[March 7, 2021] Leadership is about finding the right path and keeping to it. But, leaders are still prone to step on landmines that symbolically blow up along their way. Despite a successful career, how could it be that so many leaders slip and fall anyway?
I’ve stepped on these same leadership landmines, and so have many of my friends and peers. What are they, and how can they be avoided?
Landmine #1: Destroying trust. Human relationships of all types are based on trust. Being trustworthy means knowing how to demonstrate one’s good character, reliability, accountability, sharing goals, and avoiding divisive politics. Doing the right thing consistently matters a great deal.
Landmine #2: Isolated leaders. The burdens of responsibility and the pace of leadership can push leaders toward isolation. The cliché that “it’s lonely at the top” can be used as justification for leaders to remove themselves from people. Out-of-touch leaders will make foolish decisions because they are divorced from what is happening around them.
Landmine #3: Being indecisive. Indecisiveness or procrastination happens when leaders need to make an important decision but fail to do so. These individuals are not lazy; they just do everything to avoid making a tough decision. Such behavior has the ultimate purpose of feeling good now and avoiding stress. The problem is, it doesn’t work.
Landmine #4: Abusing privileges of leadership. This is a common problem of leaders who are senior in rank. Such a leader can use his power to receive favors from subordinates, use threats to receive entitlements, demand absolute loyalty and control through intimidation and coercion.
Landmine #5: Not delegating authority. It is natural to fear delegating authority when one must also simultaneously keep responsibility. This is a form of losing control over people and resources. Leaders who struggle with delegating authority lack the maturity needed to move their organization forward. Learning to delegate is difficult but a must-have trait.
Landmine #6: Lying, or at least not telling the truth. There are many leadership landmines, but this one will take you out. Anytime a leader lies, cheats, steals, or tolerates those who do, failure is only a short time away. Only those leaders with character and are willing to be open and transparent will accomplish the mission.
Landmine #7: Foot in the mouth. Listen closely before you speak because once said, you cannot recover those words. Yes, a leader can explain or clarify or even retract his words, but a misspoken word’s initial impact will remain. Ask questions. Understand the concerns and complexities before making a decision.
Landmine #8: Letting your ego win. Share the glory, take the blame for what goes wrong. One of the greatest demoralizers is a leader who takes all the credit and offsets the blame. Take responsibility and act to solve problems. Throwing others under the bus is a recipe for failure.
Landmine #9: Not following the rules. Lead by example. There are good and reasonable rules for everyone, and the leader is not an exception. “Do what I say, not what I do” is an invitation for big trouble.
Leadership success is an art. And, it’s risky. With a few simple concepts in mind, a leader can minimize their chances of detonating some of the most common leadership landmines.
Landmine #7: Foot in the mouth. Ha Ha, my favorite, Gen. S. Love the list. I think that I stepped on all of them.
Me as well, otherwise, I would not be as successful as I am. I learned the hard way but I learned.
Nice list, Gen. Satterfield. Now, the big challenge is to NOT step on them. I love the analogy, BTW.
Landmine #9: Not following the rules. Reminds me of my kids.
Ha Ha, good one, Lady Hawk, I would presume that most of us parents would think the same thing. They don’t clean up their rooms, take out the trash, or get a parttime job to help themselves. Better to just not follow the basic rules which they think are for other people, not themselves.
Another excellent blog post to power my way thru the day. I’m back at work and nothing could be better. Income finally flowing back into the Don Snow household and my wife is much friendlier. The lockdowns, which I think were way overblown, are now showing what a farce they were and the little impact they had on holding down the pandemic.
I think I will do the same but explain why I’m handing to my boss. 👍
Good point, Frank. Best to let them know up front why we are sharing this article. The list generated by Gen. Satterfield is well done. Looking at other articles on the same subject, Gen. S. has covered most of the territory they did. Keep this article around, in particular, if you plan on being in a leadership position.
Landmine #8: Letting your ego win. My boss at work is here. But, most of us just laugh at her behind her back.
I like Landmine #6: Lying, or at least not telling the truth. This has been a consistent theme in Gen. Satterfield’s blog for a long time now and rightly so. Not telling the truth (at least as you know it) is problematic on several levels. Most importantly, as Dr. Jordan Peterson has stated, it corrupts our “self” in that it makes us MORE prone to lie in the future and drive others to trust us less.
Yes, Martin, you nailed that one. Lying is problematic also at the community or societal level. When many of its citizens lie, then institutions are trusted less and less and people begin to feel disenfranchised. Then comes violence as an acceptable means of achieving an end.
Good points Martin and Jerome. This is a real problem, yet, according to psychologists and Gen. Satterfield, we actually encourage lying and train our young to lie often.
Well said, all. Thanks.
👍
I agree with you Martin. I’ve seen lying destroy many leader’s credibilities. So sad when it happens. All any of them had to do was to admit to a mistake (usually small) and move on. But they chose to lie their way out. It doesn’t work.
This is a great list and I already forwarded it to my boss, who is a really open fellow looking for ways to make all our leader positions better educated on how to improve productivity and improve worker satisfaction at the same time. I’m sure he’ll be happy to read your article.
Ha Ha, you have an atypical boss. Most would be insulted, I think, anyway. 😊
Excellent article, Gen. Satterfield. Hi. I’m impressed with today’s and yesterday’s articles. Each has helped me pinpoint some of the more complex issues of leadership in times of crisis. Keep these coming our way. Oh, and TEXAS sends her best regards.
Hi Georgie, well said. We all love Texas and are happy they are leading the way for states to come out of the coronavirus pandemic.