Leadership 101

A few forgotten things about leadership: 

1. The potential you see in others means nothing without their buy-in. If they don’t want it for themselves, it’s a brutal lesson in futility. Yours.
2. You will spend more time at work than with your own family over the course of a lifetime. Best love what you do. And surround yourself with the right people.
3. Do not expect others to care the way you do. Alternately, you may not care the way they do. It’s ok.
4. It weighs a lot because it is insanely lonely at the top. The sleepless nights, the fights with other decision makers, the balance never found. You probably won’t have any friends and, if you do, watch out for perception. I am not inclined.

A lovely friend sent me the following graphic after she proudly exclaimed how I had “grown a pair”.

What she does not realize is for every day my “pair” swings, I have just as many softer moments, where I’m reminded to fight the good fight means not acting like a complete arsehole and picking my battles. Forever, a work in progress.

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I ask you –

What is your toughest leadership challenge?

(The post Leadership 101 first appeared here at Running on Fumes.)

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