"Be diligent in these matters; give yourself wholly to them, so that everyone may see your progress. Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers." (1 Tim. 4:15-16)"Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves." (2 Cor. 13:5)
Part 3 of a series focused on leadership at the divisional level.
- Lead by example. As a Division Officer your ability to lead is predicated on solid and consistent self-leadership. Make sure you are where you are supposed to be, when you are supposed to be there, and you have high standards of personal appearance. Never be late or accept tardiness. Be the example of character and morality on and off the ship.
You've got a great blog started here. Keep at it. Make posting daily a habit. I think your Christian approach is an excellent one. Thanks for linking to my blog.
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ReplyDeleteIn his book The One Thing You Need to Know: … About Great Managing, Great Leading, and Sustained Individual Success, Marcus Buckingham has a great section on how the key to thriving in this new world of “excess access” is focus. Intelligence, creativity, and even hard work are not enough. For without focus, you will drown and be unable to avail yourself of the benefits of all abundance of access to all sorts of information that we have.
Focus, in turn, has two components: the ability to filter, and the ability to zero-in with laser-like precision. Both are necessary.
The big implication of this is that effectiveness comes not to those who aspire to well-roundedness, but rather to those who pursue strategic imbalance.
That is, in order to be effective, give up the myth of balance and instead seek to be strategically imbalanced. You do this by building on your strengths, rather than trying to shoring up your weaknesses. Craft your life around your strengths. And since none of us are strong in all areas, this means being strategically unbalanced. Ironically, this imbalance will not leave you brittle and out of the loop, but will actually increase your capacity and effectiveness.
Here’s the full quote (from pages 25-26):
We live in a world of excess access. We can find whatever we want, whenever we want it, as soon as we want it. This can be wonderfully helpful if we are trying to track down last month’s sales data, an errant bank statement, or a misplaced mother-in-law, but if we are not quite careful, this instant, constant access can overwhelm us.
To thrive in this world will require of us a new skill. Not drive, not sheer intelligence, not creativity, but focus [emphasis added]. The word “focus” has two primary meanings. It can refer either to your ability to sort through many factors and identify those that are most critical — to be able to focus well is to be able to filter well. Or it can refer to your ability to bring sustained pressure to bear once you’ve identified these factors — this is the laser-like quality of focus.
Today you must excel at filtering the world. You must be able to cut through the clutter and zero in on the emotions or facts or events that really matter. You must learn to distinguish between what is merely important and what is imperative. You must learn to place less value on all that you can remember and more on those few things that you must never forget.
But you must also learn the discipline of applying yourself with laser-like precision. As we will see, … [effectiveness] does not come to those who aspire to well-roundedness, breadth, and balance. The reverse is true. Success comes most readily to those who reject balance, who instead pursue strategies that are intentionally imbalanced. This focus, this willingness to apply disproportionate pressure in a few selected areas of your working life, won’t leave you brittle and narrow. Counterintuitively, this kind of lopsided focus actually increases your capacity and fuels your resilience.