This is an interesting article that I’d like to bookmark for myself, and thought I’d share it with you.

In the same way, leadership can also be demonstrated in a number of contexts, whether as the head of an organization, or as the unassuming Everyman (or Woman) who may not have an official title but who still wields tremendous influence through relationships.

For Boomers, this means being open to more fluid systemic models. “Emergents tend to emphasize organic process over linear organization, and relational networks or webs over hierarchies,” Irving notes. And Bruce Butterfield, CEO of the Forbes Group, agrees. “Leadership ladders have to give way to leadership bridges.” In ministry, this is currently reflected in the greater use of “strengths-based” job descriptions (à la Marcus Buckingham) rather than static hierarchical roles, and the preference for ministry coaching instead of consulting.

Looking for Leaders

In his new book The Origin of Wealth, McKinsey & Company Senior Advisor Eric D. Beinhocker argues that the traditional view of economics as a static, equilibrium-balanced system is going through a radical rethinking involving a multitude of disciplines. The new spin: “complexity economics,” in which the economy is viewed as a highly dynamic and constantly evolving system that is all but impossible to predict. This excerpt deals with how companies can set strategy when the future is unknowable.

Read the excerpt at Harvard Business School Working Knowledge

Leadership in organic systems (such as a network) is not the kind of leadership that one person can do. It is leadership that requires many people – a “leader-full” organization. In a network, one person cannot control the system, nor can one person fully understand it. Therefore models of collaborative, shared, or multi-level leadership become more important and critical. Developing the capacities of others becomes essential in building a “leader-full” organization.

- excerpted from “What makes a network a learning network?” (available at NCSL’s Introduction to Network Learning page.)

This is an article by Marcus Buckingham, best selling author and thought leader.

What sets a great boss apart from an average boss? Research on this is rife with provocative writing about the qualities of managers and leaders and whether the two differ, but little has been said about what happens in the thousands of daily interactions and decisions that allows managers to get the best out of their people and win their devotion. What do great managers actually do?

In our research, beginning with a survey of 80,000 managers conducted by the Gallup Organization and continuing during the past two years with in-depth studies of a few top performers, we’ve found that while there are as many styles of management as there are managers, there is one quality that sets the best managers apart from the rest: they discover what is unique about each person and then capitalise on it. Average managers play draughts, if you like, while great managers play chess.

What does the chess game look like in action? When I visited Michelle Miller, the manager who opened Walgreens’ 4,000th store, I found the wall of her back office papered with work schedules. Miller’s store in Redondo Beach, California, employs people with sharply different skills and potentially disruptive differences in personality. A critical part of her job is to put people into roles and shifts that will allow them to shine - and to avoid putting clashing personalities together. At the same time, she needs to find ways for individuals to grow.

A manager’s approach to capitalising on differences can vary from place to place but it is a tremendously powerful tool that leads to three outcomes. First, it saves management time; second, it makes each person more accountable; and third, it builds a stronger sense of team because it creates inter-dependency. It helps people appreciate one another’s particular skills and learn that their co-workers can fill in where they are lacking.

When you capitalise on what is unique about each person, you introduce a healthy degree of disruption into the workplace. You shuffle existing hierarchies, existing assumptions about who is allowed to do what, and existing beliefs about where the true expertise in a company lies. These questions will challenge the orthodoxies of companies like Walgreens and help them become more inquisitive, more intelligent, more vital and, despite their size, more able to duck and weave into the future. At some point, however, managers need to rein in their inquisitiveness, gather up what they know about a person, and put the employee’s idiosyncrasies to use. To that end, there are three things you must know about someone to manage them well: their strengths, the triggers that activate those strengths, and how they learn.

Great managers spend a good deal of time outside the office walking around, watching each person’s reactions to events, listening, and taking mental notes about what each individual is drawn to and what each person struggles with. There’s no substitute for this kind of observation, but you can obtain a lot of information about a person by asking a few simple, open-ended questions and listening carefully to the answers. Two queries in particular have proven most revealing when it comes to identifying strengths and weaknesses.

To identify a person’s strengths, first ask: “What was the best day at work you’ve had in the past three months?” What were they doing and why did they enjoy it so much? Remember: a strength is not merely something you are good at. It might be just a predilection, something you find so intrinsically satisfying that you look forward to doing it again and again and getting better at it over time.

To identify a person’s weaknesses, just invert the question: “What was the worst day you’ve had at work in the past three months?” Probe for details about what they were doing and why it grated on them so much. You might be quite competent at a weakness but it drains you of energy, you never look forward to doing it and when you do do it, all you can think about is stopping.

Although you’re keeping an eye out for both strengths and weaknesses, your focus should be on an employee’s strengths. Conventional wisdom holds that self-awareness is a good thing and that it’s the job of the manager to identify weaknesses and create a plan for overcoming them. But research by Albert Bandura, the father of social learning theory, has shown that self-assurance (labelled “self-efficacy” by cognitive psychologists), not self-awareness, is the strongest predictor of a person’s ability to set high goals, to persist in the face of obstacles, to bounce back when reversals occur, and, ultimately, to achieve the goals they set. By contrast, self-awareness has not been shown to be a predictor of any of these outcomes, and in some cases, it appears to retard them.

