Dynamic Leadership Quotes

The Paradoxical Commandments People are illogical, unreasonable, and self-centered. Love them anyway. If you do good, people will accuse you of selfish ulterior motives. Do good anyway. If you are successful, you will win false friends and true enemies. Succeed anyway. The good you do today will be forgotten tomorrow. Do good anyway. Honesty and frankness make you vulnerable. Be honest and frank anyway. The biggest men and women with the biggest ideas can be shot down by the smallest men and women with the smallest minds. Think big anyway. People favor underdogs but follow only top dogs. Fight for a few underdogs anyway. What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight. Build anyway. People really need help but may attack you if you do help them. Help people anyway. Give the world the best you have and you'll get kicked in the teeth. Give the world the best you have anyway.

To be a jazz freedom fighter is to attempt to galvanize and energize world-weary people into forms of organization with accountable leadership that promote critical exchange and broad reflection. The interplay of individuality and unity is not one of uniformity and unanimity imposed from above but rather of conflict among diverse groupings that reach a dynamic consensus subject to questioning and criticism. As with a soloist in a jazz quartet, quintet or band, individuality is promoted in order to sustain and increase the creative tension with the group--a tension that yields higher levels of performance to achieve the aim of the collective project. This kind of critical and democratic sensibility flies in the face of any policing of borders and boundaries of "blackness", "maleness", "femaleness", or "whiteness".

Scenarios are dynamic living narratives, and require updating as the world itself evolves.

The more we practice mindfulness the more we understand the emotional dynamics of the self and others.

While deeply admiring and affirming past prophets, the Qur’an casts a critical eye on human misapplication of their revelations. “Our prophetic guides came to them with clarifying signs, yet many among them soon lapsed, spreading disorder in the land” (5:32). The perpetual dynamic of monotheistic values revived by prophets only to be subsequently squandered by humans is what concerns the Qur’an. It diagnoses a range of repeated failures, including: losing a close relationship with the Divine and reverting to idolatry; debating minutiae as an excuse to avoid bold action; imposing dogma not found in scripture and turning petty disputes over dogma into deadly violence; and elites selfishly abusing their leadership positions to mislead and manipulate.

...he preferred to view his crew leadership not as decision making, but as sensemaking. "If I make a decision, it is a possession, I take pride in it. I tend to defend it and not listen to those who question it...If I make sense, then this is more dynamic and I listen and I can change it.

BDSM, in its nature, is a very intimate and intelligent therapy, if done properly.

The vanities of life:pleasure, possession, position and power.

Scripture is the ultimate source of truth and contains some of the most valuable wisdom on the planet because it was given to us by the author of life Himself.

That which a team does not want to discuss, it most needs to discuss.

It’s through diverse opinions and perspectives that a dynamic organisation can drive innovation and create its competitive advantage.

Competency is more valued than seniority; knowledge is more useful than status.

Leading large groups of people, motivating and inspiring them to accomplish a common goal regardless of adversity or danger—that’s the essence of dynamic leadership.

Board of Directors members should provide strategic oversight and guidance to help the company navigate complex market dynamics and chart a course for long-term success. It's about the big picture.

The boardroom is more than just a meeting space; it's a crucible where the future of a company is forged. It's a dynamic arena where individuals with diverse backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives converge to make decisions that can profoundly impact the lives of employees, shareholders, customers, and communities.

The dynamics within the boardroom are often complex and multifaceted. Strong personalities, competing interests, and high stakes can create an environment ripe for conflict. Know what I mean? But here’s the thing; when managed effectively, these dynamics can also lead to robust discussions, innovative solutions, and sound decision-making.

Once again, it must be reiterated that beliefs and practices that developed in response to earlier, and presumably different, environmental pressures tend to persist, and the result may come to be far less than efficient utilization of an environment

But as a war time president James Madison did not display dynamic leadership. Andrew Jackson acknowledged Madison " a great civilian," but declared " the mind of a philosopher could not dwell on blood and carnage with any composure," and judged his talents " not fitted for a stormy sea.

If I were not African, I wonder whether it would be clear to me that Africa is a place where the people do not need limp gifts of fish but sturdy fishing rods and fair access to the pond. I wonder whether I would realize that while African nations have a failure of leadership, they also have dynamic people with agency and voices.

power dynamic operates in emotional contagion, determining which person’s brain will more forcefully draw the other into its emotional orbit. Mirror neurons are leadership tools: Emotions flow with special strength from the more socially dominant person to the less. One reason is that people in any group naturally pay more attention to and place more significance on what the most powerful person in that group says and does. That amplifies the force of whatever emotional message the leader may be sending, making her emotions particularly contagious. As I heard the head of a small organization say rather ruefully, “When my mind is full of anger, other people catch it like the flu.

Nobody has to get "better" to come to Jesus.

Stagnancy will suffocate a business… Leadership must be dynamic and evolving to ensure successful growth, enhancement, and longevity.

