Mark and many of his team members are millionaires and billionaires today as a result. So does that make Mark a great leader?

I contend it does not. Short term success, no matter how big, does not equal great leadership. Great leadership of a company is measured, at least partially by the company’s success over a long period of time.  (Remember the Collins book, Built to Last?)

By all accounts, Mr. Zuckerberg is doing what he thinks is necessary to become a great leader for Facebook. It seems he is genuinely interested in seeing Facebook succeed long-term. I recently read the this article from Fast Company magazine about Mr. Zuckerberg’s approach to leadership development.

The article describes how Mr. Zuckerberg has grown as a leader over the last several years.  I was impressed with what appears to be a willingness to study other leaders, learn from them, and develop his own style based on what he has learned.

Growing Facebook from an idea to a major company with more than three thousand employees and the biggest IPO in US history took amazing leadership.  Recognizing the importance of Facebook team members and their contributions to the company while maintaining a focus on Facebook’s vision of connecting people takes a strong leader.

Mr. Zuckerberg is off to a good start.

I am excited to see what happens with Facebook over the long haul.  More importantly, I am interested to see the kind of leadership Mr. Zuckerberg provides to Facebook.

Mr. Zuckerberg may very well be a great leader. But time will be the judge of that.

They are not.

Even the dictionary thinks they are similar. Management is defined as the act of directing, handling or controlling. While leadership is defined as guiding or directing a group.

While the definitions may be similar, I believe the concepts are very different.

A manager handles, directs and controls people and activities in order to complete tasks. To be a successful manager, you must be task-oriented. Think about the managers in your business. They may have many people who report to them. They may be responsible for large budgets. However, everything they do as a manager is about accomplishing tasks – completing a job on time and within budget; producing a product; designing a website; producing a report, etc.

Leaders, on the other hand, must be focused on a bigger picture. Leaders develop, articulate and live by the values they want their company to represent. Leaders create a vision for their company and get all their employees to buy-in to making that vision a reality.

Of course leaders often have responsibilities that are “management-oriented”. However, the difference between leaders and managers is distinct. Great companies need great managers but they also need great leaders to be successful long term.

Are you a leader, a manager or both?

Click here to watch the video.

I love the phrase, “Learn, Earn, Return”. But I don’t think it’s a cycle where we move from one stage to the next.  I think we are constantly learning, constantly earning and should be constantly returning.  What do you think?

Seems kind of simple. My team works well together and seem to buy in to the overall plan.

It’s not that easy when leading my team at home.

I have a vision for my family but it’s not been clearly articulated to my family members and as a result they certainly haven’t bought into it.

My family members don’t work for me. (In fact most of the time they think I work for them) As a result they may not have the same incentives to buy in that my teammates at work have.

We establish expectations and measurable outcomes with my family but they don’t have the same incentives to accomplish those outcomes as my teammates at work.

So how does one lead a family successfully? What are the leadership qualities I have developed at work that can transfer to my family?

I have given this much thought. I need to give it much more. However, I have come to a few conclusions – let me know what you think of them:

1. Develop a vision for your family and share it with all family members. Just like you do in your company, develop a mission statement and have it posted in your home somewhere all can see it and be reminded of it.
2. Develop core values for your family. Develop them together. Share them with each other. Post them in your house where all can see and be reminded of them. Hold each other accountable to these values.
3. Lead with love. Love is powerful. But love means more than just care deeply for someone or something. To truly love, you must sacrifice and serve. We do this in our businesses and it becomes obvious to our teammates. It helps them buy in to our vision when they see us sacrifice things for the greater good of the company or serve our customers or even our employees.  For example, we might host a lunch for our employees and serve it to them; we might reduce our income rather than lay off an employee during challenging economic times.

We have to sacrifice and serve at home in order to be effective leaders as well.  This will demonstrate the love we have for them.

Through the shared vision and values and the demonstration of love, we will be great leaders at home – as we already are at work.

What do you think? What do you do at home to demonstrate your leadership?

In our businesses we often experience long, cold winters. We often get off the path of our mission. We often let outside factors we cannot control, control us and our priorities.

When this “winter” begins to creep up on you, I urge you to find Spring. Find a way to rejuvenate or re-birth your leadership. Re-focus your energy on your mission and key strategies. Go back to the basics of leadership – talk to your people every day – don’t just sit in your closed door office focused on doing your “work”; engage your people – find out what their needs are, help them to overcome their challenges; keep your people focused on the mission of your company and the key strategies you have established – remember if it’s easy for you to lose focus it might be even easier for them.

