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| Leadership Is Expensive |
Leadership will not come to your aid in a friendly, warm and fuzzy way. Leadership only arrives when you pay the high toll at the gate that governs it. Leadership does not come because you want to have some of it. A short few weeks ago I came home one evening to see if our federal leaders had solved the debt issue they were facing. There were two days left until the deadline the federal government was facing on their line of credit. I wanted to see if they had come up with a solution. My wife and I flipped channels to the three major television networks to see if the news had anything to share about that progress. With two days to go, not one of the three major networks carried any story about that process. Not one.
I looked to my wife and said, "This is a sad day. There are so many 'wrong' stories inside this development that I cannot begin to describe them without linking them together and admitting that our country has simply gotten so far out of control...the patrons have given up." She said, "What do you mean?"
I described how we have two days left to meet a seriously bad financial deadline and the major networks of the news media did not run the story tonight. Here is why. Number one, the news media has become a monster business model. The big three own the ropes and control how we see what they want us to see. They have been doing this kind of process for so long we no longer can identify it. They operate their leadership from the bowels of fear. They are more concerned about their ratings and know the customers so well that they design their programs to capture the most attention. The higher the attention ratings, the more advertising dollars they can attract. The big three know this and play that game very well. The news story about how our leaders were doing on the problem of working towards a workable solution on the debt crisis was not a story the public wanted to hear with two days remaining before the deadline was met. Number two, the public was not fired up enough to run any successful story about a process that had no progress behind the work. With two days to go until the deadline arrived, the work carried no substance to share. The big three controllers of the news media were fully aware of the attention their patrons would not give to the leadership stall that was occurring. The big three news media business models had more exciting news to share that would be better to share for improved ratings, at that time. What the heck, we still had two days left so there was plenty of time to report the increasing stress that would eventually dominate the network space about the deadline our country would face. My wife had to sit through my seminar. I was irritated by all of it.
I described how our country has lost its leadership. I described how our big three news conglomerates knew its patrons no longer had faith in the work those leaders were doing. With two days remaining, the patrons knew the leaders would wait until the very last moment to solve such a huge issue and crisis. The media business models knew this truth so there was no advantage to share any stalling activities related to the lack of decision-making skills from our leaders and subsequently waste the patrons time so they could change the channel and lower the ratings of the networks. The story at that time was not a sale-able story. The networks elected to ignore it for that night. It would not produce good ratings. Number 1 and 2 were obviously true. Media is money-driven first, number 1, and number 2, the public at that time did not care nor believe its leaders had the ability to solve the problem early. I told my wife how much this process indicates the total breakdown of our leadership in this country. The sheep have wandered off into the fields with absolutely no hope for a 'right' solution. Every single one of them is working to hard to produce and maintain a certain level of popular support from the people they serve and fear. The tail is completely wagging the dog. It is a very sad day for leadership.
If you write on the chalk board of your mind that leadership comes from being popular with your decisions, over and over and over...you will eventually believe that crap. Your subconscious mind will eventually circle those chalked words enough to push out the truth and replace it with lies. You will eventually find your thoughts become strongly connected to believe that leadership is a popularity contest. That is a lie. Do not believe it. Quit feeding your mind with this kind of foolishness. Leadership is expensive, hard to earn and will cost you some friendships. Learn how to accept this truth and become a better leader.
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| Everyone Believes They Are Good Leaders, Hogwash, They Are Not. |
The chalk board of your mind will eventually trick you into believing what is not true. Your business model will fail over and over because of it. You may be in that mode right now and in full denial of its existence. Our country is, and we are our country. We are permitting this kind of leadership to exist. We are supporting it, on both sides of the political fence. There is absolutely no leadership remaining. We are doing absolutely nothing about it because we have lost complete sight of what leadership is. The major news media business models know this truth and that is why they did not air a single note about the crisis two days before the deadlines. Yes, deadlines. It is plural. The deadlines moved, in case you did not notice. That is how we lie to each other. We also lie about our national credit rating. How, pray tell, can you honestly accept that act to whimper and whine enough to get it back to a Triple A status when it should not be there in the first place? Get serious. These are lies. They are layers of lies told enough in the chalk boards of our minds to eventually believe they are truths. Leadership is compromised when we lie. You and I at home cannot do this kind of foolishness with our own finances and get away with it. Nor should we. People, people, people...it is time to learn more about what leadership truly is and is not. If you operate a business model, quit the lies you are telling to your chalk board mind. Quit running a popularity contest with those who seem to care. Tell the truth. It is good leadership to tell the truth.
I had a great business mentor once tell me to tell the truth and see who stays with you. The ones that stay are the ones you want to stay. The rest of them were not good fodder to hang out with nor ones you should share with your valuable time. Tell the truth and find out who is made up well. The real leaders will surface.
I had a co-worker suffer a terrible personal event with her boyfriend recently. It destroyed her day at work. She elected to go home early because she could not handle the emotional stress of the treatment she was trying to manage in that affair. Before she left I told her the socks story. ( It is described in an earlier post on this blog...titled..."Sizzling Hot Business Ideas Come With New Socks.") It is a great piece describing how to develop great leadership tools. She did not appear too interested in the John Wooden story about socks and how it relates to becoming a great leader under stress. She seemed more interested in sulking about how she was being mistreated. Two days later she returned to work in a much better mood. She walked up to me and thanked me for the socks story. I was surprised. She pulled all of her co-workers together for a brief moment to apologize to all of them for letting them down while she permitted herself to get out of control emotionally. She said she did not have the right to interfere with the teams work just because she did not have her stuff together at home. She drop-kicked the boyfriend and said she was going to grow up and move on. I was watching the early development of a possible leader. She was hurting to make this move but knew deeply it was the 'right thing' to do. Respect will follow.
The news media did flood the airwaves with the deadline story of our country debt, one day later. It could not be erased on any network. It was filled with lies, popularity stances, and everything people love to have tickle their ears. We, for the most part, need to get back to performing great leadership. I know it can be done. I saw a glimpse of it shining through with the young female co-worker who drew the line in the sand with how her boyfriend believed he should be able to treat her. Her desire to earn his popular support went out of the window when she began to return some respect to herself. Good leadership is a costly affair. It will gut how you view yourself. Pay the price and enjoy the deepening rewards.
Until next time...
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