... none of them had it. They had no qualms about stealing, but they needed to be told. They liked to be told, and Viktor Chemmel liked to be the teller. It was a nice microcosm.

Leadership doesn't occur in a vacuum, it manifests in a context. These contexts are as dynamic as the personalities, stakes, culture and information available.

Unlearn your knowledge about what WAS working to understand what is working NOW

Its easier to start a global business than a local one, make your business one where you can work from anywhere in the world

Decisiveness is the number one quality of a dynamic leader; his ability to communicate a decision with passion and integrity is an art form.

Map out lofty goals… include reasonable checkpoints along the way... refine, improve, and enhance your behavior in alignment with your goals…. that is the dynamic of true leadership and the formula for success.

Helping teacher leaders come to understand their gifts is the first step in developing a specialty. Some leaders are great coaches and should focus on instructional leadership in a district or network where that is valued and supported. Great conceptual thinkers are good in startup mode but the daily grind of leading a school doesn't suit them. Other leaders thrive on the turnaround challenge. The dynamic blended future of education will allow more role specialization.

The number one job of a leader is to wake up every morning, point to the horizon, and let everybody on the team know where the organization is going. The number two job of a leader is to explain, in clear and simple terms, why the story of going to and arriving at that specific destination matters. The number three job of a leader is to analyze the skills and abilities of each team member and find them an important role to play in that story. All human beings long for a mission. We are all born self-identifying as heroes in a story and we know, even as children, that our existence on this planet matters. Not only this, but as communal beings, every person longs to join a team on a serious and important mission. This is why dynamic leaders are able to attract top talent. Every dynamic leader you know or have ever heard of had a mission burning inside them that other people wanted to join. Great leaders become great because their mission makes them great. There are no exceptions.

Another approach is actually to build the job around the person, to create a virtual job portfolio to match what he/she does best. Say you find a highly competent human being. Rather than asking the person to conform, you find appropriate things for that person to do. This permits a great deal of mobility within the organization, breaks up the traditional hierarchy, unlinks the rigid chain-of-command, and uncovers new functional slots. Such an idea is disturbing to First Tier entities, quite natural in Second Tier structures.

Management is about the position; leadership is a disposition that goes beyond positions. Managers minimize risks; leaders maximize contribution. Managers work through structures of stability; leaders work through dynamic change. While managers are defined by their position, leaders can emerge from any position.

Rare are the leaders of organizations who will tell you that their people don’t matter. However, there is a big difference between understanding the value of the people inside an organization and actually making decisions that consider their needs. It’s like saying, “my kids are my priority,” but always putting work first. What kind of family dynamic or relationship with our kids do we think results? The same is true in business. When we say our people matter but we don’t actually care for them, it can shatter trust and create a culture of paranoia, cynicism, and self-interest. This is not some highfalutin management theory—it’s biology. We are social animals and we respond to the environments we’re in. Good people put in a bad environment are capable of doing bad things. People who may have done bad things, put in a good environment, are capable of becoming remarkable, trustworthy, and valuable members of an organization. This is why leadership matters. Leaders set the culture. Leaders are responsible for overseeing the environment in which people are asked to work . . . and the people will act in accordance with that culture.

The government must realize that it is the leader and not the slave of public opinion; that public opinion is not a static thing to be discovered and classified by public-opinion polls as plants are by botanists, but that it is a dynamic, ever changing entity to be continuously created and recreated by informed and responsible leadership; that it is the historic mission of the government to assert that leadership lest it be the demagogue who asserts it.

Building everything from the bottom up is just as bad as top-down. In its egalitarian, power-to-the-people enthusiasm, GREEN sometimes puts too much of its energy into the lowest echelons. Everybody gets a say, whether competent or not. Nobody's opinion carries more weight than anyone else's. When misapplied, this noble philosophy only leads to a pooling of ignorance and wasted time. The one or two people with real expertise are shouted down by know-nothings getting their share of consensus.

Micromanagement fails because no one person can control multiple people executing a vast number of actions in a dynamic environment, where changes in the situation occur rapidly and with unpredictability. It also inhibits the growth of subordinates: when people become accustomed to being told what to do, they begin to await direction. Initiative fades and eventually dies. Creativity and bold thought and action soon die as well. The team becomes a bunch of simple and thoughtless automatons, following orders without understanding, moving forward only when told to do so. A team like that will never achieve greatness.

While we recognize the deep roots white supremacy has in the consciousness of most white people, we do not believe that only a handful of exemplary white people can be won to fighting white supremacy. We believe an end to this whole rotten system is in the ultimate interests of the vast majority of humanity, including the majority of white people. Accordingly, we reject the notion of the "white solidarity organization" that acts under the leadership of this or that people of color organization. The abdication [by] white people of the responsibility of thinking for themselves does not magically erase the colonial dynamic that exists between white people and people of color. The evasion of struggle over questions of principle for fear of being unpopular or criticized by people of color can only be called the politics of guilt. Moreover, the decision to take leadership from a particular organization is itself an intervention in the internal affairs of the community in which the organization is based. There is no escape from he logic of this society other than a revolutionary commitment to change it.

