The Ultimate Leadership Capability: Creating Flourishing Teams
Photo by Brigitte Elsner on Unsplash
One of the core responsibilities of leadership is preparing the next generation. This begins with building teams that thrive. Strong, flourishing teams are essential to the leadership journey. I explore the journey as the central thesis of my book, The Leader With A Thousand Faces.
Most leaders begin their careers leading a small team with a single, focused objective. It can be a project or overseeing day-to-day operations. Early success leads to larger responsibilities: larger projects and bigger teams to manage. While all of this is happening, you will work under the guidance of a leader who helps you learn, grow, and succeed. This mentorship is part of this first step in your journey.
As you grow, you will shift from being a team lead to being a leader of teams. This is when you learn how to delegate responsibility for the project. You are still accountable; the team's failings are your failings. Success in this part of your journey relies on effective communication to set clear expectations. You provide coaching and mentoring to the team without micromanaging or doing the work yourself. You will mentor our teams just as you were mentored.
The cycle repeats and expands. You will assemble teams, propose projects, and set strategic direction. Your title will evolve from Project Manager to Senior Project Manager and then to Director, VP, and so on. You start to view organizational charts not as people in boxes, but rather teams within teams. As you build flourishing teams and develop the next generation of leaders, you create space for yourself to allow your journey to continue.
At every step, you need mentors. Mentors share their experience and help you learn, grow, and succeed. You will also be mentoring others at the same time.
Everyone is on their own journey. Each journey affects those around them, just as the moon orbits the Earth; the Earth, in turn, takes the moon along its trek around the Sun. All the journeys influence each other.
This is The Leaders Journey. With each phase, you learn new skills, gain deeper insights, and develop broader perspectives that propel your own journey.
The chapters in my book all end with haikus like this one. (I find writing haikus powerful to distill a single idea with clarity and focus.
Visionary leaders
Create flourishing teams, which
Opens space for their growth
Related Articles
When Work Teams Flourish, Productivity Increases | Texas McCombs
The Global Flourishing Study: Study Profile and Initial Results on Flourishing | Nature
Team dynamics: Five keys to building effective teams | Google UK
Psychological safety in the changing workplace | American Psychological Association
Go, teams: When teams get healthier, the whole organization benefits | McKinsey & Company
When Two Leaders Are Better Than One | Harvard Business Review
Chips and Salsa: Snack-sized news and posts
Analogies are powerful tools for understanding. By definition, they are always imperfect. The analogy that AI is a calculator for words resonates with me. This article explores that analogy to help us understand AI.
Actually, AI is a ‘word calculator’ – but not in the sense you might think | The Conversation
SEO is dead; long live GEO.
GEO is the new SEO. Here’s everything you need to know | Wired
We all stand on the shoulders of others. More often than not, we do not know whose shoulders they are. I reviewed The Only Woman in the Room, a biography of Hedy Lamarr (No. 3).
5 Forgotten Geniuses Who Changed the World in Silence | Medium
There is a significant difference between investing and trading. Trading is like gambling at the casino. The house always wins. People only brag about when they win and never talk about when they lose. Investing takes a long view and ignores the bumps and potholes in the road until they become so frequent that you decide to reexamine the map and chart a new course.
I Read Every Investing Book So You Don’t Have To | Medium
This article does a good job of explaining the challenges facing companies that rely on H1B visas. The visa program needs to be examined and reformed. What we need is comprehensive immigration reform. We need people of all skill levels to grow our economy. We need to improve and modernize our visa protocols. We need border security. When we chip away at the edges, we create negative consequences. Some call them unintended (check out my last newsletter), but with just a little thought and scenario planning, the challenges could have been anticipated.
Trump's H-1B change, immigration crackdown could send jobs overseas | Axios
Over 40% of the U.S. economy is driven by small businesses, employing almost have of the workforce. They are under immense pressure.
As businesses wait for a tariff ruling, some have run out of time | Marketplace
Alzheimer’s and dementia are terrible diseases. As science helps us live longer, more people and their families are suffering.
Alzheimer's is the Sixth Leading Cause of Death in the U.S. | Statista
Alzheimer's Death Rate Has Doubled in the U.S. Since 2000 | Statista
I would challenge this headline. Smart glasses will make people dumber. No one will have to learn or remember anything; I call this mental laziness. Privacy is another huge issue. If someone is wearing the glasses, you have to wonder if you are being recorded (audio and video). What if the wearer is not part of your conversation, but just sitting next to you? There are some good use cases, but more often than not, smart glasses will stifle our interactions.
Meta’s Smart Glasses Might Make You Smarter. They’ll Certainly Make You More Awkward | Wired
When you take a new role, you have about 90 days to lay out a change plan. If you don’t announce your future vision, you will become the owner of what you inherit. The First 90 Days is a great book on how to build your action plan.
How executives can fast-track their impact in the first 90 days | Fast Company
The drop in foreign students will hurt the U.S. economy over the long-term. Many foreign students stay in the country on valid visas, obtain green cards, and become citizens. They add to our GDP and create wealth. Some go on to found thriving companies and become major employers. Elon Musk is an example, except for the valid visa part right after college.
Everything is always in motion.
Visualisations explore what the deep future holds for our night sky | Aeon
Workslop is a great word. We have had it for as long as we’ve had email. It looks better and there is more of it.
AI "workslop" is crushing workplace efficiency, study finds | Axios
Some time ago, I wrote a newsletter about Elon Musk and DOGE. ‘The title was There Are Many Different Leadership Styles – Chaos Is Not One Of Them.’ This article shares some of the real-world consequences of DOGE’s approach to efficiency.
The Story of DOGE, as Told by Federal Workers | Wired
When this is available from Amazon, I will buy a new Kindle. I have only seen the Kindle Colorsoft in stores. The sample displays appeared muted.
My movies tend to be much older. Casablanca, My Man Godfrey, King Kong, The Searchers, The Apartment, and Forbidden Planet come to mind.
Always Watchable — Movies That Never Fail | Medium
Wednesday, for me, is one of the most entertaining shows on Netflix. The billboard campaign is brilliant. You drive down the highway and see Enid. A mile later you see Wednesday.
I couldn’t resist. Apologies to the owners of this vehicle.
What do you think of the truck | YouTube
Quotes
"I'm a very strong believer in listening and learning from others."
- Ruth Bader Ginsburg
“The smartest person in the room, I’ve learned, is usually the person who knows how to tap into the intelligence of every person in the room.”
- Scott Kelly
“A flower does not think of competing with the flower next to it – it just blooms”
- Sensei Ogui
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I write about leadership in business and life. I am a certified M&A Specialist and Leadership coach. My perspectives are based on my 40+ year career working with leaders from around the world at over 100 companies.
My goal is to make this newsletter as interesting and valuable as possible. Please share your thoughts and suggestions for improvement. If there are specific topics in leadership you would like me to focus on in future issues, please send them my way.
You can order The Leader With A Thousand Faces on my website’s Recommended Reading Page. This page also has links to purchase the books discussed in this and previous newsletters.
