{"id":169,"date":"2017-08-08T02:14:16","date_gmt":"2017-08-08T02:14:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/?p=169"},"modified":"2017-08-08T02:14:16","modified_gmt":"2017-08-08T02:14:16","slug":"java-with-joe-get-powerful-with-positive-power-and-influence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/?p=169","title":{"rendered":"Java with Joe: Get Powerful\u2014With Positive Power and Influence"},"content":{"rendered":"

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If you\u2019re a regular reader of this blog, you know that leadership is one of its frequent topics. What constitutes good leadership? How does an individual develop the qualities necessary to be a good leader? How does an organization support good leadership?<\/p>\n

Whether explicitly or implicitly, discussions about leadership often seem to involve the question of power. That\u2019s because, whether we do it consciously or unconsciously, we often think of power as the power to do something<\/em>\u2014the capacity to get others to do what we want them to do, to exert control, to deliver results. These connotations of power imply the ability to coerce, and that\u2019s not something everyone is comfortable with.<\/p>\n

Personally, I like to think of power in a different way. Rather than think of it as a form of control over others, I like to think of power in two ways. First, there\u2019s power over myself\u2014the power that comes with self-discipline, with self-awareness, with persistence and passion. And second, there\u2019s power as the ability to help others succeed, to deliver results not by driving others but by enabling others<\/em>. Whether you call this Servant Leadership, Values-driven Leadership, Level-5 Leadership, or anything else, it comes down to something quite different from power as the ability to coerce.<\/p>\n

As I\u2019ve said before, there\u2019s nothing \u201csoft\u201d about this kind of power. In their book<\/a> on \u201cServant Led\u201d companies, James Sipe and Don Frick compared the ROI of 11 publicly held, servant-led companies to the 11 \u201cgreat\u201d companies in Jim Collins\u2019 Good to Great<\/em>, as well as to the pre-tax return of the 500 largest public companies in the US. Over a 10-year period, the servant-led companies significantly outperformed the others.<\/p>\n

This kind of power\u2014the power that comes from self-awareness and self-discipline, the power to succeed by helping others succeed\u2014this kind of power is values-based. It depends on a leader\u2019s being committed to and consistently acting on the basis of values such as humility<\/em>, empathy<\/em>, caring for others<\/em>, listening<\/em>, persuasion<\/em>, and true collaboration<\/em>.<\/p>\n

But here\u2019s something I find quite interesting. In hiring situations, and also when I\u2019m asked to come in and help an organization achieve higher levels of engagement, I often ask people, \u201cWhat are your values and how were they shaped?\u201d And whether I\u2019m talking to front line employees or C-suite executives, it\u2019s amazing how few people can answer that question. \u00a0Even after taking some time to think it over, they really seem to have trouble coming up with anything solid, in the sense that they can actually explain what they mean by a given value, and talk about when and how they\u2019ve demonstrated it.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s a problem. If you don\u2019t know what values are most important to you, how can you assess whether you\u2019re living by them? How can you decide whether they\u2019re likely to make you the kind of leader\u2014the kind of person\u2014you aspire to be? How can you look at an organization and decide whether you\u2019ll be a good fit?<\/p>\n

Most of all, how much more powerful, in the best sense of the word, would you be as a leader if you were clear about your values?<\/p>\n

And by the way, the less aware you are of your own values, the more likely you are to say one thing and do another. How many leaders have you encountered who say that they value collaboration when most of the time they act as if the only opinion that really matters is theirs? Believe me, when you fall into this trap, the people around you will notice\u2014and they\u2019ll be much less likely as a result to trust you, respect you, and yes, follow you.<\/p>\n

What it comes down to is that having high levels of self-awareness around your values can be the groundwork for becoming a very powerful person, in the best sense of the word.<\/p>\n

So, here are a few questions to consider. When was the last time you took a hard look at yourself in order to be able to articulate your values and how they were shaped? Have you ever shared your values with your team and have they every had the chance to share theirs with you? Is there anything holding you back from doing the above?<\/p>\n

As always, I\u2019d love to hear your thoughts on all of this.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you know that leadership is one of its frequent topics. What constitutes good leadership? How does an individual develop the qualities necessary to be a good leader? How does an organization support good leadership? Whether explicitly or implicitly, discussions about leadership often seem to involve the question […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-169","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=169"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":170,"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169\/revisions\/170"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=169"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=169"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greensummit.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=169"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}