Always remember that great managing is about release, not transformation. It’s about constantly tweaking your environment so that the unique contribution, the unique needs, and the unique style of each employee can be given free rein. Your success as a manager will depend almost entirely on your ability to do this.

We’re dealing with a lot of change here at the moment.

In his classic book “Future Shock” author Alvin Toffler explains that human beings have a limited biological capacity for change. When they experience a level of change that exceeds that biological capacity they go into “Future Shock”.

He gives examples: if you change your job, and then move house, and go through a divorce or get married, all at the same time, you will probably experience Future Shock as your ability to assimilate all the changes is overwhelmed. You will face psychological destabilization, depression, irritability, reduce immunity, and even physical sickness.

Change is the only constant, it seems. When the army is on the move, the scenery keeps changing.

In my son Prahlad’s horoscope it said that his childhood would be characterized by a lot of instability. That’s definitely the case. We try to keep some things constant for him, as practically everything around him changes.

Right now we’ve gone from 14 people in the ashram to 7. Living with 7 people the place feels empty. All the schedules are disrupted. All the rosters are invalid. We have to renegotiate our living arrangement and work out new ways to do things. It requires a lot of energy, and is unsettling.

The irregular schedule at my job doesn’t help me. This week I’m doing 12 pm - 9 pm. That’s good for my morning yoga teacher training classes, but not good for the evening ones. This week I’ve swapped shifts for my two evening class nights. Next week I’ll have to see what my schedule is and work around that.

Here are a few observations on change:

1. There is a natural resistance to change. Change is scary - it’s risky. “We may not have the best situation now, but at least we have something, and we know what it is,” we rationalize. Many times we consciously or even unconsciously resist or undermine change. We’re happy when things return to the status quo.

Because the soul is eternal and unchanging the experience of change in the material world is unsettling. The more exclusively your perceptual orientation and sense of self is externally focused, the more unsettling it will be. Spiritual practice alleviates this. Some things may change, but getting up in the morning and chanting the Hare Krishna mantra has remained a constant for me in nine countries with different languages, climates, and cultures. My experience has been that this puts me in touch with something eternal. When change and the associated anxiety threaten to overwhelm me I take shelter of this practice.

2. At a certain point an organization tries to settle into a stable state. If you’ve ever tried to turn an organization around then you’ll know how difficult it is. Every single person in the organization, while they profess their desire for improvement, wants things to remain the way they are - at least for them. The aggregate effect of this is an unwieldy behemoth as each person’s individual resistance to transformation translates into organizational change resistance.

3. The only time change stops is when you die. If you succeed in your resistance to change, you just issued a death sentence. If we try to hold to things, keep them the way they are - we will lose everything. The only time a ball stops moving when it’s in the air is at the peak of its climb. This lasts for a momentary fragment of a second when its movement is arrested. The next moment, by the force of nature, it plummets back to Earth.

In this world things are either increasing or decreasing - growing or diminishing. Let go of yesterday, and seize hold of tomorrow.

My observation is that this mission does in a way resemble one writer’s description of war - “prolonged periods of extreme boredom punctuated by moments of sheer terror” - in the sense that as we advance the mission we are continually breaking and reforming our instruments and arrangements (those are the moments of sheer terror). As soon as this stops, forward movement has stopped. Once your forward movement stops you lose momentum, and then the natural forces of this world just start to grind you down. Your team starts to succumb to inevitable attrition, dwindling around you until only the hardcore are left. Unfortunately, many times these are the people who are most comfortable with stasis and the most unsettled by change - the idea of leaving is too much of a change for them, so they stay while others who may have a lower organizational committment than they, but are more open to change, leave.

4. We have to live courageously - all of us. We have to accept that going forward means leaving something behind. Things are not going to stay the same. Yesterday finished last night, and the successes of last year are historical tales that can inspire us, but fade more with each passing day.

General Patton’s speech to the 3rd Army in England before the invasion of Normandy contains an inspiring example of the kind of conceptual orientation that is needed to sustain momentum:

I don’t want to get any messages saying that we are holding our position. We’re not holding anything. Let the Hun do that. We are advancing constantly and we’re not interested in holding onto anything — except the enemy.

Vince Lombardi in another famous speech says that “we must be committed to excellence and to ultimate victory, even though ultimate victory can never be won, and even if it is won, can never last”.

5. Change processes should be managed carefully to reduce the effects on the people. By clearly and repeated restating the vision people will find it easier to fix their vision on the guiding star that remains burning brightly ahead as the scenery changes. Efforts should be made to keep some stability in place - shared meals at regular times, regular programs and meetings. Some things should be kept the same for the sake of keeping something the same, while everything else is changed around it. Those things can then be changed once people have become comfortable in the new situation, if they need to be changed.

