Everyone is responsible for business growth

In my new book, No-Compromise Leadership, one of my favorite Neilisms is, "If I can't sleep at night, no one sleeps at night." It's not intended to be a message for leaders to stress out their employees, it's simply a thought-provoking and rather amusing quote to drive home the fact that leaders don't have to shoulder the burden of growing a business alone. Leaders define the destination and keep the business on a steady course. That's the real work of leadership and that work includes inspiring great performance as well as making tough decisions.
Leadership is a delicate concoction of foresight, focus, tenacity, trust building and accountability that produces measureable results. When this concoction gets out of whack, those measureable results can head in the wrong direction, signaling that indifference has contaminated the business culture. Indifference sounds like, "Why should I work hard or care about the performance of the business. I'll get paid no matter what?" Indifference is another word for apathy and apathy can kill a business.
When the funk of apathy slows a business down, leaders typically identify employees as the problem. They reason that employees just don't get it or care, or that they're simply lazy. Well, my fearless leaders, I bet you know where this is going. Bingo! It's not them - it's that delicate leadership concoction of yours that's out of whack. You're enabling the very behavior that's slowing your business down by not engaging as the leader.
Everyone is responsible for business growth. It's such a simple statement that resonates with good stuff like teamwork, empowerment and progress. But that "everyone is responsible" thinking begins with the leader creating a culture where clarity, openness, trust and shared accountability are the rule rather than the exception. In such a culture, the only way indifference and apathy can set in is when the leader is distracted or just not paying attention.
Sense of urgency is a key business driver. It's the business equivalent of a throttle on a jet. Take the pressure off for only a second and it begins a steady decent. If you're dealing with lackluster performance, indifference and apathy in your business - if you want everyone to be responsible for business growth - it's time to take the pilot's seat, push forward on the throttle and communicate to your team what the destination is and what it's going to take to get there. In these crazy economic times, it's what no-compromise leaders do.
Pass this email on to your business colleagues, managers and friends.
Neil Ducoff, Strategies founder & CEO
In my new book, No-Compromise Leadership, one of my favorite Neilisms is, "If I can't sleep at night, no one sleeps at night." It's not intended to be a message for leaders to stress out their employees, it's simply a thought-provoking and rather amusing quote to drive home the fact that leaders don't have to shoulder the burden of growing a business alone. Leaders define the destination and keep the business on a steady course. That's the real work of leadership and that work includes inspiring great performance as well as making tough decisions.

Leadership is a delicate concoction of foresight, focus, tenacity, trust building and accountability that produces measureable results. When this concoction gets out of whack, those measureable results can head in the wrong direction, signaling that indifference has contaminated the business culture. Indifference sounds like, "Why should I work hard or care about the performance of the business. I'll get paid no matter what?" Indifference is another word for apathy and apathy can kill a business.

When the funk of apathy slows a business down, leaders typically identify employees as the problem. They reason that employees just don't get it or care, or that they're simply lazy. Well, my fearless leaders, I bet you know where this is going. Bingo! It's not them - it's that delicate leadership concoction of yours that's out of whack. You're enabling the very behavior that's slowing your business down by not engaging as the leader.

Everyone is responsible for business growth. It's such a simple statement that resonates with good stuff like teamwork, empowerment and progress. But that "everyone is responsible" thinking begins with the leader creating a culture where clarity, openness, trust and shared accountability are the rule rather than the exception. In such a culture, the only way indifference and apathy can set in is when the leader is distracted or just not paying attention.

Sense of urgency is a key business driver. It's the business equivalent of a throttle on a jet. Take the pressure off for only a second and it begins a steady decent. If you're dealing with lackluster performance, indifference and apathy in your business - if you want everyone to be responsible for business growth - it's time to take the pilot's seat, push forward on the throttle and communicate to your team what the destination is and what it's going to take to get there. In these crazy economic times, it's what no-compromise leaders do.

Pass this email on to your business colleagues, managers and friends.

Neil Ducoff, Strategies founder & CEO and author of No-Compromise Leadership

Everyone is responsible for business growth

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