy or imitate them like a parrot. Everyone has vastly different leadership styles.

History books are filled with leaders who are soft-spoken, introverted, and quiet, all the way to the other extreme of being out- spoken, extroverted, and loud, and everything in between.

A quiet and simple Gandhi or a soft-spoken peanut farmer named Jimmy Carter, who became president of the United States and won a Nobel Peace Prize, have been just as effective world leaders as a loud and flamboyant Churchill, or the tough leadership style employed by The Iron Lady, Margaret Thatcher.

I admire Hemingway as a writer. But if I copy Hemingway, I'd be a second or third rate Hemingway, at best, instead of a first rate Sharif. Be yourself, your best self, always competing against yourself and bettering yourself, and you will become a first rate YOU instead of a second rate somebody else.

10. Give. Finally, be a giver.
Leaders are givers. By giving, you activate a universal law as sound as gravity life gives to the giver, and takes from the taker. The more you give, the more you get. If you want more love, respect, support, and compassion, give love, give respect, give support, and give compassion.

Be a mentor to others. Give back to your community. As a leader, the only way to get what you want, is by helping enough people get what they want first. As Sir Winston Churchill once said, "We make a living by what we get, we make a life by what we give."


By Sharif Khan


Contribution of Lucy Doss

Workplace Communication Essentials

Whether you own your own business, lead a corporate division, or simply need to collaborate with others in order to do your work, one thing is certain: you need to communicate, and communicate well, to truly shine. The value of skillful communication can be seen in the most extraordinary groups and individuals, who go beyond basic number-chasing to excel in ways that lend a deeper mystique and meaning to their work.

Yes, workplaces are rife with stories of abominable communications from managers, leaders, or employees who get shuffled around from one post to another because no one wants the unpleasant -- and skill-requiring -- job of pointing out and holding them accountable for their unskillfulness. Indeed, surveys show that poor communication is one of the root causes for workplace stress, higher absenteeism, and people leaving the organization.

But just because there are many mediocre and sub-par performers, do you really want to be one? In some cases, following the pack is really just the lazier and less desirable option. While greater mastery has its demands, and requires you to move past your comfortable status quo to higher levels of development and skillfulness, the fruits of those labors include better relationships, less stress, deeper meaning, greater satisfaction, higher confidence, fewer miscommunications and misunderstandings, and more. Aren't these worth putting in a little bit more effort?

Some of the essentials for higher-performing groups and individuals:

Get centered. Your best instinct, communication, and decision-making come when you're centered, rather than when you're preoccupied, flustered, angry, or otherwise "off-center." Thus, practices that help you stay centered are worth the time and effort.

Listen well. Skillful listening makes other people feel heard, and it also ensures that you're getting authentic, good quality information and are making deeper and more positive connections with others. Poor listening happens often, and results in miscommunications, misunderstandings, and other mishaps.

Speak clearly. Ums, ahhs, errs, uh-hmmms, and other poor habits make it difficult for people to understand what it is you're trying to communicate. This includes speaking too quickly (or speaking so slowly or softly that you put people to sleep before your sentence is finished), or speaking into your shirt or hand. Endeavor to relax your voice, take a deep breath, hold a positive intention, and say what you're trying to say.

Think creatively. Do you think? It's a weird question, to be sure, but it's amazing how often people don't think — they just DO or follow without putting any updated thought into their doing or following. Asking questions, among other things, is one great way to stimulate creative thinking. For example, you can ask, Does my approach to to this need to be updated? Have I fallen into a rut? What other solutions are possible for this problem? How else could I be seeing this?

Be receptive. Be open to what others are saying or offering, or to potential solutions that might be just on the other side of your perception. Often, you might restrict the flow of ideas or communication, or just make yourself feel unnecessarily tense or anxious, because you're making too many assumptions or are being too quick to judge and criticize. Allow yourself the pleasure of increased receptivity.

Inquire skillfully. Asking good questions is a facet of skillful listening and creative thinking. Skillful inquiry is different from interrogation, where you're basically grilling someone in order to dismantle a belief or idea that you don't agree with. Skillful inquiry is also different from making statements that have question marks on the end, such as "You don't really believe that?" You inquire because you want to learn more, and by learning more you — and your results — are enriched.

Stay relaxed. Have you ever spoken with someone who was very preoccupied or agitated? Who seemed like they were ready to leap away (and may have already done so, mentally)? This isn't to say that excitement and passion are to be squelched, but rather than stress and tension, be relaxed in order to be more skillful and effective. Choose whatever strategies appeal to you to help you stay relaxed, no matter what is happening around you.

