If you find a problem...

Recently, I had the pleasure of listening to a lecture given by the Danish management consultant Christian Ørsted about what he calls "Lethal leadership" - a great pleasure, because there were many interesting takeaways.
It was not necessarily things that was unaware of - but there were points that are not necessarily consistent with how people usually act, and hence, it can be really good to put words on them.
One of the most outstanding examples was how to handle people, when they report problems.
Often (if the old-fashioned method of "killing the messenger" isn't applied), it is implicitly expected that if someone reports a problem, the same someone should also be able to come up with a solution.
An expectation which often has as its only outcome that if someone sees a problem, she keeps her mouth shut unless she is so lucky as to know how to solve it. Something which far from always happens to be the case.
Therefore, it is important to say that if someone finds a problem, then you expect that person to tell about it. Then, together, you can assess the problem and put an effort into solving the problem using the best best means available - rather than frightening people into silence by setting up unrealistic expectations.
(Translated from Hvis du finder et problem..., originally published October 13th, 2017)

Stray thought on leadership

It's scary how many people believe that when you are a leader, people are there to serve you - when in reality, it is the exact opposite way around: you are there to serve people.
(Translated from Strøtanke om lederskab)

Leaders and leadership - where's the connection?

Once again, I had the pleasure to visit TED.com to listen to a presentation - this time, it was Simon Sinek, author of the books "Start With Why" and "Leaders Eat Last". In the presentation, he tells us abour leaders, and leadership in general:
In the presentation, Sinek draws the following conclusion, which i find immensely interesting.

Leaders hold a position of power or authority, but those who lead inspire us. Whether they're individuals or organizations, we follow those who lead, not because we have to, but because we want to.

- in other words: if one claims to be a leader, it does not necessarily have any connection to whether or not one is able to exhibit leadership abilities - as we do not follow leaders because we are told that they are leaders, but rather because we want to follow them. And it is the leadership rather than the title that is important.
Maybe more leaders should take this into consideration?
(Translated from Hvad har ledere med lederskab at gøre?, originally published February 28, 2016)