Too much change will overwhelm people. The more externally focused their consciousness, the less change they will be able to handle. Encouraging people to go deep into spiritual practice will increase their ability to cope with change.

So more attentive chanting is the answer. I personally find change useful in helping me to retain an internal attitude of helplessness. Over the last 10 years since I first took a leap of faith I’ve found myself in constant freefall, with no sign of a landing yet…

You’ve come to the right place to find out about Lord Vader. Last year I discussed the value of failure in an article entitled “Leadership Lessons from Darth Vader“. Darth Vader is the man, and he has some valuable lessons to teach us. It’s especially relevant to remember now that we’re talking about initial lessons from Atma Yoga.

We are going to absorb the Star Wars trilogy into the Vedic tradition, along with Lord of the Rings, and give them a Vaisnava conclusion. Just watch over the next few generations, if you’re sticking around for them.

Our ashram has multiplied and we now span two houses in Red Hill. The second house is in Argyle St, 459 metres away from our original facility, according to whereis.com.au.

There are currently 15 residents across these two ashrams. Argyle St is all ladies, and Red Hill is our “landing pad” facility.

We preannounced the ashram initiative on the 22nd of April, and signed off on the 2nd of May.

Last night we held our Saturday Summit, where the residents of both facilities convene to reflect and share their victories and challenges of the past week, and to take part in our weekly Leadership Development sessions. This week we covered Commitment - the thing that carries you through to completion after the initial enthusiasm that inspired you to start has long gone.

John Maxwell talks about the “Edison Method” - Thomas Edison would call a press conference to announce a wonderful new product, then he would go into his lab and invent it. Preannouncing helps to develop commitment. When your plans are public the pressure is on to deliver.

During the construction of Atma Yoga we hit a point where the majority of the team were adamant that we needed to delay the opening by one week. After all the effort that we had put in, pushing ourselves to our limits, and even after all the miraculous occurrences, they realized that it wasn’t going to be possible to finish in time. However, I was just as adamant that we were going to open on that date.

“I’ve publicly committed to March 11th as the opening date - internationally. I am not going back out there to tell people that we have failed. We must succeed.”

It was a miracle, and we opened.

Oftentimes we commit to something, but then later on, disillusioned, or rather overcome with illusion, we give it up. The force of the material nature overcomes us and we lose sight of the guiding star that inspired us to strike out in the first place. In the darkness of this night we lose hope, and can sometimes give up - “whimsically renouncing”.

This is why public vows are important. The vows of initiation before the spiritual master and the sacred fire - the vows of marriage. It doesn’t matter how you feel later on - you made a vow - now go through with it.

These public vows help to overcome the vagaries of the mind, to become immunized to a certain extent from the deception of circumstances and “how you feel right now”. Your feelings are unreliable. After weeks of work and little sleep we were all depressed and exhausted. But a vow had been made, and it would be completed. In marriage, in study, in any undertaking, at some point your inspiration will waver. As Maxwell explains, our commitment is tested when things take longer than anticipated, and when they are more difficult than anticipated. Having made a public commitment then helps us to stay on track.

Commitment is an important quality to have as a leader. As you preannounce and consistently deliver, your credibility increases. If you preannounce and fail, similarly your credibility diminishes. After a few of those, you either disqualify yourself completely as a leader, or you learn valuable lessons about realistically gauging your own abilities and limitations (which includes those of your team), and the measure of the environment.

As Sun Tzu puts it in his Art of War: “Know yourself, know your enemy, and you will not know defeat in 100 battles.”

Canakya Pandit says that unrealized plans should be shared with a few only. That’s one point of view. I personally find myself inspired by Arjuna’s example. On the battlefield he publicly vowed: “Tomorrow I will kill Jayadratha or I will enter into the fire!” Of course, his brother Yudhisthira had something to say about Arjuna’s impetuousness - “Why didn’t you just decide to do it, without saying anything! Now they will do everything they can to stop you!”

In spite of all their attempts to stop him, however, Arjuna came through with the goods. Word.

Building Church Leaders.com has a great article by Ken Blanchard, author of The Secret: What Great Leaders Know and Do.

I once asked Don Shula, longtime coach of the Miami Dolphins, “What are your goals next year?”

He said, “I think goal-setting is overrated.”

“What do you mean?”

“Everybody in professional football has a similar goal,” he answered. “If they have halfway decent players, they want to win the playoffs. If they have good players, they want to win the Super Bowl. So I haven’t won more games because I have better goals. I’ve won more games because I’m willing to roll up my sleeves and do whatever it takes to make it happen.”

Leadership demands that we have the ability to realize our goals—to turn vision into reality. Those who have given themselves to leadership know how difficult this is. But effective leaders have a way of getting to the real issues.

In 2001 Vrajadhama and I spent the night in Don Shula’s resort in Miami (it’s a long story). Don wasn’t there, but I must say I was very impressed with his digs.

I like this point of his too. If we don’t set any goals, we’re not even in the game. People who actually have goals are on the playing field. Doing the work needed to achieve those goals is where the real differentiation comes in.

