On Leadership

Leadership can bring to mind a variety of people: A political leader, pursuing a passionate and personal cause, an explorer cutting a path through a jungle for his group to follow, a CEO developing his company's strategy to beat competition, a coach motivating his team to victory, and even the ultimate, unlimited leader our God above.

Leaders have vision, passion, and determination. They make life exciting, inspiring, and set the direction for success. 

Choosing a good leader is paramount to a successful company or franchise. Typically it's track record or proof of concept that are evaluated in choosing a leader. More importantly though, leaders must understand people, after all they are the chief psychologist.

Communication is important because leaders have to deal with hierarchical systems - lawyers, accountants, managers, sales, marketing and business development. They have to hire and dismiss personnel.

Leaders deal with spinning plates and are able at any given time to solve complex problems, analyze statistics and financials, and create strategic operatives. They are effective negotiators and are confident under stress. 

People have long studied leaders because they want to be one - or at least be more like them. Critical public eye is on leaders and the gap between wealth of major CEOs and coaches, and their workers and players. The attention leads extra intrigue to the ability of a few to amass such prestige and power. 

Leaders are typically a first born child in their family and typically they are tall. A prestigious education is most common of Fortune 500 CEOs for instance (Columbia, Harvard, or University of PA). 

The leadership sweet spot is usually in a person's 50s and early 60s. Most leaders cite a struggle or failed venture in their past that helped them learn how to innovate and problem-solve. 

Great leaders create an inspiring vision of the future, motivate and inspire people to engage with vision, manage delivery of the vision, coaches, and builds a team that is effective at achieving the vision.

"Leadership is the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it." – Dwight D. Eisenhower