Leading with Personal Values

In most organizations, today’s complex world demands that leaders, and those they lead, adopt a different model. As Steve Jobs, the co-founder of Apple Computer, put it, “The only thing that works is management by values. Find people who are competent and really bright, but more importantly, people who care exactly about the same things you care about”.

Leadership used to be about managing for results with a strong bias towards reward and punishment. Managerial Leadership Theory (also known as Transactional Leadership) is exemplified in the military complex, where rules, procedures and standards are essential. Followers are not encouraged to be creative or to find new solutions to problems. Research has found that transactional leadership tends to be most effective in situations where problems are simple and clearly-defined.

Transactional leaders are focused on maintaining the status quo; “transformational” leaders are focused on helping their team take results to the next level.

Transformational leadership extends beyond maintaining day-to-day operations and typically includes implementing different goal-setting methods, teambuilding practices, and or collaborative tactics.

Serving Life, is an original documentary executive produced and narrated by Academy Award winner Forest Whitaker. The film takes viewers inside Louisiana’s maximum security prison at Angola, where the average sentence is more than 90 years. The prison warden there has decided that the old and severely ill inmates should not die alone. In this moving film, we see values-driven management at work. By valuing all lives, the warden converts hardened criminals into caring Hospice volunteers, and in so doing, produces results once thought impossible at this former “worst” prison.
At Boxer Advisors, I am proud to encourage the executives I work with to explore different leadership styles and philosophies to suit a broad base of organizations and issues. In practice, however, I agree with Steve Jobs, and believe that leading with your values is one of the strongest statements you can make.

We invite C-level executives to participate in the Transformational Leadership Forum, Boxer Advisors is hosting next March 28, 2014. This session will present executives an opportunity to learn from each other and from best practices that will help build their transformational leadership skills.

Boxer Advisors is a full-service consulting, training and coaching firm with more than 50 professional consultants, facilitators, and coaches and carefully selected partners providing services to Federal agencies and Fortune 1000 companies since 1996.

Contact us today to learn more.

Photo credit: http://www.sxc.hu/photo/1404329;