One thing that I noted in Prema Padmini’s recent presentation on Bhakti-vrksa (we have a podcast on that coming up), is that there was definite goal setting - there were statistics of performance, targets, and then measurement of success or failure in achieving those targets.

On Geoff’s recommendation I obtained a copy of First XI: Winning Organisations in Australia. The first section of this book is entitled “Effective Execution”. The top performing organisations in Australia all have in common that they pre-announce their goals, then get them.

I’m sure that there are organisations that pre-announce and then fail on execution, but the fact of the matter is that you have to have goals, and you then have to achieve them.

Here’s a quote that I read recently:

A vision without a task makes a visionary
A task without vision makes for drudgery
A task with a vision makes a missionary

Now that you’ve read my ten cents worth, check out the full text of Ken’s article Turning Vision into Reality, in which he talks about the practicalities involved in turning vision into reality, with reference to church and business situations.

A friend writes:

As I was reflecting on how easy it is to become in a “victim” mentality I thought how your “lead, follow, or step aside” is also relevant there in a similar way. You can either lead your life, follow your life as it drags you around, or you can step aside. Goodness-passion-ignorance.

Here are some excerpts from my personal notes on the first chapter of Bhagavad-gita that relate to effective and authentic leadership, which relate to the previous post.

It’s important to distinguish between the two. Within all organizations there are leaders and managers who are more or less effective, in terms of their capability to effect change. Then there are leaders who are more or less authentic, in terms of their alignment with universal principles. Ideally we need leaders who are both effective and authentic.

However, if we have to choose one or the other, we prefer inefficiency over inauthenticity.
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What is Leadership? There are many definitions of leadership that highlight its different aspects. John Maxwell, author of “The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership” defines leadership as “influence, nothing more, nothing less. He who thinks he leads but has no-one following him, is simply taking a walk.” This is a functional definition of leadership, one that basically says that a leader is someone who has followers.

Leadership has been described by leadership educator Todd Duncan as “a total commitment to purpose, accompanied by the determination to carry it out.” This is a characteristic definition that describes the personal qualities of a leader.

My personal definition of leadership is “the supply of vision and direction in a situation of confusion and uncertainty”. This is a definition that highlights the identity of the leader as a service provider.

In his 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership John Maxwell presented the idea that leadership can be described as a set of principles that can be learned and applied. When practices align with these principles, leadership is effective.

In his book Principle-centered Leadership Stephen Covey takes this a step further. Not only are the practices, or the “how” of leadership governed by principles, but the actual direction and goal of leadership, or the “what” and “where”, are also subject to universal principles.

No-one can deny that Adolf Hitler was a leader in the sense that he effectively mobilized and directed the energy of many followers toward the pursuit of distant goals. However, not many people would be comfortable with a book entitled: “Leadership Secrets of Adolf Hitler”. We are sure that he is not a leader worthy of emulating. We have a sense that leadership in not only its form, but also its function, is governed by moral imperatives. These moral imperatives, signalled by our conscience, or our “internal compass” in the language of Covey, indicate fundamental principles of the universe. Leadership which conforms with these principles in terms of its form is Effective Leadership. Leadership which conforms with these principles in terms of its form and function is Authentic Leadership.

In these terms Hitler may have been an effective leader, but he was not an authentic leader. It’s not just how you lead the people that is governed by principles that you should be aware of and consciously align with – where you lead them is also governed by principles. With great power comes great responsibility. Those who lead not in accordance with these principles, intentions not withstanding, are guilty of misleading.

Bhagavad-gita describes these fundamental universal principles – the underlying framework of the universe that reflects the purpose of the universal architect. Leaders who align their practices with these principles will be effective leaders. Leaders who align their goals and the goals of the organizations they steward with these principles will be authentic leaders – leaders who are empowered to create a better world.

Leadership is absolutely crucial. As the oft-repeated saying has it: “everything rises or falls on leadership”. Failures or lack of leadership can be found near the root of all problems. At this present moment in time, with so many social and environmental indices tottering toward the red line, the world is crying out not just for effective leadership, but for authentic leadership. Bhagavad-gita contains the timeless principles that will empower leaders to be effective and authentic leaders. The greatest need at this point in time is for those people who have been called to lead to step forward and take up the Service of Leadership.
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In contrast to the conchshell sounded by Bhishma, the conchshells sounded by Arjuna and Krishna are described as “transcendental” (divya in the original Sanskrit). This is an indication that the leadership of Arjuna and Krishna is in accordance with underlying universal principles, as will be further explained in this work.

