Habit #4 - I-M-C Syndrome

Inspiration, Motivation and Collaboration are means for achieving ends i.e. vision or mission. Failure to use these powerful tools undermines a leader’s ability to achieve goals/mission as he becomes solely dependent on his position and power to make people do what he wants them to do. People follow because they don’t have a choice and that is bad leadership.

This could happen because of four reasons:

1. Not believing in capacity of people to raise to the occasion, team members are seen either achievers or non-achievers.

Habit #2: Temptation of Forbidden (Low Hanging) Fruit

Low-hanging fruit are easy to get, bring in early gains, they are good to start with, enthuse people, change perceptions for good, improve morale, I give you that!

But once morale is pepped, perceptions are set right, you need real results...only real battles give real results, you need to go after damn good fruit, not just low hanging ones, that’s where the money is!

Beyond early gains, leaders ought to set right direction, nudge their teams in right direction  away from small stuff on to changes that nurtures long term growth sustainable gains - it is the primal function of leadership. A bad leader fails in this basic function, to set right direction.

Why?

Bad leaders get hung up on low-hanging fruit,

Habits of Highly Ineffective Leaders

Internet is teeming with articles and blog posts on Leadership. Google search ‘Qualities of a leader’ yields 21.3 million results in 0.14 seconds whereas search for “Qualities of ineffective leaders”, gives just 1.73 million results but take 29% more time – are we ignoring the unpleasant side of the leadership coin? Granted that it is charming to be a great leader, but I think it is easy to be a bad leader than being a good one. Probability of being a bad leader exceeds that of being a good one. Like a consultant Kent Romanoff said   “... [we get to see] a spectacular cavalcade of incompetence...” so spectacular that I can’t help but rant about it. 

Attitudes and beliefs are influenced by culture, they give leaders a distinct local shades of behavior patterns. Here are some common symptoms of bad leadership in India, one at a time:

Habit #1 - Coterie Complex: bad leaders nurture a coterie around them - this is devil’s temptation, nothing less, an age old failure function that leads to inevitable decay. History of India is replete with stories of kings, their fiefs and their deputies indulging in this suicidal orgy, building coteries of yes men around them - sucking up to someone has never gone out of fashion!

Like bacteria infested water,