Actionable Leadership
By Mike Myatt, Chief Strategy Officer, N2growth
Understanding and implementing the concept of “actionable leadership” is a major key to success in becoming a great CEO. Much has been written about leadership theory, leadership concepts, leadership style, leadership dynamics, what leaders are, or are not, and a plethora of other leadership-centric content. However my question to you is this: What is leadership without action? Theory is fine for the classroom, but in the business world, theory without action is little more than useless rhetoric. Don’t tell me, show me…Don’t talk the talk, but walk the walk. In today’s post I’ll discuss the element that separates wannabe leaders from authentic leaders…Action.
Do you have great vision? Are you a master of strategy? Do you have boundless energy or mesmerizing charisma? While the aforementioned qualities are certainly admirable, they are only valuable if they influence or create action. Walt Disney, one of the greatest creative talents and true innovators of our time realized the value of action when he said: “The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.”
A close examination of truly great leaders will reveal that, to the one, they all have a strong bias toward action. It was Andrew Grove the former Chairman and CEO of Intel and Time Magazine’s 1997 Man of the Year who said “You have to take action; you can’t hesitate or hedge your bets. Anything less will condemn your efforts to failure.” If you can’t take action, if you can’t make the tough decision, and if you can’t instill a bias toward action in your peers and subordinates, then you don’t belong in a leadership position.
A critical part of the talent management life-cycle is leadership development. If your mentoring and training programs don’t focus on the development of action oriented leaders then you are simply breeding obselesence, and utlimately…failure. When an organization stops learning they begin dying. It is more critical than ever in today’ economic climate that leadership development be a top priority for CEOs who want to build a thriving enterprise moving forward.
Remember that leadership is not a spectator sport. Great leaders will do anything to get off the bench and into the game. If your company has passive and/or timid leadership you will face serious problems in sustaining your competitive advantage. Furthermore, if your company isn’t leveraging action learning to develop leaders, fuel innovation, foster collaboration, and catalyze growth then you are missing a substantial opportunity. My message is a simple one…stop pondering and pontificating and take action.
