Much nonsense is spouted about leadership. Mostly it is in lists of abstract, fluffy concepts like goal-orientation, influence, charisma, empathy, authenticity, openness, self awareness and more; far, far more. None of these is of the slightest use to someone who actually aspires to lead. They try to tell you what you should be, not what you must do.
General David Petraeus knows about leadership. He’s been head of the US army, director of the CIA, partner in KKR and chair of its Global Institute. His approach is worth noting and it makes more sense than anything that social media pundits and self-styled gurus waffle on about. It is very practical. Nearly anybody can understand what is required and most people would be able to do it at some level. Here is a paraphrased version of its components.
Understand the Context
It starts with research; lots and lots of research. Only when the full scope of companies, individuals, politics, law, logistics, technologies and environment are identified; when sources of power and its accumulation are revealed; and when the nature of ecosystem change and its effect on evolution of the players is tracked, can strategy begin. Research must be objective and strategy-neutral even if sometimes it may look academic – knowledge for its own sake. Because this involves a lot of work, it is absent from nearly every article ever written on leadership.
Get the Big Ideas Right
Use people who know. Use them inclusively to shape strategic options. By involving your team in developing strategy, you have buy-in from the start. Big ideas don’t hit you between the eyes. They may start as a distracting thought that needs to be nurtured and tested. Developing big strategic ideas is a formal, structured process. Like understanding Context, it also involves a lot of work. You don’t develop these big ideas by reading ‘best practice’, or with a flash of inspiration in the shower, or from pre-digested case-studies..
Communicate Them
Your team needs to understand the reason for achieving certain goals but it almost certainly does not need to be told how to reach them. There are many versions of the saying, ‘No plan survives first contact with the enemy’. What it means is that your team has to assess when to divert from a plan, and improvise. If they understand the Context and the Big Idea, they are equipped to deal with unexpected events; setbacks as well as opportunities. Communication and open debate can generate difficult and awkward challenges but, unless communication is two-way and real, you will not receive true reports when things change and you need to adapt..
Refine and Update
Check constantly that the Context and the Big Ideas are still valid. It is always hard to concede that you may have got something wrong, or that you failed to anticipate a change in the environment. If you have put in enough work on them in the first place however, you have the knowledge and insights necessary to change course without losing respect and authority.
This is about leadership, not about supervision, management, administration, oversight, or any of the other things that people call leadership in their Linkedin profiles. Every one of the above four components requires a lot of work but there is one way in which they are easier than standard shibboleths like authenticity, coachability, culture, alignment, transparency, vulnerability and so on. They are practical things that anyone can understand and most can do. They don’t specify an essential character trait or personality: you can be a psychopathic narcissist or a compassionate empath. People will trust and follow the person who knows what they are doing, and why.