What Leadership Isn’t

What Leadership Isn’t:

A Partial List

First Written June 2007

 You might not be a leader if:

• You think you’re the Lone Ranger
• You’re always looking over your shoulder
• You need someone else to set you in motion
• You’re afraid to ruffle feathers
• You avoid work that denies you attention/credit/compliments
• Everyone has to like you
• You’d rather work on things than with people
• You hoard credit and find it painful to pay compliments
• You think people should “get it” the first time
• You “treat everyone the same”
• You devalue people based on “ism’s”
• You regularly keep score on what the company “owes you”
• You pay more attention to relationships above you than below
• You think recognition is a zero-sum game
• You prefer to be the source rather than a resource
• You let emotion and mood drive your reactions and interaction
• You’d rather be right than in relationship
• You think developing your people is restricted to their technical skills
• You think position means power
• You “wing it” when running a meeting
• You think employees are there for you to use as needed
• You really wish you could just close the door and get to work
• You think a good presentation consists of accurately delivered data
• You wait for problems to solve themselves and blow up when they don’t
• You let others take the risk of proposing ideas while you criticize them
• You reject others’ observations about your ideas rather than considering them
• You sneered at most of this list