Effective leadership follows principles of practice which empower it to effect change. Authentic leadership follows principles of purpose which empower it to effect holistic positive change. Duryodhana was expert in applying the principles of practice, and as such he was able to amass a large force of capable, competent leaders. However, he had no interest in any purpose other than his own - the goal and direction of his leadership was not in accord with principles, therefore he was misleading these people. Leadership which follows principles in its form but deviates from or ignores universal principles in its function is actually little more than manipulation. A leader has been given a gift in the form of their ability to lead. With great power comes great responsibility. A leader exists within the context of a universal order, as do the people he or she leads. It is the responsibility of the leader to know what that universal order is, and to lead in accordance with it. Bhagavad-gita is just for this purpose.
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Krishna had vowed not to fight in the battle, but to join one side of the conflict. His army would fight on the other side. Duryodhana elected Krishna’s army, and Arjuna chose to have Krishna on his side. The inner meaning of this is that leadership which is lacking in effectiveness, in efficacy, due to a lack of understanding of the principles of practice is preferable to leadership which is lacking in alignment with the principles of purpose. It’s better to be going in the right direction at 5 miles an hour, than off a cliff at 100.

For all the efficiency of modern western civilization we see a number of alarming statistics, among them rates of violent crime, suicide, divorce and other indicators that efficiency is not everything.

Nityananda-kari dd asks:

(You) said ‘Level 5 leaders hold organizational priorities above ego priorities because they value the mission above themselves. ‘ and ‘level 5 leaders are committed above all to the mission. Followers or leaders who are not committed to the mission will destroy the organization.’ What’s the standard of a level 5 servant? If I know that I’m not a leader, but want to be a good follower, what guidelines should I follow? Can you put some light on this?

Thanks for your questions Nityananda-kari. I will do my best to reply.

Leaders and followers are both servants. After all, jivera svarupa haya, krsnera nitya-dasa. In his book The Courageous Follower, Ira Chaleff makes the point that followers do not orbit around leaders - both leaders and followers orbit around and serve a higher purpose. Just as teachers and students form a “learning circle” around a body of knowledge, similarly leaders and followers form an “action circle” around a common purpose.

Take away the knowledge, and the teacher-student relationship disappears. Take away the purpose, the mission, and the leader-follower relationship disappears.

Both followers and leaders work together in order to advance in an organized fashion toward common goals.

The term Level 5 Leader comes from Jim Collins, and was first introduced in an article that he wrote for the Harvard Business Review, entitled Level 5 Leadership: The Triumph of Humility and Fierce Resolve. The idea was expanded and fully explained in his book Good to Great.

You can read about the concept of a Level 5 Leader on Jim’s website.

Here is a graphic from there that describes the hierarchy:

OK, so your question is, if I understand it correctly: “How can I be an effective follower?”

We are actually all leaders, because our actions influence others. There will always be someone who looks up to us, and even apart from that our actions contribute to an overall culture by reinforcing it. Even a follower leads by setting an example of how to follow. The best followers are leaders.

By asking this question you have already demonstrated a leadership quality - proactivity. You are not sitting back waiting for someone else to do something - you are doing something about the situation.

His Holiness Bhakti Tirtha Swami, in his book Leadership for an Age of Higher Consciousness, explains that people end up with bad leaders because they do not know how to choose good leaders. Our present-day governments are elected democratically, so the people bear some responsibility for the leaders they end up with. Of course, the fairness of the electoral system in many countries is disputable, but in other arenas of life who we choose to follow is our own decision.

The first duty of a follower is to know who to follow. The qualification of a disciple is that they should know who is a real guru. Srila Prabhupada gives the example of gold - if you want to buy gold, then you had better know what real gold is, or you will be cheated. Similarly, if you are going to follow, then you had better know who is a real leader.

Blind following is condemned. We sometimes give the example of a soldier who kills on the command of superior officers and is thereby immune to prosecution. The analogy goes that this same person killing on their own prerogative is held accountable for their actions. This example is given to illustrate the idea that one who acts following the directions of the Supreme Personality of Godhead does not enjoy either the fruits or the reaction of their work.

However, to continue with this analogy, we find that the Nazi German soldiers who tried to use this defense at the Nuremburg trials after World War Two had it struck down. The court would not accept that they had “simply followed orders”.

Following these trials, every serviceman around the world now knows that they have a duty to refuse to obey illegal orders. This means that the soldier must know what constitutes legal and illegal orders. It is not enough to be a mindless automaton.

Similarly, we must know what are valid directions. We may not be able to take responsibility for other people, we may not be able to courageously initiate action, to inspire others to action, and to strategically navigate the way through a metaphorical battlefield, but we should still know enough to be able to recognize someone who can, and to know whether or not they are headed in the right direction.

If we are not a front-line person who leads the charge, but rather a second-line person who comes in directly behind lending support, then other second-line persons, and third-line persons will look to us for cues on who they should line up behind.

One of the arguments for Krishna being the Supreme Personality of Godhead that Srila Prabhupada would give was: “Vyasadeva has accepted, Madhvacarya has accepted, Ramanujacarya, Lord Caitanya, Srila Bhaktivinode Thakura and Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati have all accepted. Therefore we also accept.”

We exist somewhere in a hierarchy. Both in front of us and behind us others are linked in. Our service is to lend our support in all directions. This is called 360 degree leadership. Whether our role is to demonstrate leadership in cleanliness by washing the floor with a cloth every morning, leadership in sadhana by rising early and chanting as an example for others, whatever it may be, we also have the responsibility to show others how to link into the hierarchy.

