The Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership

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The Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership

• Spring 2006

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The Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership

• Model the Way
• Inspire a Shared Vision
• Challenge the Process
• Enable Others to Act
• Encourage the Heart

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Model the Way

• Spending time with others, working side by side
  with colleagues, making values come alive, being
  highly visible during times of uncertainty, and
  asking questions to get people to think about
  priorities and values

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Inspire a Shared Vision

• Know your constituents and speak their language
  have intimate knowledge of their dreams, hopes,
  aspirations, visions, and values forge a unity
  of purpose by showing how the dream for the group
  is for the common good ignite the flame of
  passion in others by expressing enthusiasm for
  the compelling vision of the group.

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Challenge the Process

• Leaders venture out. No one ever claimed to
  achieved something by keeping things the same.
  Leaders are pioneers. They search for
  opportunities to innovate, grow, and improve.
  Leaders know well that innovation and change all
  involve experimentation, risk, and failure. The
  proceed anyway. The key that unlocks the door to
  opportunity is learning. Leaders are learners.
  They learn from their failures and their
  successes.

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Enable Others to Act

• Leaders make it possible for others to do good
  work. They know that those who are expected to
  produce results must feel a sense of personal
  power and ownership. Constituents neither perform
  at their best nor stick around for very long if
  their leader makes them feel weak, dependent, or
  alienated. But when a leader makes people feel
  strong and capable as if they can do more than
  they ever thought possible they give it their
  all and exceed their own expectations. When
  leadership is a relationship founded on trust and
  confidence, people take risks, make changes, keep
  organizations and movements alive.

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Encourage the Heart

• People become exhausted, frustrated,
  disenchanted. Theyre often tempted to give up.
  Leaders encourage the heart of their constituents
  to carry on. Its part of the leaders job to
  show appreciation for peoples contributions and
  to create a culture of celebration. Recognition
  and celebrations arent about fun and games,
  though there is a lot of fun and there are a lot
  of games when people encourage the hearts of
  their constituents. Neither are they about
  pretentious ceremonies designed to create some
  phony sense of camaraderie. Leaders know that
  celebrations and rituals, when done with
  authenticity and from the heart, build a strong
  sense of collective identity and community spirit
  that can carry a group through extraordinarily
  tough times.

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The Ten Commitments of Leadership

• Find your voice by clarifying your personal
  values
• Set the example by aligning actions with shared
  values
• Envision the future by imagining exciting and
  ennobling possibilities
• Enlist others in a common vision by appealing to
  shared aspirations
• Search for opportunities by seeking innovative
  ways to change, grow, and improve
• Experiment and take risks by constantly
  generating small wins and learning from mistakes
• Foster collaboration by promoting cooperative
  goals and building trust
• Strengthen others by sharing power and
  discretion
• Recognize contributions by showing appreciation
  for individual excellence
• Celebrate the values and victories by creating a
  spirit of community

• Model the Way
• Inspire a Shared Vision
• Challenge the Process
• Enable Others to Act
• Encourage the Heart

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81 Action Points

• Find your voice (8 action points)
• Set the example (8 action points)
• Envision the future (8 action points)
• Enlist others in a common vision (9 action
  points)
• Search for opportunities (8 action points)
• Experiment and take risks (8 action points)
• Foster collaboration (8 action points)
• Strengthen others (8 action points)
• Recognize contributions (8 action points)
• Celebrate the values and victories (8 action
  points)

• Model the Way
• Inspire a Shared Vision
• Challenge the Process
• Enable Others to Act
• Encourage the Heart

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1. FIND YOUR VOICE BY CLARIFYING YOUR PERSONAL
VALUES

• Look in the mirror
• Take time for contemplation
• Write a tribute to yourself
• Record the lessons from the leaders you admire

• Write your credo
• Engage in a credo dialogue and assessment
• Collect stories that teach values
• Audit your ability to succeed

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2. SET THE EXAMPLE BY ALIGNING ACTIONS WITH
SHARED VALUES

• Create alignment around key values
• Speak about shared values with enthusiasm and
  confidence -- even drama
• Teach and reinforce through symbols and artifacts
  
• Lead by storytelling

• Put story telling on your meeting agendas
• Ask questions
• Keep score
• Do a personal audit

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3. ENVISION THE FUTURE BY IMAGING EXCITING AND
ENNOBLING POSSIBILITES

• Read a biography of a visionary leader
• Think about your past
• Determine the "something" you want to do
• Write an article about how you've made a
  difference

• Write a vision statement
• Become a futurist
• Test your assumptions
• Rehearse with visualizations and affirmations

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4. ENLIST OTHERS IN A COMMON VISION BY APPEALING
TO SHARED ASPIRATIONS

• Get to know your constituents
• Find the common ground
• Develop a collective vision statement
• Expand your communication skills

• Expand your communication skills
• Breath life into your vision
• Speak from the heart
• Listen first -- and often
• Hang out

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5. SEARCH FOR OPPORTUNITIES BY SEEKING INNOVATIVE
WAYS TO CHANGE, GROW, AND IMPROVE

• Treat every job as an adventure
• Seek meaningful challenges for yourself
• Find and create meaningful challenges for others
• Add fun to everyone's work

• Question the status quo
• Renew your teams
• Create an open-source approach to searching for
  opportunities
• Send everyone shopping for ideas

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6. EXPERIMENT AND TAKE RISKS BY CONSTANTLY
GENERATING SMALL WINS AND LEARNING BY MISTAKES

• Set up little experiments and develop models
• Make it safe for others to experiment
• Break mindsets
• Break it up and break it down

• Give people choices
• Accumulate yeses
• Admit your mistakes
• Conduct pre- and postmortems for every project

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7. FOSTER COLLABORATION BY PROMOTING COOPERATIVE
GOALS AND BUILDING TRUST

• Conduct a collaboration audit
• Be the first to trust
• Ask questions, listen, and take advice
• Always say we
• Create jigsaw groups

• Focus on gains, not losses
• Make a list of alternative currencies
• Take a lot of human moments
• Create places and opportunities for informal
  interactions

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8. STRENGTHEN OTHERS BY SHARING POWER AND
DISCRETION

• Offer visible support
• Assign critical tasks
• Enrich people's jobs
• Use modeling to develop competencies

• Stop talking and start building at staff meetings
• Enlarge people's sphere of influence
• Educate, educate, educate
• Create a learning climate

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9. RECOGNIZE CONTRIBUTIONS BY SHOWING
APPRECIATION FOR INDIVIDUAL EXCELLENCE

• Be creative about rewards
• Make recognition public
• Provide feedback en route
• Be a Pygmalion

• Foster positive expectations
• Make the recognition presentation meaningful
• Find people who are doing things right
• Dont be stingy about saying thank you

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10. CELEBRATE THE VALUES AND VICTORIES BY
CREATING A SPIRIT OF COMMUNITY

• Schedule celebrations
• Install a public Bragging Board
• Create a commemorative award honoring exemplary
  actions
• Demonstrate caring by walking around

• Show passion and compassion
• Be a cheerleader your way
• Have fun
• Set the example plan a celebration right now