But The Plain Fact Of The Matter Is That, For Any Person To Successfully Lead Others, He Or She Must

“But the plain fact of the matter is that, for any person to successfully lead others, he or she must deal with reality and be ready to accept the fact that leadership, at times, can bring out the worst in us. And understanding, as well as coming to grips with the darker side of your personality, is key to dealing with real-life situations.”

— Donald T. Phillips, Lincoln on Leadership

6 Fortune Cookies

It's cookie time! =)

You will grab flour, oats, raisins, chox chips, white chox chips, M&Ms, chox chunks, peanut butter, shredded coconut, ...

Using a basic recipe ... peanut butter, chox chip, oatmeal raisin, dbl chox chip cookies, white chox chip cookies, and coconut cookies.

Your little ones will help prepare the dough for each.

The dough will be stored in tuperware containers in the fridge.

When the cookie craving strikes, you will scoop out a ball of dough and microwave it for 1 minute on a plate.

If you want economic freedom, why are you protesting for AntiBody testing?

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Elliot ArrNet Archie

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Leadership Guidance

It's interesting as I dig deeper into leadership through studying it, I stumble across something that expands a topic I thought was very limited. Initially, I thought guidance was simply answering questions and directing people towards a state goal, but it is so much more than that. So, here is a bit of what I've discovered.

My understanding of Guidance was expounded through Project Management and Management Review meetings. I had someone ask me, "I'm about to see my manager to do a performance review, what should I expect / talk about?"

I pondered this question, because a manager needs to provide guidance on how their report is performing, and how they can improve if needed, or how they can improve the project they are working on. It should be noted that if you live/work in a dual culture company where you have a manager who manages your work load and performance, while another manages the overall projects you work on, and yet another manager controls the overall product you are working on, this can be quite the frustrating position to be in. Who is your manager?

But, here is what each manager can provide you, and what you can help your manager understand you need ...

Guidance from Managers

Every manager can provide 4 things to you ...

An open forum to manage expectations

A review of the risks and solutions to problems you are facing in your work.

Access to a knowledge base either internal or external to help you answer questions about the work you're doing, the project you're working on, and the product that you are delivering.

And finally, support

When you look at these 4 components in the full definition of leadership .. Guiding Intent with Integrity .. you begin to see how these support the definition.

Having an open forum to manage expectation helps both you, the managers, and the team understand what you can do, when you can do it, and how you are going to do. When this is not conveyed, various parties within the group can become upset that expectations were not met, and may blame you for not being in integrity or having subversive intentions.

Having a forum to review the risks and solutions is also crucial to insuring that expectations are met. This helps the manager know what things are pinch points, will require more time, or could possibly halt a project .. thus delaying a deadline that could cost the company / customer a sale.

Knowledge is the bread and butter of any project. You are the SME for what ever you are working on. This is why you are there, and why you haven't been replaced with someone who can do the work better and faster using current techniques. Your managers trust your judgements on how best to navigate through the various risks and achieve the solution within a timely manner.

And, finally a manager provides support in the form of off loading work you don't have to do to other subordinates. If you are building a rocket that needs 20 engines, the manager could focus you on building the more involved complex parts, while subordinates build the mundane repeatable things .. like rocket engines. How many did you need 32? Or was it 28?

I'm sure there's more to come as I continue to explore this topic. I look forward to sharing it with you as I discover it.