In other words, in the long list, most everything is about a leader’s character; only a single characteristic pertains to giftedness (teaching). Depending on how the traits are counted, the ratio is as drastic as twelve to one. There’s nothing on this list about being a strong leader, being able to cast a vision, or being charismatic or dynamic. I am not suggesting those aspects of leadership are irrelevant, but they certainly are not the heart of God’s concern for a pastor. Nor are they ever to trump God’s concern over character. As the Reformer Martin Bucer noted, “It is better to take those who may be lacking in eloquence and learning, but are genuinely concerned with the things of Christ.”33 When this God-given ratio is reversed and churches prefer giftedness over character, churches inevitably begin to overlook a pastor’s character flaws because he’s so successful in other areas. Leadership performance becomes the shield that protects the pastor from criticism. As Michael Jensen observed, “We frequently promote narcissists and psychopaths. Time and time again, we forgive them their arrogance. We bracket out their abuses of their power, because we feel that we need that power to get things done.”34

Being an outsider, being picked on, was very painful, but in hindsight it made me a better judge of people. In my life I would spend a lot of time assessing threats, judging tone of voice, and figuring out the shifting dynamic in a hallway or locker room crowd. Surviving a bully requires constant learning and adaptation. Which is why bullies are so powerful, because it’s so much easier to be a follower, to go with the crowd, to just blend in. Those years of bullying added up, minor indignity after indignity, making clear the consequences of power. Harry Howell had power, and he wielded it with compassion and understanding. That wasn’t always easy for him, because he had to deal with a lot of immature kids. Others had power, like the bullies at school, and they found it far easier to wield it against those who were defenseless and to just go along with the group rather than stand up to it. I learned this lesson, too, in one of the great early mistakes of my life. * * * In 1978, I attended the College of William & Mary. I was one of many insecure, homesick, frightened kids living away from home for the first time, although we would admit none of that to one another, or even to ourselves. Because of overcrowding, I was among seventeen freshman boys living in a

Questions and Topics for Discussion This book is written in an oral history format. Why do you think the author chose to structure the book this way? How does this approach affect your reading experience? At one point Daisy says, “I was just supposed to be the inspiration for some man’s great idea….I had absolutely no interest in being somebody else’s muse.” How does her experience of being used by others contribute to the decisions she makes when she joins The Six? Why do you think Billy has such a strong need to control the group, both early on when they are simply the Dunne Brothers and later when they become Daisy Jones & The Six? There are two sets of brothers in The Six: Eddie and Pete Loving, and Billy and Graham Dunne. How do these sibling relationships affect the band? Daisy, Camila, Simone, and Karen are each very different embodiments of female strength and creativity. Who are you most drawn to and why? Billy and Daisy become polarizing figures for the band. Who in the book gravitates more toward Billy’s leadership, and who is more inclined to follow Daisy’s way of doing things? How do these alliances change over time, and how does this dynamic upset the group’s balance? Why do you think Billy and Daisy clash so strongly? What misunderstandings between them are revealed through the “author’s” investigation? What do you think of Camila’s decision to stand by Billy, despite the ways that he has hurt her through his trouble with addiction and wavering faithfulness?

One section of the socialists, the Mensheviks, deduced that the leadership in the coming revolution should belong to the liberal bourgeoisie. Lenin and his followers realized that the liberal bourgeoisie was unable and unwilling to cope with such a task, and that Russia's young working class, supported by a rebellious peasantry, was the only force capable of waging the revolutionary struggle to a conclusion. But Lenin remained convinced, and emphatically asserted, that Russia, acting alone, could not go beyond a bourgeois revolution; and that only after capitalism had been overthrown in Western Europe would she too be able to embark on socialist revolution. For a decade and a half, from 1903 till 1917, Lenin wrestled with this problem: how could a revolution led, against bourgeois opposition, by a socialist working class result in the establishment of a capitalist order? Trotsky cut through this dogmatic tangle with the conclusion that the dynamic of the revolution could not be contained within any particular stage, and that once released it would overflow all barriers and sweep away not only tsardom but also Russia's weak capitalism, so that what had begun as a bourgeois revolution would end as a socialist one. Here a fateful question posed itself. Socialism, as understood by Marxists, presupposed a highly developed modern economy and civilization, an abundance of material and cultural wealth, that alone could enable society to satisfy the needs of all its members and abolish class divisions. This was obviously beyond the reach of an underdeveloped and backward Russia. Trotsky, therefore argued that Russia could only begin the socialist revolution, but would find it extremely difficult to continue it, and impossible to complete it. The revolution would run into a dead end, unless it burst Russia's national boundaries and brought into motion the forces of revolution in the West. Trotsky assumed that just as the Russian Revolution could not be contained within the bourgeois stage, so it would not be brought to rest within its national boundaries: it would be the prelude, or the first act, of a global upheaval. Internationally as well as nationally, this would be permanent revolution.

