subject of customers. I have spent several years attending a lot
of seminars, talks, and discussions on the subject. It has led me
to put together my own training seminar. It is not just something
that I feel I ought to do. It is something that fires me up”.’
32
This attribute is extremely important in terms of technological
awareness. Obviously it’s not realistic to expect a business leader to
be capable of Java programming, but if a modern leader doesn’t have
a natural inquisitiveness of new inventions, and a close colleague
who is technologically literate, he or she is extremely vulnerable to
approving the wrong IT system, missing a new product or a new
way of doing business.
Frank Lane, a programmer-turned-entrepreneur, runs a design and
advertising company in southern England, called Image. He still
teaches himself something new about programming every month, as
well as avidly reading management textbooks and magazines. As a
result of this curiosity, and comfortable with IT, he has introduced
the use of WAP mobile Internet technology with his salespeople, at a
time when many have been struggling to make the most of the
development. His staff can check the availability of advertising space
while they are with a client, and book space instantly, connecting to a
system that is updated in real time.
Frank Lane describes this relentless curiosity as the habit of being
‘permanently in school’.
33
Continual learning means continual
inventiveness, which is, as the example above illustrates, a far more
effective way of improving efficiency than cost-cutting.
There are indirect benefits also. As we discussed in Chapter 2, the
human brain is capable of unknowable improvement, given the right
stimuli. One can draw a close analogy with physical exercise
momentum complete leadership chapter ten
179
pages 178 /
Superior chief executives exhibit an underlying
curiosity and need to know more about people, things
and issues.
improving the body. Run up a hill every morning and our legs
strengthen; exercise the grey matter through reading philosophy or
playing chess or studying quantum mechanics and our brain
capacity improves.
To maintain this capacity, it’s important not to become burned out
(see page 125). Athletes have discovered that it is possible to over-
train – the symptoms are ‘muscle soreness and weakness, reduced
exercise tolerance, reduced motivation, mood swings, sleep
disturbance, recurrent infection, loss of appetite and diarrhoea’.
34
The same applies to developing the mind; exercise is essential, but
overload is dangerous. It’s better to consider the quality of our
decisions, and gain a sense of the improvements we may have made
in our decision-making ability.
4Take pride in the achievement of others
We can’t do everything by ourselves. If you head a large company or
division, the vast bulk of the duties and tasks are carried out by
others. This is a fairly obvious statement, but the case studies
throughout this book have illustrated the ease with which we
persuade ourselves that we have to do it all ourselves; and also the
achievement and the joy to be gained from letting others shine.
Many of the executives that we’ve interviewed stress the importance
of recruitment: the right person in the right post. If we feel compelled
to interfere, then it’s possible that we have too much urge to control,
and we need to work on this ourselves, but it’s equally possible that
someone charged with an area of responsibility is simply out of their
depth, and would feel enormous relief at being moved to another
area, or receiving the training needed to perform well.
The coaching style, as described in Chapter 3, is the one most closely
associated with bringing out the best in others, but intriguingly, it’s
not the only one. Indeed, such is the degree to which achieving your
aims depends on others’ contributions that the whole of leadership
could be said to be creating the climate in which others can shine.
..................Content has been hidden....................
You can't read the all page of ebook, please click here login for view all page.