Leadership and the Culture of Simulation (2)

Executing a Vision for Impact as a Shared Experience in Leadership

Observing Patterns of Behavior

You can learn a lot by watching and listening. It is more important than being prepared to speak when someone takes a breath. It is really the only way you can know what the actual needs of a group are. I have had the privilege of working for organizational leaders who by watching them helped me clarify and validate the patterns of behavior that led to the creation of my Circle of Impact model of leadership.

The model is intended to not only help people discover reality but to do so together. For only as a team of shared purpose based upon mutual respect and trust can an organization today weather the perfect storm of collapse that we are facing.

Later today, I go to celebrate one of those leaders who is retiring. He is my model of what a leader of impact is like.

Five Leadership Behaviors

The following is an excerpt from my short book, Seeing Below The Surface of Things: The Brokenness of the Modern Organization. These behaviors help leaders create a culture of Simulation that makes it difficult to see what reality is.

There is the behavior of hubris. In effect, we are better than our competitors, and will always be so. This type of arrogance blinds an organization to its weaknesses and fragility. Sometimes the hubris is very open, and other times quiet and hidden. In both ways, there is a belief that necessary change only comes from the person in control.

A second type of behavior is cluelessness. Don’t laugh. It is more widespread than hubris. It is marked by a lack of awareness. The source of cluelessness is rarely clear. I only know that many leaders lack self-awareness. They are unaware of their own contributions to the problems of their organizations. …

A third type of behavior is the parallel mindsets of idealism and defeatism. A blind belief that the organization will always succeed or will always fail creates vulnerability … Denial of reality is a huge obstacle to overcome when a key to an organization’s future is determined by how well they can fix the problems they face.

A fourth behavior is an obsessive attention to detail. The result is the familiar practice of leaders’ micromanaging every facet of the organization’s function. Perspective is lost through this behavior. …

A fifth behavior is the helper / facilitator. This behavior is similar to the micromanager. Instead of focusing on detail, it is focusing on helping staff do their job. An attention to performance in a positive sense can become problematic when the attention becomes a distraction. The hidden motivation for this behavior is, on the one hand, an inability to trust the person to be responsible for their job, and on the other, the need of the leader for constant validation that their contribution is valuable.

Hubris, cluelessness, idealism, defeatism, obsessive attention to detail, and the helper/facilitator are signals that you or the leader of your organization are not fully rooted in reality. What would a reconfiguration of these traits look like where the organization has a firm grasp on reality? The list could be:

Humility instead of Hubris

Self-awareness instead Cluelessness

Positive Resilience instead idealism or defeatism

Clear priorities instead obsessive attention to detail

Leadership Facilitator instead of helper/facilitator

In our world, we labor under the illusion of leadership greatness. Wars, pandemics, economic collapse, and social unrest are the hallmarks of the culture of leadership simulation. The same illusions of grandeur that propelled the Gang of Five to highjack the presentation are the same reason that many leaders cannot accept responsibility for the crises that come under their leadership.

What then does leadership rooted in reality look like? Here’s the story of the man who I will honor at his retirement later today.

Leading with Vision

Tom Campbell is the retiring president of the Black Mountain Home for Children, Youth and Families in Black Mountain, NC. I met Tom during the selection process for the next president of the home seventeen years ago. Our family volunteered at the home. We have a long-term financial commitment to the home. And I was serving the board as a consultant in their presidential search when Tom was hired.

Tom stood out as a person with vision. At that point in time, the home may have had 20 children under its care. Tonight, they will bed down around 90 children living in family homes on the campus. Each home has two sets of live-in parents who rotate throughout the month. At sixteen, the youth move into a transitional living home, preparing for the time when they turn eighteen and are now considered on their own.

During these seventeen years, the program has grown, the campus has grown, the staff has grown, and the impact within the community of organizations that care for children in need across our state and nation has grown. Every aspect of that vision is specific. Every aspect is tied in some way to the impact that it will have upon a child.

Executing the Vision

A vision is only as good as its execution. Tom has been relentless in building partnerships with people, churches, and organizations that serve to advance the home and the wider childcare community. His vision is practical. He sees what needs to happen and finds ways to make it so.

Everything operates within a concept called Continuum of Care*. This platform of values is the measure applied to every decision. The reality is that none of these children come to the home with an investment portfolio or a college fund. When they turn 18 years of age, they are on their own. But the Continuum of Care means that the home had to provide a way for these young, emerging adults to find a way to be able to go to college. As a result, an apartment village was created for the youth where they can live while continuing their education.

Tom’s Leadership Qualities

After working in a variety of capacities with Tom and the home over the past two decades, the pattern of behavior that I saw in him was not only visionary with excellence in execution but those qualities listed above.

Humility as seen in graciousness.

Self-awareness in understanding that it is all about the children.

Positive Resilience in addressing the physical, financial, programmatic, social, and regulatory challenges that the home daily faces.

Clear priorities based on what is the impact on the children.

Facilitator of other’s leadership as the team excels in their individual contribution to the home being a standard for children’s homes nationally.

The Measure of Leadership is Impact

The Culture of Simulation that afflicts the philosophy and practice of leadership today has no measures that are externally measureable. Sales numbers don’t measure external impact but internal operational efficiency. When I began in this field 38 years, the conventional understanding was that leadership is a role and a title in an organization. I saw it differently.

Instead, I saw that all leadership begins with personal initiative to create impact that makes a difference that matters. The measure of impact is that of change. A change that makes a difference that matters. In measuring leadership, what changes because of a decision, a vision, or the execution of the vision? What difference are they making? This is the only measure that matters in the context of The Culture of Simulation. It is because it is tangible, externally measurable, and replicable in every person, organization, and community. This is the impact that the members of the Black Mountain Home community seek through our participation and contributions. This is the reality that Tom has led us in creating.

Here is the outcome of the execution of the vision that he described to us seventeen years ago. This vision will continue to unfold as the Black Mountain Home has always been about leadership as a shared responsibility. And will continue to be so long into the future.

* Black Mountain Home for Children, Youth, and Families CONTINUUM OF CARE:

• We serve children from birth to college age and beyond, including:

• Community-based foster care with an emphasis on children 0-6 years old, including many with special medical needs.

• Campus-based residential care for school age children living in family-style homes on our beautiful 90 acre campus.

• Transitional living and life skills coaching for teens preparing for independent living.

• Independent Living for youth who have earned a high school diploma or GED and are pursuing a additional education, vocational training, or participating in our Apprenticeship Program.

• Lifelong Living Program for youth who need continued support in adulthood due to intellectual and developmental disabilities.

SERVICE AREA:

Our primary service area is Western North Carolina; however, our home is open to any child in NC in need of care.

CAMPUS LOCATIONS:

• Main Campus located in Black Mountain, NC, including an on site home, Eller House, for specialized foster care.

• Whitewater Cove campus located in Pisgah Forest, NC which can meet the needs of up to six children in addition.

In the next essays in this series, I’m going to dig into the three dimensions of the Circle of Impact as a way to separate reality from the Culture of Simulation.