Be mindful. This is a lovely way of saying, "Pay attention!" It can be downright frightening when someone isn't paying attention to where they're walking or while they're driving. But it's also annoying if you don't pay attention when you're speaking with someone, or if you leave things unfinished or other than where you found them (particularly when you're in someone else's space, or have someone else relying on your contribution). Cultivating mindfulness is simply learning to pay attention to what you're doing.

Have intention. What's your intention? You can ask yourself this question when you're starting a project or task, getting ready to go to a meeting, or starting a conversation or responding to something someone has said or done. You can also ask this question of someone else, as in, "What is your intention for involving me in this project?" or "What was your intention for saying that?" Knowing your intention, and understanding someone else's intention, will help you be more conscious of what you're doing or saying something — which means you'll be able to be more effective and skillful.

Be genuine. Being genuine can include speaking honestly, being friendly, saying "no" when you feel like saying "no," or expressing excitement or sadness or sympathy when you feel it. It might mean admitting, "No, I don't really agree with that," or "You know, I think you've changed my mind!" Being authentic or genuine doesn't give you license to be rude or lacking in compassion, however. "I was just being honest" isn't a good excuse for being unskillful. By increasing your mindset-management skillfulness, and your interpersonal communication capabilities, you'll feel more confident about being who you are.

By Jamie S. Walters

Courtesy: Lucy Doss

Top Secrets of Success

Click here to download in pdf format.

Keys to Managing Change Successfully and Avoiding the 9 Most Common Pitfalls !!

Dealing with change, great and small, is a fact of life in today’s companies. When change is handled well, the credibility of the company with everyone affected, as well as everyone who hears about it, is enhanced. But, when change is handled badly, the credibility and employee morale are significantly damaged resulting in negative consequences for the company and the people involved. The following are some keys to managing change and some pitfalls of which to be aware.

Four Keys to managing change successfully

1.Make sure you have identified every person or group with a vested interest in, or who will be impacted by the change, both inside and outside the company, then ensure that your strategy and action plans address these well.

2 Whenever possible, involve representatives of each affected group in planning or implementing the details of the change plan, before and after the change announcement as appropriate.

3.Tell the truth.

4.Do the right thing even if it’s inconvenient or difficult.

Nine Pitfalls to avoid in change situations

1.Underestimating the speed, strength and impact of the grapevine.

2.Underestimating the time and effort it will take to handle the change well.

3.Poor communication including: too little, too late, too soon before you have your act together, badly presented, leaving those with a vested interest out, not truthful, inaccurate, or insensitive.

4.Inadequate change plans that fail to account for all the proper elements.

5.Good plans that are badly or only partially implemented.

6.Disengaging the change process prematurely before every issue, person or group has been properly addressed.

7.Not involving the right people to get an accurate picture of what needs to be addressed and the best way to do it in the planning process before the change is announced or begun.

8.Failure to maintain confidentiality to prevent premature leaks about the issue.

9.Failing to debrief when all is concluded to be certain there are no loose ends and to determine what you have learned of use for next time

One way to get a good overview of any change situation is to use simple mapping techniques that can help you identify the elements to address in any given situation. One of the easiest and most versatile is “Mind Mapping" (also known as the tinker toy or molecular model). You begin with the change situation in a circle in the middle, lines out from that to new circles each of which contain someone or something significantly impacted by the change and then expand that second layer to a third layer.

Consider the last major change you had all or part of the responsibility for planning, managing or implementing (or several if you can). With that change in mind, now ask yourself the following questions and write down your answers. Then file them where you will think of them and can find them the next time you are responsible for planning, managing or implementing a change.

1.What went right? Why? Based on this, what have I learned that I can apply in a future change situation? Be as specific as you need to for this to make sense and be useful when you look at it next time, whether 6 days or 6 months from now.

2.What went wrong? Why? Based on this, what have I learned about what not to do that I can apply in a future change situation? Be as specific as you need to for this to make sense and be useful when you look at it next time, whether 6 days or 6 months from now.


By Marie Kane

Contributed by Lucy Doss

Personal Leadership: One Key to Growing Any Organization !!

What did Winston Churchill, Lee Iacocca and Bill Gates have in common? Certainly they were great personal leaders who knew what they wanted and how to get it. However, they didn't succeed because they had great personal leadership qualities. They succeeded because they understood the importance of hiring managers who also possessed personal leadership skills.

These leaders built an environment in which leadership qualities flourished in all employees. As each employee reached new heights of achievement so did the organization, ensuring that the individuals and the organization outperformed the competition.

Leadership is an elusive trait. The typical CEO and senior management team have little formal training in effective leadership and base their style on trial and error. This style will not work. CEOs cannot lead others if they cannot effectively lead themselves. They must develop personal leadership in themselves and their management team.