Never feel comfortable where you're now, get stuck, complacent, and stagnate in one spot; be always relevant, dynamic, and multi gifted. This is one of the rules of the 21st C.

Successfully navigating life's difficulties requires that we continually expand our understanding of love.

Showing empathy involves taking into account the feelings of others, walking a mile in their shoes, and asking ourselves how we would feel if we found ourselves facing similar circumstances.

South Africa needs some serious, ethical, authentic, values-driven and dynamic leadership – from government, business and civil society – over the next few years. Without such leadership we shall lose a golden opportunity to take this country towards the prosperity, peace and pride that it sorely needs.

One of Col. John Boyd’s most important insights we need to make a greater effort to understand is, “Machines don’t fight wars, people do and they use their minds.” How this applies to law enforcement is to understand what technologies, processes, policies and procedures work on the street, one must first understand how people think and act in the uncertainty, fear and chaos of dynamic encounters and what creates friction in decision making as a cop interacts with a suspect bent on getting his way or in a crisis situation such as a multiple car accident with mass casualties, a blizzard, hurricane, tornado, or fire etc.2

EMOTIONAL PAIN is an inevitable reality of life..while it gives discomfort, it is also a dynamic force to 'awareness'. Pain is a very human way of 'demanding change'.Whenever you feel pain about something, you need to CHANGE something! It is that simple...

It is not necessary for district leadership to make a choice between structural and cultural change; both are absolutely necessary. But in many districts, efforts to uniformly implement RTI place a greater emphasis on compliance with paperwork and protocols than on high levels of engagement and ownership among its teachers. RTI is as much a way of thinking as it is a way of doing; it is not a list of tasks to complete, but a dynamic value system of goals that must be embedded in all of the school’s ongoing procedures. This way of thinking places a higher priority on making a shared commitment to every student’s success than on merely implementing programs.

Knowing that organisations are at the core of our society, it then becomes clear that humanity needs these organisations to prosper. There, the creation of a transparent, accessible, dynamic and meritocratic organisation model can generate sustainable organisations and as a result, a sustainable society

In fact, the brain is the best and most efficient organisational structure known in nature. Each element – each neuron – has the same constituency, but its level of influence varies dynamically according to the function of a specific movement. Every neuron is equally important in the fulfilment of their common mission of governing our lives

Eliciting the user stories is a dynamic collaborative endeavor which supports the concept of value. Essentially, just gathering requirements will populate the backlog with unnecessary user stories that do not contribute value.

The metaphor of the early American explorer fits policing and the complex problems we face on the street daily. As we search for peaceful outcomes to the situations we encounter numerous unknowns despite the similarities, in the types of incidents and crises we observe day to day. Standard operating procedures, policy and procedure practices are all very useful when we have standard problem and things go as we plan but what happens when things deviate from the standard and go outside the normal patterns? Here is where we must rely on resilience and adaptation, our ability and knowhow. Experienced people using their insights, imagination and initiative to solve complex problems as our ancestors, the early American explores did.  As we interact with people in dynamic encounters, the explorer mentality keeps us in the game; it keeps us alert and aware. The explorer mentality has us continually learning as we accord with a potential adversary and seek to understand his intent to the best of our ability. An officer who possesses the explorer mentality understands that an adversary has his own thoughts objectives and plans, many which he cannot hear, such as: “I will do what I am asked,” “I will not do what I am asked,” “I will escape,” “I will fight,” “I will assault,” “I will kill,” “I will play dumb until...,” “I will stab,” “I will shoot,” “he looks prepared I will comply,” “he looks complacent I will not comply, etc.” The explorer never stops learning and is ever mindful of both obvious and subtle clues of danger and or cooperation.

Do not lose focus because of small wins or temporary set-backs. You can only score if you keep your eyes on the ball and be certain of where you want to place it even if you are not in physical sight of the goal. Visualise the dream but never take your eyes off the dynamic plan of action.

The art of effective leadership is about navigating the dynamics of growth and success… holding a vision and leading a team, but arriving at the same time.

Ask yourself - Can you manage projects and meetings effectively? Do you have requisite knowledge of the business financial numbers? Can you manage conflict and change within dynamic environments? Do you have what it takes to respond to the demands of a global village? How deep is your leadership substance?

The ethos when I went through Teach for America was that good teaching and good leadership could solve the problems of poverty,” said Dominique Lee. “That’s part of the pie, but that’s not all of the pie. Our most dynamic teachers were burning out—the need and anger in the children, the mental health issues, the absenteeism, the transience.” They were witnessing the effect of what researchers call adverse childhood experiences, multiple traumas that, studies have shown, significantly interfere with learning and focus in children in the most disadvantaged communities.

Well, strategy. The competitive landscape. Morale. The dynamics of the executive team. Top performers. Bottom performers. Customer satisfaction. Pretty much everything that has a long-term impact on the success of the company. Stuff you just can’t cover in weekly or monthly meetings.

