You Might Be Wrong! - By Rick Williams

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You might be wrong!

Believing you might be wrong is not usually seen as a leadership strength. Confidence, strength, clarity, and conviction – we believe these are leadership strengths. Successful leadership requires three steps: decide on the best path forward; communicate a vision of success; and execute on the plan.

Confidence, strength, clarity, and conviction are required to communicate a vision of success and to execute on your plan. Deciding where to take your organization – the path forward – requires a different strength.

If you are the division director, team leader, CEO, or department head, your job is to make decisions – make choices – choose the future for the organization. You’re expected to know the right thing to do. You probably have this expectation of yourself. 

We usually make decisions quickly, drawing on our instinctive reactions to what is in front of us at the moment. This approach often gets us in trouble because we do not slow down and take the time to fully understand the challenge we face and the options we have.

Check out my recommendation for taking time to define Success before making an important decision – HERE.

Usually, we don’t fully understand the opportunity or threat, we have not thought through what success will be most valuable, we have not considered the execution risks, and we have not laid out why we should choose one future path over another.

Whatever your initial – gut reaction – thinking about the challenge facing you – you might be wrong!

Whether you believe your new gizmo will sweep the market, your troublesome product director should be fired, your legacy service will not be threatened by AI, or your new financing will be a cake walk, SLOW DOWN. Take a moment to engage with your team and key advisors.

Ask for their thinking. Listen to their experience. Discover and learn from what you hear. Then decide with a more complete understanding of the challenge facing you and your real options.

Successful leadership requires making smart decisions and then competently executing on your decisions. Quick, poorly thought-through decisions produce poor performance.

A strong and successful leader is prepared to make decisions that create the future for the organization they lead. They also feel strong and confident in themselves. Their strength allows them to ask, “What do you believe we should do?”. Their strength allows them to learn from others. Their strength allows them to consider new information and change their thinking about the best path forward for their organization.

Successful leaders are open to learning from others. All ideas are good ideas!

Sailboat Racing from Newport to Bermuda

Yes, I wrote that “Everything I Know About Leadership I Learned On My Sailboat.”

On Friday, June 19, I will be on my J 130 sailboat, CHARIAD, starting the 640 mile race from Newport, RI, to Bermuda. Here are three ways you can follow us on the race.

Bermuda Race Website: https://bermudarace.com/

YouTube:    https://www.youtube.com/@CHARIAD-Racing

Facebook:   https://www.facebook.com/chariadracing

The Bermuda Race Website will have a continuously updated chart of the Atlantic Ocean showing each of the 170 racing sailboats on their way to Bermuda. Like watching horses race around the track but we take four or five days getting to the finish line.

We will post videos and pictures on Facebook and YouTube from the boat while we are racing. Follow CHARIAD’s channels to get updates.

Also, check out CHARIAD’s website: www.CHARIAD.com

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