As Duryodhana exhorts his men: “Now you all show support from your different positions in the phalanx to Bhishmadeva” (Bg. 1.11).

So I would say this: Learn to recognise authentic and effective leaders, and follow them. Back them up. Help them by lending support and giving honest feedback, in that order.

You may not exercise leadership directly in a formal role, but you should still seek to learn about it in order to be able to recognize and support those who do, and in order to take responsibility for your influence on others. This is a very important service.

Thank you for your questions and the opportunity to respond to them. You have already taken the first step in your leadership development journey by asking them. I hope some of the above points are of service to you.

your servant,
Sita-pati das

ISKCON Communications Europe Leadership Team (ICELT) is holding meetings in Radhadesh, Belgium, April 18 - 22.

I saw the program here, and immediately developed a desire to attend.

As you might know, Communications and Leadership are the two majors of my study. The particular sessions that are going to be held are very interesting for me too. They typically examine the tension between two contradictory considerations.

One thing that you realize when you leave the armchair and start to assume the responsibility of the service of leadership is that theory may be very clear, but the actual implementation is not. There are a large number of contradictory, complementary, and confusing factors. Balancing them all is as much art as it is science, and it requires continual adjustment.

The sessions at the ICELT meetings examine contemporary contradictions in preaching.

A pet one of mine is the emphasis that Srila Prabhupada put on the fact that the Krishna Consciousness movement is not “Hindu”, and the 1996 ISKCON Communications Ministry proclamation that we are. That’s going to be examined on day two in a session entitled: “Am I a Hindu? Yes, no, when it suits me. ”

Obviously I can’t go, but the Lord within the heart knows everything, and by His mercy the ICELT meetings are going to be podcasted live.

Word. I may write summaries of the sessions on here if time allows

If you are responsible for people, then here are 12 questions that you should review. These twelve questions come from the Gallup Q12 survey. The Gallup Q12 survey is the result of extensive research into what questions in organizational cultural surveys actually produce results that match up with the output of the organization.

If you take a ranking of organizations in terms of their effectiveness, and then try to look inside them to see whether the employees or integrants of the organization are actually happy and well engaged there are questions that will give you meaningful insight, and others that won’t.

For example, if you ask: “Do you get paid enough?” in effective and ineffective organizations you’ll find people who’ll say yes, and people who’ll say no.

In contrast, with the following questions, integrants of effective organizations will answer yes. If a person answers no to the majority of these questions then they are not happy where they are, and will not produce their best work - in fact they may even become alienated from the organization, its management, and its mission to the point where they begin to work against its interests. When the answers are overwhelmingly “no” to these questions retention is low and staff turnover is high.

As a manager these questions give insight into what the priorities need to be to create an engaging culture where people can find their fit and produce their best work. I’ve put the questions that managers need to ask themselves under each Q12 survey question.

1. Do I know what is expected of me at work?

Are there clear goals set for the group? Are there clear expectations for individuals? Are their tasks and the outcomes suitably defined?

2. Do I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work right?

Do your people have what they need to get the job done, or are they frustrated through a lack of resources?

3. At work, do I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day?

Are your people “only doing what only they can do”? Are they engaged 80/20 in their strength zone? Do they know what their strength zone is?

4. In the last seven days, have I received recognition or praise for doing good work?

Do we have a culture of appreciation? Are we appreciating people enough?

5. Does my supervisor, or someone at work, seem to care about me as a person?

Are we working alongside people, thinking about their development, and giving them tasks for their development, or are we just using them as a means to an end?

6. Is there someone at work who encourages my development?

Are we working on empowering and building up our people?

7. At work, do my opinions seem to count?

Have we implemented any suggestions from this person? Where can we action input from this person?

8. Does the mission/purpose of my company make me feel my job is important?

Are we clear in linking the mission of the organization with the tasks that our people are performing? Are we casting the vision?

9. Are my co-workers committed to doing quality work?

What standard are we accepting, what standard are we setting? Are we creating a culture of excellence where people can contribute to the creation of excellence, or are we allowing that to be eroded?

10. Do I have a best friend at work?

Are we making efforts to team people up in compatible arrangements, and giving time and space for friendships to form?

11. In the last six months, has someone at work talked to me about my progress?

Are we committed to developing our people? Is that being felt? Are we communicating that?

12. This last year, have I had opportunities at work to learn and grow?

Are we aligning, empowering, and releasing our people, or trying to keep them under control?

Interviewed in the latest issue of Leadership magazine are Andy Stanley, pastor of Northpoint Community Church and author of 7 Principles of Effective Ministry, among other titles, and Jim Collins, author of Good to Great.

There is a teaser article on Christianity Today. I’m eagerly awaiting my copy to arrive in the post. I subscribe to two magazines - Back to Godhead (we actually have two subs, one for the ashram, one for Atma Yoga), and Leadership magazine.