Changing Attitudes toward Leadership

Anyone, whether CEO or supervisor, can develop personal leadership and make it a dynamic force in his or her life.
Changing attitudes is difficult. Each of us has two things in common, the present and the future. During our present, we program our future. The program we set today determines the results we get tomorrow. If we desire to create a future that is different from our present, we must change our actions and the way we think today.

We exhibit personal leadership when we take responsibility for leading ourselves to reach our personal vision by changing our lives so that we will reach new heights of achievement and lead a life that is positive and fulfilling.

The Most Important Leadership Attitudes

The key to developing personal leadership is to believe in yourself first. Once you know you can accomplish anything you desire, you are ready to tackle the world and generate great personal success.

Even those not in management positions must begin to think like a leader. Position is unrelated to responsibility. Everyone who exhibits effective personal leadership and believes in themselves can become a leader and a positive role model.

The key leadership attitudes are:

Be a great role model. Forget the old adage, "Do as I say, not as I do." Your actions, not your words, are the most important messages that you send to others.

Maintain a great attitude about people. Believe that your people are self directed and will work for personal growth and increased responsibility. Expect your staff to exhibit personal leadership and help them to continually grow to new levels.

Be personally motivated. Think of yourself as a thoroughbred that runs to win. You act to meet your personal needs and desires. Motivation is internal, not external.

Inspire people to build their internal motivation by building motivation in yourself and by challenging everyone to be the best.

Improve yourself even just 1% a month, a tiny amount. Through the miracle of compounding, you will double your effectiveness in less than 5 years. This powerful motivator gives you control over your life and can double your effectiveness several times over during your career.

Finally, work for yourself. Once you discover the great truth that your employer is paying you to work for yourself, you will realize that work is a blessing, not a burden. The better you hone your personal leadership skills, the more success you will bring to yourself.

Steps to Develop Personal Leadership

The following proven, simple but sometimes difficult to follow steps will help you develop more success though personal leadership. Develop the conviction and courage needed to accomplish change. You can make personal changes although these changes will take time and effort. Take these steps:

Write your goals down. Know yourself and your present condition so you can be realistic about where you are going. Writing your goals crystallizes your thoughts and forces you to be realistic and logical. You are able to build a solid foundation.

Develop an action plan. A large dream can be overwhelming so break your goals into manageable pieces and define the steps necessary to accomplish them. Then put the steps into a logical sequence.

Do the most important step of all: schedule your action steps. Make appointments with yourself to accomplish your action steps so that your busy life and the many competing demands on your time do not derail you. When you plan, you will take the steps necessary to create future success.

Track and measure results so you know where you are. Items you track and measure get accomplished. When you make steady progress, you are much less likely to experience personal doubts. As you track your success you can enjoy your accomplishments.

Summary

Personal leadership, whether at the CEO level or at the supervisory level, will bring you great personal rewards. You, as an effective personal leader, will develop a strong success attitude that gives you:

The freedom to choose your own path to success.

The confidence that you are following the life plan that is right for you.

The elimination of confusion and frustration that comes from trying to please others.

The challenge and excitement of developing all of your own potential.

Strong personal leadership also gives the organization a competitive advantage in today's compressed, highly competitive business cycle.

Effective CEOs take the attitude for themselves and their management team that "If you don't grow, you go." They understand that when they exhibit personal leadership as they strive to evolve the organization to the next level, they also provide a role model for their employees, who must accept and lead change.

In the resulting culture, employees meet their personal goals by helping the organization meet its goals. Personal growth translates into organizational success.

Robert Schuller provided us with a great personal vision statement that you can use in your 1% growth plan when he said, "Whatever you do today, do it better tomorrow."


By Tom Northup

Contributed by Lucy Doss

The Factors of Leadership Motivation

Leaders do nothing more important than get results. But you can't get results by yourself. You need others to help you do it. And the best way to have other people get results is not by ordering them but motivating them. Yet many leaders fail to motivate people to achieve results because those leaders misconstrue the concept and applications of motivation.

To understand motivation and apply it daily, let's understand its three critical pillars. Know these pillars and put them into action to greatly enhance your abilities to lead for results.

1. MOTIVATION IS PHYSICAL ACTION.

"Motivation" has common roots with "motor," "momentum," "motion," "mobile," etc. all words that denote movement, physical action. An essential feature of motivation is physical action. Motivation isn't about what people think or feel but what they physically do. When motivating people to get results, challenge them to take those actions that will realize those results.