Dynamic Leaders value and nurture relationships to create long term associations that create and achieve professional respect~bns

It is impossible to make predictions—to say if the Islamic Republic will collapse or if it will survive in its current form. Certainly its current form isn’t the one it took in the immediate wake of the revolution. Although Khamenei has been committed to safeguarding the revolution, he has also created a new theocracy—one that relies on the greed of the Revolutionary Guards and the Basij instead of the loyalty of its founding fathers. Khamenei has banished nearly all the clerics who held power when Ayatollah Khomeini was alive. Despite falling oil prices and economic sanctions, Khamenei had enough petro-dollar to satisfy his military base of support: the Guards and the Basij. The oil revenue has been the biggest deterrent to democracy in Iran, even though the windfall has transformed the fabric of Iranian society. The Iranian middle class, more than two-thirds of the population, relies on the revenue instead of contributing to economic growth, and thus has been less likely to fulfill a historic mission to create institutional reform. It has been incapable of placing “demands on Iranian leadership for political reform because of its small role in producing wealth, as in other developing countries. The regime is still an autocracy, to be sure, but democracy has been spreading at the grassroots level, even among members of the Basij and the children of Iran’s rulers. The desire for moderation goes beyond a special class. As I am writing these lines, Khamenei’s followers are shifting alliances and building new coalitions. Civil society, despite the repression it has long endured, has turned into a dynamic force. Khamenei still has the final word in Iranian politics, but the country’s political culture is not monolithic. Like Ayatollah Khomeini, who claimed he had to drink the cup of poison in order to end the war with Iraq, Khamenei has been forced to compromise. The fact that he signed off on Rohani’s historic effort to improve ties with the United States signals that the regime is moving in a different direction, and that further compromises are possible.

Fundamentally, effective leadership is based upon an invitation to relationship and a challenge to change. A gifted discipler is someone who invites people into a covenantal relationship with him or her, but challenges that person to live into his or her true identity in very direct yet graceful ways. Without both dynamics working together, you will not see people grow into the people God has created them to be.

If Jesus needed time for self-care, it is only reasonable to expect that you and I do as well.

Since leaders do inevitably shape the culture of the church, the vital question is whether we are shaping that culture into a living expression of the reign of God or an expression of a different agenda. Many will have experienced the pain of merely human priorities that were stamped onto a church by a few powerful personalities, or will have encountered situations in which the politics of denominational leadership drove the agenda of a church’s life with little regard for Jesus’ own priorities. How much better it is when such leadership power and influence are used to enable the church humbly to seek the Lord’s agenda and to cooperate in the work of fulfilling it.

Mastering speed is the essence of war. Take advantage of a large enemy’s inability to keep up. Use a philosophy of avoiding difficult situations. Attack the area where he doesn’t expect you.” ~Sun Tzu the Art of War1   In handling dynamic encounters, the phrase "time criticality" is often discussed. In this discussion there is often a miss-conception that to put time on your side, you must force the issue or, force the subject into action and always advance your position by moving forward. Speed is the essence of conflict, but speed does not always mean moving fast physically. It means preparing so you are in a position of advantage, which gives you time, hence speed.

It is my experience and from research, that law enforcement professionals all too often needlessly rush, using dynamic responses, in circumstances where a non-dynamic (scaled) response would clearly better our position of advantage. We have to reconsider the way we do things in an effort to keep ourselves and those we protect, safer when responding to situations. If an individual is no longer in position to harm others then the conditions requiring high risk intervention has changed and a more scaled, cautious solution should be pursued.

Without conflict and tension, music lacks dynamism and movement. The composer and the improvisational musician alike must contain the dissonance within a frame that holds the audience's attention until resolution is found. Music also teaches to distinguish the varieties of silence: restless, energized, bored, tranquil, and sublime.' With silence one creates moments so that something new can be heard; one holds the tension in an audience or working group, or punctuates important phrases, allowing time for the message to settle. Creating music takes place in relation to structures and audiences. Structural limits provide scaffolding for creativity. Plato put it this way: "If there is no contradictory impression, there is nothing to awaken reflection."' People create in relation to something or someone. Although the audience may be safely tucked inside the composer's mind, still it is there.

The dynamics between a CEO and the next person in line for his or her job are often fraught, though. We all want to believe we're irreplaceable. The trick is to be self-aware enough that you don't cling to the notion that you are the only person who can do this job.

A leader’s movement is dynamic, purposeful, and ordered. The very perception of movement often gives vitality to a leader’s mission and engenders dynamism in one’s co-workers. Joan of Arc seemed to have an intuitive grasp of this when she traversed the entire length of Northern France on horseback several times in a few months. This was six hundred years before modern transportation made that an easy feat. Prior to that, Joan had never left the confines of her local community.

