Did you know

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If you asked 25 different executives around the world how they define leadership, you would very likely get 25 different answers. Perceptions, values and experiences affect the way we understand our roles as leaders. Is it about headship, directing, control?  Despite any variation in the definition of leadership, most leaders understand that their roles bear the heavy loads of responsibility and accountability. Leaders today are drawing upon the notion of servant leadership to foster the kind of maturity organizations need to prosper in a diverse, well-connected stakeholder environments. This often requires a different type of leadership training for executives and mid-level management. 

Einstein’s quote is a perfect segue to Travis Bradberry’s article, Emotional Intelligence – EQ  (Forbes, Jan 9, 2014). We now know there is more to success than cognitive ability and application. Bradberry points out two specific, but critical statistical findings:  1) Average IQ subjects outperform highest IQ subjects 70% of the time. 2) Emotional intelligence received credit above 33 other job skills for 58 percent of success in various jobs. Organizational leaders would do well to shape talent acquisition and retention strategies accordingly and factor in emotional intelligence as a indicator of performance.

The World Economic Forum estimates that only half of Fortune 500 companies survive beyond 50 years. In What is the life expectancy of your company?, Mark Goodburn maintains that CEOs struggle with strategic vision, transformation implementation and status quo. Small business numbers are not promising either. The Small Business Administration estimates indicate one half of all small businesses survive beyond five years while only one third survive beyond 10 years. 

Survival depends on organizational stability. However, we also know that innovative, forward-thinking strategy is foundational to ongoing success. Stabilization and innovation are two distinct functional categories of business management, but they are interdependent. To capitalize on that, leaders must plan the extent of vision.