Obstacles that Senior Leaders Face Daily

By | September 12, 2016

[September 12, 2016]  As part of our physical fitness training in the Army, my fellow soldiers and I regularly negotiated the standard obstacle course.  Its purpose was to challenge us to find ways to successfully navigate through the many barriers (and have a little fun that I never seemed to have).  Yet, leaders face many other types of complex and exasperating obstacles.

“By prevailing over all obstacles and distractions, one may unfailingly arrive at his chosen goal or destination.” – Christopher Columbus

As leaders we are judged by how well we overcome obstacles.  Fundamentally, those who are wise know that adversity actually strengthen leaders and make them better.  The harder the “kick in the teeth,” the better the leader can be; it may be the best thing for leadership development.

Many times over the last few years, I’ve discussed how leaders must learn to deal with those obstacles.  I’ve dealt with the issue generically and grouped all obstacles into a single category but only on an occasion or two have I given specifics.  Below are some of the daily obstacles that leaders encounter:

  1. The lure of tactical efforts over strategic thinking.
  2. A focus on email, phone calls, and other trivia over people issues.
  3. A lack of moral courage among other senior leaders.
  4. The lack of authority to resolve an issue or problem.
  5. Neglect of long-range planning and transformation.
  6. The physical and mental health of leaders and workers.
  7. Obsolete schools for training of leaders/managers.
  8. Overreliance on technology as a solution.
  9. The search for the perfect employee and ideal team.
  10. Using the “our problems are different” excuse.
  11. Reliance on statistics and quality control measures for decision making.
  12. Blaming the workforce for problems.
  13. Strict adherence to established procedures and standard operating principles.
  14. The attractiveness of easy, off-the-shelf solutions.
  15. Failure to quickly deal with toxic leaders.

These are certainly not trivial issues.  For example, many will think that the physical health of a leader or worker is no big problem.  “They’ll get well soon enough and be back,” we tell ourselves.  Yet one of the biggest problems in any organization is that a significant proportion of the workforce is unhealthy; either physically or mentally.  Time is taken from the senior leader’s schedule to work through the problems these obstacles bring.

[Don’t forget to “Like” the Leader Maker at our Facebook Page.]

 

Author: Douglas R. Satterfield

Hello. I provide one article every day. My writings are influenced by great thinkers such as Friedrich Nietzsche, Karl Jung, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Jean Piaget, Erich Neumann, and Jordan Peterson, whose insight and brilliance have gotten millions worldwide to think about improving ourselves. Thank you for reading my blog.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.