Now, like anything related to relationships there are no absolute absolutes. Some men may find themselves in situations in which women simply do not test them in any capacity. That’s not necessarily a good thing, and here’s why. The only women who won’t test you at all are: 1. Women who have zero romantic interest in you, and… 2. Highly aggressive or experienced women who already have (and prefer) control over you. Women test men because they seek both love and leadership from them. Therefore, if she has no romantic or emotional interest in you, you won’t be tested. And if she’s not interested in a relationship dynamic in which you lead her you probably won’t be tested either.

Demonstrating managerial courage is to tell the right things, at the right time, to the right person and appropriately.

Courage is essential in a management context and, above all, in leadership.

Knowing how to manage requires one to know how to start a movement rather than just to follow it. And one must take a firm position when necessary.

A leader should not try to avoid tension, crisis, or confrontation.

Redefining the paradigm of business benchmarking in a dynamic technological world, fosters new strategic concepts that will define how businesses will evolve to gain traction.

MYTH It’s not possible to learn how to be a dynamic leader. TRUTH Leadership presence can be cultivated and is available to me.

diversity of opinion balanced with the need to make and implement decisions. Chronic indecision is not only inefficient and counterproductive, but it is deeply corrosive to morale. Curiosity. A deep and abiding curiosity enables the discovery of new people, places, and ideas, as well as an awareness and an understanding of the marketplace and its changing dynamics. The path to innovation begins with curiosity. Fairness. Strong leadership embodies the fair and decent treatment of people. Empathy is essential, as is accessibility. People committing honest mistakes deserve second chances, and judging people too harshly generates fear and anxiety, which discourage communication and innovation. Nothing is worse to an organization than a culture of fear. Thoughtfulness. Thoughtfulness is one of the most underrated elements of good leadership. It is the process of gaining knowledge, so an opinion rendered or decision made is more credible and more likely to be correct. It’s simply about taking the time to develop informed opinions. Authenticity. Be genuine. Be honest. Don’t fake anything. Truth and authenticity breed respect and trust.

If culture doesn't truly support team coherent dynamicity, if the culture in more simple words is toxic, weak, complacent. Do not expect wonders because the driver of individuals will be self protection and avoidance of conflict!

A third ambiguity is the need for a healthy tension between belief and criticism as part of the dynamism that makes a high performing institution. Operating officers and staffs need to be mostly believing. Trustees need to be mostly critical. Administrators and staffs need to be mostly believing because the morale of those who do the work of the institution needs to be sustained, and part of the trust of all constituencies rests on a communicated belief in the rightness of what is being done. Trustees need to be mostly critical because it is the scrutiny of a critical attitude that keeps administrators and staffs on a true course.

They had built the foundation of a strong culture. Each decision was guided by three questions: Does it move us towards our vision? Does it match our values? Does it meet our standards?

If we hate meetings, can we be making good decisions and successfully leading our organizations? I don’t think so. There is simply no substitute for a good meeting—a dynamic, passionate, and focused engagement—when it comes to extracting the collective wisdom of a team. The hard truth is, bad meetings almost always lead to bad decisions, which is the best recipe for mediocrity.

As I near the end of all of that and think back on what I’ve learned, these are the ten principles that strike me as necessary to true leadership. I hope they’ll serve you as well as they’ve served me. Optimism. One of the most important qualities of a good leader is optimism, a pragmatic enthusiasm for what can be achieved. Even in the face of difficult choices and less than ideal outcomes, an optimistic leader does not yield to pessimism. Simply put, people are not motivated or energized by pessimists. Courage. The foundation of risk-taking is courage, and in ever-changing, disrupted businesses, risk-taking is essential, innovation is vital, and true innovation occurs only when people have courage. This is true of acquisitions, investments, and capital allocations, and it particularly applies to creative decisions. Fear of failure destroys creativity. Focus. Allocating time, energy, and resources to the strategies, problems, and projects that are of highest importance and value is extremely important, and it’s imperative to communicate your priorities clearly and often. Decisiveness. All decisions, no matter how difficult, can and should be made in a timely way. Leaders must encourage a diversity of opinion balanced with the need to make and implement decisions. Chronic indecision is not only inefficient and counterproductive, but it is deeply corrosive to morale. Curiosity. A deep and abiding curiosity enables the discovery of new people, places, and ideas, as well as an awareness and an understanding of the marketplace and its changing dynamics. The path to innovation begins with curiosity. Fairness. Strong leadership embodies the fair and decent treatment of people. Empathy is essential, as is accessibility. People committing honest mistakes deserve second chances, and judging people too harshly generates fear and anxiety, which discourage communication and innovation. Nothing is worse to an organization than a culture of fear. Thoughtfulness. Thoughtfulness is one of the most underrated elements of good leadership. It is the process of gaining knowledge, so an opinion rendered or decision made is more credible and more likely to be correct. It’s simply about taking the time to develop informed opinions. Authenticity. Be genuine. Be honest. Don’t fake anything. Truth and authenticity breed respect and trust. The Relentless Pursuit of Perfection. This doesn’t mean perfectionism at all costs, but it does mean a refusal to accept mediocrity or make excuses for something being “good enough.” If you believe that something can be made better, put in the effort to do it. If you’re in the business of making things, be in the business of making things great. Integrity. Nothing is more important than the quality and integrity of an organization’s people and its product. A company’s success depends on setting high ethical standards for all things, big and small. Another way of saying this is: The way you do anything is the way you do everything.

