Leadership seems like a slippery thing:  Do I have it, do I not? What am I supposed to learn to be a good leader?  What should I show up as?  If I’m not a jump-on-the-stump person, can I still inspire people?  What if I have no followers?

Research and experience show that organizations that have good leadership do better than those that do not – they are more successful, have higher customer satisfaction, and have more engaged employees.  Successful organizations are infused with a different kind of leadership than what is found in hierarchical, autocratic, and control-oriented structures.  Today, successful organizations depend on leadership that is inclusive, team-based, networked.  This is a shift in mind-set for many people – and it is an essential one.

We think of leadership is as a combination of three elements.  A person who practices all three elements is practicing leadership, wherever she sits in an organization.  An organization that is structured to expect, support, and depend on these three elements from individuals and teams will most likely prove far more successful than one that does not.  The three elements of high-performance leadership are:

• A set of beliefs - about people; the nature of work; motivation; the distribution of knowledge, creativity, and decision-making
• A set of functions – five types of activities that are the ‘work of leadership’ and must be performed at every level of the organization
• A set of forms – informal and formal ways of sharing power

Let’s look at the first element here:  a set of belief.  Consider how an organization is run or how a supervisor manages if the foundational belief is that people are lazy and that they try to avoid work.  The supervisor will be on everyone’s back, pushing, following up, punishing, or trying to motivate people to simply do their jobs.  Micro-management writ large.  Absenteeism and tardiness, even at regular staff meetings, are the norm.  Adequacy is the expected goal.  Excellence is unheard of.  Not the type of organization that most people want to be a part of, yet that is what we see so often.

Then consider what a supervisor does if she believes something vastly different - that people are self-motivated and love to contribute to the work of an organization they believe in.  That particular supervisor provides the tools and environment for people to do the jobs they were hired to do – and then she gets out of the way.  She steps in when there is a divergence from the mission or when her colleagues need her to do something they can’t.  She expects excellence and gets it.  Conflict is managed within the group because it is not interpersonal but rather healthy and focused on improving shared work.  The environment is creative, supportive, engaging, and energized.

To get at some philosophy issues, think about how you would complete the following sentences.   'I believe that  . . .

-   people are basically . . .

-   work is  . . .

-   people are motivated by   . . .

-   knowledge is found . . .

-   creativity is found . . .

-   goals are set by . . .

-   decisions should be made by. . . . . . .

-   time . . . . . . .

-   teams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

-   individuals  . . . . . . . . . . .

-   leaders . . . .

-   communication . . . . . . . .

-   emotions in the workplace . . . . .

-   discipline . . . .

Now, repeat the exercise for how your organization, with its specific culture, would complete the sentences.

Consider how these various beliefs show up in leadership styles, as we did above with the example of believing that people are lazy or self-motivated.

A high-performing organization has deliberately chosen what it believes – its philosophy – and therefore is clear about what is expected of individuals, teams, and the organization.  With a clear philosophy, organizations are well on their way to being productive, effective and efficient, and high-performing.