You generate maximum effectiveness when you synchronize your “circle of influence” and your “circle of concern”, to use, I believe, the language of Stephen Covey (I heard it via Tirtharaj prabhu).

Basically it means that you should be interested in what you are responsible for. If you can be primarily interested in that you’ll be more effective. If you can be exclusively interested in that, you’ll be very effective (although many people who are interested in things that they are not responsible for will spend their time calling you a fanatic, among other epithets - <<que ladren Sancho!>>).

This universal principle is explained by Krishna in conversation with Arjuna:

“Those who are on this path are resolute in purpose, and their aim is one. O beloved child of the Kurus, the intelligence of those who are irresolute is many-branched.” - Bhagavad-gita 2.41

As Stephen Covey explains, your circle of influence is what you are responsible for. Responsible means response-able, or in other words, where you are actually able to make a difference.

One witty scientist said: “Give me a place to stand and a long enough lever, and I will move the world”. In situations where we have no leverage we are unable to make a difference, no matter how much energy we apply. Learning to recognise where we have leverage, or influence, and where we do not, allows us to understand better where our circle of influence lies.

The author of the Serenity prayer prays: “Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”

As we narrow the focus, as we eliminate interest, expenditure of time and mental energy, in things that lie outside our circle of influence, we are able to concentrate more energy in the arena in which we are able to make a difference. This leads to greater effectiveness.

It’s a simple principle, but it took some time for me to grasp it explicitly. Most recently, Tirtharaj Prabhu took some time to explain it to me using the terms that I introduced this post with. Before that time I couldn’t put it into words, but now that I look back I see that my success has come when I’ve applied that principle, and I’ve been thwarted when I didn’t apply it. The more I apply it, the more effective I become. There are many people who spend their time railing against real or imagined injustices. The impression that I get from them is that they feel disempowered and frustrated. We start to make a difference, to effect real positive change, when we synchronise our interest and our responsibility, when we synchronise our circle of concern with our circle of influence. And when we start to do that, we feel good about ourselves, because we are making a difference.

There is no contradiction between understanding this principle and understanding the self as non-doer and Krishna as the Supreme Controller. We shouldn’t say something like: “What has Stephen Covey got to teach us?” When someone speaks the truth, we should listen, and hopefully, you’d think, we’ll be able to recognise it. Krishna Himself explains this principle in the Bhagavad-gita, and the Srimad Bhagavatam:

“It is firmly declared that the steady adherence of transcendentalists to their respective spiritual positions constitutes real piety” Srimad Bhagavatam 11.20.26

So when you understand it and apply it, you are understanding something that Krishna has explained, and ultimately established. It’s called reality my friends.

Hmmm.. a while ago I posted a link to an article by Pastor Brian McLaren on the subject of constructing a response to the question of homosexual marriage. A lot of what he said, and especially his sensitive approach, resonated with me.

Shortly afterwards, another pastor whose blog I read, Mark Driscoll of Mars church, posted a response to that, laying down the smack on Brian’s approach. The comments to this posting are very interesting and informative about the different mentalities of the living entities.

Today Mark posted an apology. He hasn’t changed his views, but he’s gotten some nice realizations about how to coexist with other preachers. Brian doesn’t lay down the smack on Mark, and now Mark realizes that he shouldn’t lay down the smack on Brian. Isn’t that nice.

I respect both of these men, for what they do, for what they think, and for the way they handle themselves. This is one good example of all three of these.

The sign, and the title of this post, are a little self-deprecating humour by Mark in his apology. Gotta love that self-deprecating humour.

It is a fact that the destruction of the family unit, the basic building block of human society, leads to an increase in psychologically disturbed and sociologically dysfunctional population, as explained in the Bhagavad-gita:

An increase of unwanted population certainly causes hellish life both for the family and for those who destroy the family tradition. By the evil deeds of those who destroy the family tradition and thus give rise to unwanted children, all kinds of community projects and family welfare activities are devastated.

-Bhagavad-gita 1.41-42.

Here’s an excerpt from a recent news article published in New Zealand, acknowledging this very phenonemon, its increasing occurence, and proposing measures to address it:

A child in the first three years of their life exposed to neglect and violence may be heading for a life of crime, a former Human Rights Commissioner and recently retired district and family court judge says.

Graeme MacCormick has released a paper calling for all newborns to be placed on a national “at-risk” register so child services can identify which children, and their caregivers, need assistance and support - before it’s too late.

“It is from disadvantaged children, those not given a good start in life, that most of our young and not so young criminal offenders come,” Mr MacCormick said.

“We cannot afford more police, more court staff, more judges, more prisons, more accident and emergency and mental health workers, more wasted lives, than we already have.”

New research by New Zealand’s Brainwave Trust shows a baby’s brain is only 15 per cent formed at birth, with the remaining 85 per cent being formed in the first three years.

“Neglect, violence and abuse during these years can damage normal brain development resulting in the profound and permanent disruption to the brain’s structure, leading to lifelong social, emotional and learning difficulties,” according to website of the trust made up doctors, educationalists, academic and business professionals.
….
Mr MacCormick acknowledged there would be high costs and a lot of manpower needed to establish and implement an at-risk national registry.