Systems are static, but people are dynamic. When leaders design systems to evolve people, bureaucracy is born.

The Quarterly Off-Site Review is a critical chance to step back from the daily, weekly, monthly grind, and review things from a distance.” “Review what?” For the first time, Will read directly from his notes. “Well, strategy. The competitive landscape. Morale. The dynamics of the executive team. Top performers. Bottom performers. Customer satisfaction. Pretty much everything that has a long-term impact on the success of the company. Stuff you just can’t cover in weekly or monthly meetings.

Recognize that strategies shift and can change the underlying dynamics of your organization. Effective leaders are constantly reinventing and disrupting their organizations to take advantage of the next growth wave. They realize the dangers of maintaining the status quo when disruptive forces, trends, and customer requirements change.

This fire sign is ruled by Mars. Aries are confident, optimistic, courageous, passionate and determined. They do well in leadership roles, and enjoy individual sports and physical challenges. They can also be impatient, aggressive, impulsive and short-tempered and will not find their calling in any role or job that they are not able to utilize their dynamic talents.

This can have devastating consequences for the fast-growing company. Over a short period of time, say a year, the number of employees can leap from 50 to 150 in a startup, or from 150 to 500 or more during a later phase of rapid growth when the business model is promising and the funding is in the bank. Seemingly overnight, the new employees can vastly outnumber their predecessors, and this dynamic can permanently redefine the corporate culture. Brent Gleeson, a leadership coach and Navy SEAL combat veteran, writes, “Organizational culture comes about in one of two ways. It’s either decisively defined, nurtured and protected from the inception of the organization; or—more typically—it comes about haphazardly as a collective sum of the beliefs, experiences and behaviors of those on the team. Either way, you will have a culture. For better or worse.”2

A powerful leader knows how to take the fall for the benefit of his followers. He can never shift any blame because he knows the dynamics of being a prominent figure.

It is God who calls, qualifies, and assigns; we respond by being faithful, available, and trainable

Today we are privileged to have at our continual disposal not only the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit, but also the Word of God — an invincible combination in the arsenal that the Bible calls “the weapons of our warfare” (see 2 Corinthians 10:4,5). Why, then, don’t we see the same level of God’s resurrection power and glory consistently manifested in our midst today that the Early Church experienced? Although there may be many answers to this question, one answer is certain: Far too many Christians today have come to lean on their own understanding and intellectual abilities at the expense of consulting the Holy Spirit for His guidance in their lives. They assume they already know what He wants them to do. And because they don’t depend on and yield to the leadership of the Holy Spirit the way the Early Church did, they miss opportunity after opportunity to see His power released in their lives.

Edward IV’s policy of ‘Regional Governance’ (1461–71): During Edward IV’s first reign, Somerset politics was still influenced by the Stourton and Hungerford affinities which may have sought the patronage of Edward’s courtier, Humphrey Stafford. He was the only son of the Beaufort-Stourton client William Stafford by Katherine Chideock, and it was because of his Chideock inheritance (principally focussed in Somerset, Dorset, and Wiltshire) that he was destined to be a leading member of the Somerset gentry. In the later 1450s, Stafford may have been associated with the earl of Wiltshire whose first wife was his cousin (pp. 192–3). The Bonville-FitzWaryn alliance had dominated Devon politics throughout the 1440s and 1450s (see Chapter 5) but on Bonville’s death in 1461, his sole heir was his infant great-granddaughter, Cecily. Naturally, a child could not provide adequate leadership to the Bonville-FitzWaryn connection. Moreover, Bonville’s allies, Lord FitzWaryn and Sir Philip Courtenay, were also both entering their sixties (both were deceased before 1470), and similarly could not provide the dynamic direction that was required. Into this leadership void, stepped Lord Stafford (p. 207). …[Humphrey, Lord] Stafford [of Southwick] became a crucial national–regional power-broker–one of the pillars upon which rested the pediment of Yorkist government (p. 210). It seems clear that Lord Stafford’s land-holding, office-holding, and clientele suggest that he acted as a political core for the south-west region. Stafford’s inheritances already made him a significant figure in Somerset and Dorset but, favoured by Edward IV, he was granted extensive lands forfeited by Lancastrians throughout the south-west, such as the estates of the earldom of Devon. In addition to his own properties, Stafford was showered with many offices in Somerset and Dorset, as well as other positions of immense significance in the region–in particular, his endowment with the most important duchy of Cornwall offices ensured that he dominated Cornwall (p. 221). It seems quite understandable to find that, as a figure of local, regional, and national importance, Lord Stafford’s associations were regional in nature: he was connected to major figures from each county… (pp. 221–2).