I counsel leaders who must motivate individuals and teams to get results not to deliver presentations but "leadership talks." Presentations communicate information.. But when you want to motivate people, you must do more than simply communicate information. You must have them believe in you and take action to follow you. A key outcome of every leadership talk must be physical action, physical action that leads to results.

For instance, I worked with the newly-appointed director of a large marketing department who wanted the department to achieve sizable increases in the results. However, the employees were a demoralized bunch who had been clocking tons of overtime under her predecessor and were feeling angry that their efforts were not being recognized by senior management.

She could have tried to order them to get the increased results. Many leaders do that. But order- leadership founders in today's highly competitive, rapidly changing markets. Organizations are far more competitive when their employees instead of being ordered to go from point A to point B, want to go from point A to point B. So I suggested that she take a first step in getting the employees to increase results by motivating those employees to want to increase results. They would "want to" when they began to believe in her leadership. And the first step in enlisting that belief was for her to give a number of leadership talks to the employees.

One of her first talks that she planned was to the department employees in the company's auditorium.

She told me, "I want them to know that I appreciate the work they are doing and that I believe that they can get the results I'm asking of them. I want them to feel good about themselves."

"Believing is not enough," I said. "Feeling good is not enough. Motivation must take place. Physical action must take place. Don't give the talk until you know what precise action you are going to have happen."

She got the idea of having the CEO come into the room after the talk, shake each employee's hand, and tell each how much he appreciated their hard work physical action. She didn't stop there. After the CEO left, she challenged each employee to write down on a piece of paper three specific things that they needed from her to help them get the increases in results and then hand those pieces of paper to her personally - physical action.

Mind you, that leadership talk wasn't magic dust sprinkled on the employees to instantly motivate them. (To turn the department around so that it began achieving sizable increases in results, she had to give many leadership talks in the weeks and months ahead.) But it was a beginning. Most importantly, it was the right beginning.

2. MOTIVATION IS DRIVEN BY EMOTION.

Emotion and motion come from the same Latin root meaning "to move". When you want to move people to take action, engage their emotions. An act of motivation is an act of emotion. In any strategic management endeavor, you must make sure that the people have a strong emotional commitment to realizing it.

When I explained this to the chief marketing officer of a worldwide services company, he said, "Now I know why we're not growing! We senior leaders developed our marketing strategy in a bunker! He showed me his "strategy" document. It was some 40 pages long, single-spaced. The points it made were logical, consistent, and comprehensive. It made perfect sense. That was the trouble. It made perfect, intellectual sense to the senior leaders. But it did not make experiential sense to middle management who had to carry it out. They had about as much in-put into the strategy as the window washers at corporate headquarters. So they sabotaged it in many innovative ways. Only when the middle managers were motivated - were emotionally committed to carrying out the strategy - did that strategy have a real chance to succeed.

3. MOTIVATION IS NOT WHAT WE DO TO OTHERS. IT'S WHAT OTHERS DO TO THEMSELVES.

The English language does not accurately depict the psychological truth of motivation. The truth is that we cannot motivate anybody to do anything. The people we want to motivate can only motivate themselves. The motivator and the motivatee are always the same person. We as leaders communicate, they motivate. So our "motivating" others to get results really entails our creating an environment in which they motivate themselves to get those results.

For example: a commercial division leader almost faced a mutiny on his staff when in a planning session, he put next year's goals, numbers much higher than the previous year's, on the overhead. The staff all but had to be scrapped off the ceiling after they went ballistic. "We busted our tails to get these numbers last year. Now you want us to get much higher numbers? No way!"

He told me. "We can hit those numbers. I just have to get people motivated!"

I gave him my "motivator-and-motivatee-are-the-same-person!" pitch. I suggested that he create an environment in which they could motivate themselves. So he had them assess what activities got results and what didn't. They discovered that they spent more than 60 percent of their time on work that had nothing to do with getting results. He then had them develop a plan to eliminate the unnecessary work. Put in charge of their own destiny, they got motivated! They developed a great plan and started to get great results.

Over the long run, your career success does not depend on what schools you went to and what degrees you have. That success depends instead on your ability to motivate individuals and teams to get results. Motivation is like a high voltage cable lying at your feet. Use it the wrong way, and you'll get a serious shock. But apply motivation the right way by understanding and using the three pillars, plug the cable in, as it were, and it will serve you well in many powerful ways throughout your career.

Contributed by Lucy Doss

Time Management

Click here to download this intereting article in pdf format.

Leadership Lessons from General Colin Powell

Click here to download this interesting powerpoint presentation.

Hewitt’s Salary Increase Survey 2008-09

Impact of Economic Downturn

View the latest Salary Increase Survey (2008-2009) from Hewitt Associates.

Click here to download in pdf format..