“(But) the costs of doing nothing are huge.”

From stuff.co.nz

The proposal here is the proverbial “ambulance at the bottom of the cliff”. An at-risk register does nothing more than identify the mangled victims - what about taking a good hard look at the sociological forces that are pushing them off the cliff - the behaviour patterns and lifestyle choices that people are offered and encouraged to take? The advice and access to knowledge that they are given? The formation of values across the society?

Thought - Action - Habit - Destiny.

Simply registering people once they reach the last stage is like putting a band aid on a tumor. Unfortunately our present leaders are largely unequipped with the necessary vision to understand the root causes of the problems and how to address them. They also lack the determination to carry out the courses of action necessary to address them in cases where they have some knowledge - either due to their own weakness of character, or because they fear losing their position, elected as they are in many cases at the whim of the people.

People want to be to be happy - and as Krishna asks rhetorically in Bhagavad-gita: “how can there be any happiness without peace?” (Bg 2.66). Real leadership means to empower people with a vision that enables them to make the best choices. At the moment people are being blinded by the glimmer of economic interests, and the ultimate wellbeing of the very society they live in is in jeopardy.

In Peru I saw many people with a lot of money - but they were unable to enjoy it because they had to spend it on private police forces and barbed wire fences. If our own short term interest (preyas in Sanskrit) leads to a deterioration of our environment - both the social environment and the physical environment - then how is that ultimately fulfilling?

The Bhagavad-gita contains a systematic exposition of timeless fundamental principles, beginning with individual consciousness and leading up to wider social implications. Without addressing the individual and the lifestyle choices they make, it’s meaningless to discuss social issues. Without addressing their own personal character, the persons in positions of authority in our society will be unable to provide us with authentic leadership.

Warren: How have you raised up so many leaders in your church?
Cho: It is a main work to motivate the people. Through my experience, I have found that only 10% of the whole congregation will be motivated to work. So I would ask my Seniors to look for only an available person whom the Holy Spirit is already beginning to develop as a Cell Leader or as a Senior Cell Leader. So we are all looking for people in every section of our ministry - always looking - and I ask my Seniors to pick up those people.
Warren: What do you look for? What do you tell them to look for?
Cho: Naturally, those people who are available, and learn very much by themselves, and who are very much concerned about the lost souls; a heart for evangelism. Then those people are candidates for Cell Leaders.

Read the transcript of the breakfast conversation between these two preachers.

As an addendum to that last post: credible vision alone is also insufficient for authentic leadership. There have been people who have had credible vision. They have convinced people to join them in their cause, but they’ve gone the wrong way.

One definition of leadership, which I consider to be a powerful but incomplete one, is that it is “simply your ability to inspire the men through your communication”. That’s definitely an important factor, but far from the only one.

Thought for the day:

I heard John Maxwell say once that “previously it was thought that if you could cast vision, you were a leader. But there is more than one thing to being a leader - in fact there are 21″ (a reference to his 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership).

I certainly know some people who can cast vision like anything, but I was left wondering - “why does this person sound like a leader, but have no-one following them, and not inspire me to follow them either?”

I realized that vision is not sufficient - it has to be credible vision to be effective. I wrote about that in a post on Effective Vision in May of last year.

Today’s thought is a re-expression of that.

Vision gains credibility as you execute on it and get results.

In the beginning perhaps no-one else “gets” your vision. No-one else pays it any heed, believes in it, or wants to contribute to it. But you don’t let that stop you (if you do you definitely don’t have a credible vision). You execute on it anyway, because your vision has at least enough credibility to have one person who believes in it (you), and as you execute on it and make it happen, it rises in credibility.

Here is an example:

My first job in the tech industry was assembling PCs in a small firm in Auckland, New Zealand, called Eclipse Technology. After about 6 months there the company went bankrupt. I remember bumping into the CEO, Carmel, in the hallway during the windup process. She asked me what I was going to do. I told her that I thought I’d be a sysadmin, maybe with Unix machines. Six months previously I’d come from a job I’d held for a year washing dishes in a cafe.

She looked at me and scoffed: “You’ll never do that - you’ve got no experience”.

I didn’t want to point out to her that as the CEO of a company that just went bankrupt she didn’t enjoy so much credibility with me. Obviously my vision of my employment future didn’t have so much credibility back then for people other than myself. Three years later, on the cusp of Y2K I was a sysadmin, albeit for Windows machines. Ten years later, I’m working administering Linux systems.

Ok, to round off this post - here’s another thought I’ve been having for a while:

Vision - if you can hold it, you can have it.

The bigger the vision, the more opportunities you’ll get to give it up, before you get it.

Three very inspirational stories for me from the sacred literature are the stories of Dhruva Maharaja as a child, and also his encounter with the mystical illusions of the Yaksas, and the life story of one of my personal heroes, Hiranyakasipu.