The importance of Marshall’s pre–Pearl Harbor leadership is impossible to ignore. To cite one dynamic example, fully three-quarters (more than 45,000) of the Army’s lieutenants and captains who fought in all theaters of World War II were graduates of the Officer Candidate Schools he fought so hard to establish before the United States entered the war, in the face of strong opposition from both Roosevelt and Stimson.

Everybody goes where everybody goes.

Optimism. One of the most important qualities of a good leader is optimism, a pragmatic enthusiasm for what can be achieved. Even in the face of difficult choices and less than ideal outcomes, an optimistic leader does not yield to pessimism. Simply put, people are not motivated or energized by pessimists. Courage. The foundation of risk-taking is courage, and in ever-changing, disrupted businesses, risk-taking is essential, innovation is vital, and true innovation occurs only when people have courage. This is true of acquisitions, investments, and capital allocations, and it particularly applies to creative decisions. Fear of failure destroys creativity. Focus. Allocating time, energy, and resources to the strategies, problems, and projects that are of highest importance and value is extremely important, and it’s imperative to communicate your priorities clearly and often. Decisiveness. All decisions, no matter how difficult, can and should be made in a timely way. Leaders must encourage a diversity of opinion balanced with the need to make and implement decisions. Chronic indecision is not only inefficient and counterproductive, but it is deeply corrosive to morale. Curiosity. A deep and abiding curiosity enables the discovery of new people, places, and ideas, as well as an awareness and an understanding of the marketplace and its changing dynamics. The path to innovation begins with curiosity. Fairness. Strong leadership embodies the fair and decent treatment of people. Empathy is essential, as is accessibility. People committing honest mistakes deserve second chances, and judging people too harshly generates fear and anxiety, which discourage communication and innovation. Nothing is worse to an organization than a culture of fear. Thoughtfulness. Thoughtfulness is one of the most underrated elements of good leadership. It is the process of gaining knowledge, so an opinion rendered or decision made is more credible and more likely to be correct. It’s simply about taking the time to develop informed opinions. Authenticity. Be genuine. Be honest. Don’t fake anything. Truth and authenticity breed respect and trust. The Relentless Pursuit of Perfection. This doesn’t mean perfectionism at all costs, but it does mean a refusal to accept mediocrity or make excuses for something being “good enough.” If you believe that something can be made better, put in the effort to do it. If you’re in the business of making things, be in the business of making things great. Integrity. Nothing is more important than the quality and integrity of an organization’s people and its product. A company’s success depends on setting high ethical standards for all things, big and small. Another way of saying this is: The way you do anything is the way you do everything.

A study at Google found that the #1 dynamic that set successful teams apart from other teams was the presence of psychological safety, the ability of team members to take risks without feeling insecure or embarrassed (Rozovsky, 2015).

When you find yourself in a moment of doubt, you can turn it into an opportunity to ask yourself how your deeper motivations and your colleagues’ might play into the situation, possibly transforming the dynamic.

Leading with vulnerability is tough, but it’s essential to establishing a strong team dynamic.

As a sharp illustration of this, there was a very good article20 on the revcom.us site about this capitalist who had investments in Bangladesh but who wanted to be a socially-conscious capitalist. This article ran down all the ways in which he tried to do things differently, do them in a way that would not so viciously exploit the women working in the plants that he owned—not have them in such horrific conditions, give them more social benefits—and how he was forced to give that up by this very driving force of anarchy, by the competition from other capitalists doing things in more efficient, more ruthless ways. So even though he was a good-hearted capitalist—and that may sound like an oxymoron (a contradiction in terms), but he was actually a good-hearted capitalist—still, he couldn’t keep up his “kind capitalism” because of the basic dynamics of what drives capitalism.

In traditional performance management models, working teams present to leadership in performative, high-stakes monthly or quarterly reviews. By keeping these reviews on such an infrequent cadence, both sides can lose sight of what the real purpose of the review is: to support and sustain the work, and to ensure that everyone is moving together toward the desired results. Such an approach is ill-suited to the ecosystem economy. When you have agile tribes, chapters, and squads working on dynamic, cross-sectoral value propositions, you need to push your performance management process toward a much more frequent operating cadence.

Above all, leaders are talent coordinators. Find the talent, foster talent and fit the individual talent to create a dynamic team

Leaders are talent coordinators. We find the talent, foster talent and know where the individual fits in to create a dynamic team

perspective, and generate new options for actions. Let’s look at the difference between knowledge and questions: Knowledge is past; Questions are future. Knowledge is static; Questions are dynamic. Knowledge is rigid; Questions are flexible. Knowledge limits options; Questions create possibilities. Knowledge requires adaptation; Questions call for innovation. Knowledge is a location; Questions are a journey. Knowledge can be superior; Questions require humility. Knowledge knows; Questions learn.