While Spring may come around once a year as a good reminder for us to rejuvenate and refocus, it is my experience we need this kind of reminder more often than once a year. I suggest you set a tickler in your calendar to celebrate the arrival of Spring in your business quarterly.

What do you think?  How often do you celebrate the arrival of spring in your business?

I know it’s easy to dismiss as a complaint from a disgruntled worker – and maybe it was just that. However, isn’t that fact in and of itself enough to say there is a leadership hole at Goldman Sachs?

Below is a link to the letter, read it for yourself and draw your own conclusions. My conclusions are these:

1. As much as good leadership can help propel organizations forward toward their mission, bad leadership can ruin organizations.
2. Bad leadership can mean many things but the roots of bad leadership are not complicated. The roots of bad leadership are:  Lack of values or focus on the wrong values; Inability to establish and communicate the mission or the organization.

In the case of Goldman Sachs (if you believe the article), the leadership was bad because of both these issues. They did not have the right values and they were not focused on the right mission. In fact, it appears they may have been focused on the wrong mission – their own personal ones – not that of the organization.

Good leaders never put their own personal agendas before the mission of the organization they lead.

Here’s a link to the article.  Let me know what you think…

We all need to find ways to continuously improve. Leaders are no different. I recently read a blog about Leadership Development for Leaders. Click here to read it.

The author offers six great ideas for leadership continuous improvement.  I’ve got a few additional suggestions:

1.  Read.  I find in just about everything I read there are leadership lessons to be learned.  Whether it’s business books, self-help books or my favorite, non-fiction – especially biographies.

2.  Share/Network.  Talk with your friends about leadership.  Odds are they are in similar positions in their companies.  Find out what they do that works and doesn’t work.

3.  Try new techniques.  Don’t be afraid to try new approaches to leadership.  Emulate something you learned from a friend or read about in a book.

What other ideas do you have to help leaders stay on top of their games?

Perhaps at no time have leaders had as great a challenge as they are now faced with: Engaging employees.

Engaging employees means creating and harnessing their positive energy toward great things for the company. And equally as important reducing or eliminating negative energy that can drag an entire company down.

I recently read and article about the concept of harnessing the positive energy of your workforce. (Click here to read it).

I plan on purchasing the book, “Leading the High Energy Culture”. In a future blog, perhaps I’ll report on what I learn from the book.

Do you have a high energy workforce right now?

Read the post by clicking here.

I couldn’t agree more that TRUST is the key to successful leadership. Also trust is not something you acquire without a proven track record – you must earn trust by your actions.

What do you do to establish trust in your company? In your association? In your family?

I also know that no one is perfect. It is impossible for good leaders to be good all the time.

I have been bothered by something I have noticed in some organizations for some time. I haven’t been sure how to describe it. I have also been a little embarrassed to discuss it – frankly I wasn’t sure if my leadership was faltering and creating the opportunities for these bothersome situations to occur.

Here is the situation: I have witnessed leaders in organizations repeatedly put their own personal interests above the interests of the organization. There are many challenges with this behavior. The most concerning however, is that the organization cannot reach its potential unless its leadership puts the interests of the organization ahead of their own interests.

I recently saw a poll conducted in the SmartBrief on Leadership I subscribe to. The poll question was this: “How well do leaders in your organization compromise with each other to achieve the best result?”

I was shocked at the results.

• 50% of respondents said they often put their organization first but sometimes personal interests prevail
• 27% of respondents said they always negotiate and compromise, and put the business first.
• 15% of respondents said they often put personal interests ahead of their organizations’
• 7% of respondents said they always put personal interests ahead of their organizations’

My shock is that so many people always or often put their own personal interests ahead of their organizations’.  It is my belief that when people put their own interests above those of the organization, it is the beginning of the end for the organization.

How can an organization survive, let alone be a successful, “best in class” organization if its constituents are not as interested in achieving the mission of the organization and delivering value to the organization’s customers as they are in whatever personal agenda they may have?

Even good leaders cannot keep people from putting their personal interests ahead of their organizations’.  So, what can good leaders do to help their organization succeed in spite of their self serving peers?

My answer – always do what’s right regardless of how unpopular that choice may be.

What’s your answer?