Book RE_review: The Five Dysfuntions of a Team

When I first read this book I was new to organizational leadership.  I didn’t realize the true implications of following or not following these principles would be.  Three organizations later I understand that the principles found in this book are more than good suggestions for helping foster teamwork.  They are rules that must be followed in an organization wants to succeed.

Since I’ve never done an official review of this book, you could say that this is not really a RE_review.  But this is coconut island…and everything is from my perspective!  So this RE-review  is going to take a snapshot of just some of the things that stuck out to me this time through:

• Great teams don’t hold back with one another…They are unafraid to air their dirty laundry.  They admit their mistakes, their weaknesses, and their concerns without fear of reprisal.
• Politics is when people choose their words and actions based on how they want others to react rather than based on what they really think
• Concerning goals: “If everything is important, then nothing is.”
• (No one) gets completely used to conflict.  If it’s not a little uncomfortable, then it’s not real.  The key is to keep doing it anyway
• By being even slightly connected to formal performance evaluations or compensation, 360-degree programs can take on dangerous political undertones.
• Team leaders must create an environment that does not punish vulnerability.
• By building trust, a team makes conflict possible because team members do not hesitate to engage in passionate and sometimes emotional debate, knowing that they will not be punished for saying something that might otherwise be interpreted as destructive or critical.
• …teams that avoid ideological conflict often do so in order to avoid hurting  team members’ feelings, and then end up encouraging dangerous tension.
• …it is key that leaders demonstrate restraint when their people engage in conflict, and allow resolution to occur naturally, as messy as it can sometimes be.
• …reasonable human beings do not need to get their way in order to support a decision, but only need to know that their opinions have been heard and considered.
• …it is better to make a decision boldly and be wrong – and then change direction with equal boldness – than it is to waffle.
• One of the most valuable disciplines…a team should explicitly review the key decisions made during the meeting, and agree on what needs to be communicated to employees or other constituencies about those decisions.
• …one of the best tools for ensuring commitment is the use of clear deadlines for when decisions will be made, and honoring those dates with discipline and rigidity.
• The enemy of accountability is ambiguity…
• Teams that are willing to commit publicly to specific results are more likely to work with a passionate, even desperate desire to achieve those results.

Over the years I’ve learned that sacrificing conflict around ideals among team members for the sake of “harmony” is only vain attempts of unity.  Rather, this type of behavior only promotes unhealthy amounts of tension, and the conflict in the end is always messier than the conflicts that should have occurred.

In the end, the goal to to effective teamwork for a leader is not to stand in front of your team and have all the answers, or see your team as a group of people who carry out your goals.  Rather, a good leader invokes the honest evaluations and even opinions of the those around them, understanding that the goals set by a collective effort is always better than the decisions of one person – no matter how exceptional that one person is.

Book RE_review: The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership

Why a RE_review?

WHAT IS A  RE_review?

Simply, it’s a chance for me to put in writing my habit of proactively pursuing a life long passion of developing as a leader.  Since leaders are learners, and learners are readers, I have made it a practice of mine to always having the bible in one hand and a leadership book in the other.

Tonight I finished my regular reading of John Maxwell’s The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership.  Over the years I’ve gained so much insight from this book, but each time I read it, I am either enlightened to some principal of leadership that I must have overlooked the last time I read it, or I am encouraged in the areas I’ve succeeded as well as failed.  Because both success AND failure is the fertile ground for learning, I appreciate the times I take to stop and have moments of self evaluation based on the values and principals I’ve set for myself.

So what tidbits of truth did I find myself uncovering or rediscovering?  Let me share a few:

• Concerning the Leader vs the Entrepreneur: “People may be buying what he (an Entrepreneur) ha to sell, but they’re not following him.  At best, he is able to persuade people for a moment, but he holds no long-term influence with them.”  From this quote, I realized why Pastor who say discipleship is like sales always rubbed me the wrong way.
• Champions don’t become champions in the ring – they are merely recognized there.
• Major barriers to successful planning are fear of change, ignorance, uncertainty about the future, and lack of imagination.
• …the deeper the relationships (with others), the stronger the potential for leadership.
• Build enough of the right kinds of relationships with the right people, and you can become the real leader in an organization.
• …people listen to what someone has to say not necessarily because of the truth being communicated in the message, but because of their respect for the speaker.
• How do people react when you communicate?  When you speak, do people listen – I mean really listen? Or do they wait to hear what someone else has to say before they act?
• Truth is the foundation of leadership.  To build trust, a leader must exemplify these qualities: competence, connection, and character.
• If people don’t know what to expect from you as a leader, at some point they won’t look to you for leadership.
• …who you get (to follow you) is not determined by what you want. It’s determined by who you are.
• (the quality of leaders around you) does not ultimately depend on a hiring process, a human resource department, or even what you consider to be the quality of your area’s applicant pool.  It depends on you.  Who you are is who you attract.
• Effective leaders know that you first have to touch people’s hearts before you ask them for a hand.
• You don’t get credit for being “right.” Your success is measured by your ability to actually take the people where they need to go.
• Great leaders recognize that when to lead is as important as what to do and where to go.
• Reading a situation and knowing what to do are not enough to make you succeed in leadership.  Only the right action at the right time will bring success.  Anything else exacts a high price.
• Success in not measured by what you are leaving to, but by what you are leaving behind.
• You will be judged by how well your people and your organization did after you were gone.

Good stuff =)

Now it’s time to rip myself apart and be honest with where I need more growth.

Book Review: Put Your Dream to the Test by John Maxwell

In John Maxwell’s newest book, Put Your Dream to the Test:10 Questions to help you see is and seize it, John tries to tackle the many questions about having life dreams/aspirations/goals and the path to pursue and hopefully achieve them.

I’ll admit, the initial impression of what I thought the premise of this book would be didn’t really appeal to me from just a judgment of the cover.  I’m not one for your “self-help” pick-me-uppers ,which is what I thought this book was going to be about.  But as I began to read I was more than pleasantly surprised.

As I read this book, I began to realize that the word “Dream” here can be replaced with what I would describe as “Calling.”  My calling is directly affected by my relationship with Christ because I have committed to being someone who “Delights in the Lord“, allowing Him to give me the “Desires of my Heart.”  It may just be a matter of semantics, but it made all the difference to me.

Personally, this book touches specifically on just a part of the spectrum good leadership (which is my favorite subject of study at the current moment) or what Covey would call a “Highly Effective Person.”  The idea of a dream is what drives the human nature.  Some “experts” of personal development call it “seeing with the end in mind”.  In the Christian world, it has even been called in a round-about way, “Holy Discontent.”  In normal circumstances this book might have been a snoozer for me, but at this particular juncture in life, evaluating my “Dream” is exactly what I needed – and this book had a lot to offer.

Here are just a few quotes:

• …a dream is an inspiring picture of the future that energizes your mind, will, and emotions, empowering you to do everything you can to achieve it.
• Failure is the price we must pay to achieve success.
• Followers don’t give their best to something they don’t understand.
• Yes, we do need to aim high.  However, we don’t have the ability to attain whatever we seek.  I don’t possess the ability to achieve every potential I can imagine. I don’t believe that I can achieve any goal. That is not reality.
• …you have to take a realistic look at yourself to know where your habits are taking you.
• …complacency kills passion.  It reduces us to average.
• It is impossible for me to ignore the reality of my present position and be successful.
• Successful people think differently from unsuccessful people, especially in the area of failure.  They see it as a regular part of success, and they get over it.
• The great men and women of history were not great because of what they earned and owned.  They were great because they gave themselves to people and causes that lived beyond them.

I really needed this book at this time in my life, and I was glad to have read it and gained some insightful wisdom on how to approach the journey of going after my “Dream.”

Got dreams?