women in power – principles of leaders

I believe this comes from a book, ‘women in power’, but I can’t attribute this properly as it is a photocopy in an old file I unearthed while cleaning.

  1.  If you have influence over even one other person, you are a leader.
  2. The most important job of a leader is to create a thinking environment throughout the organisation.
  3. Women’s culture, with its emphasis on interactive thinking skills, is a necessary training ground for leaders, especially men.
  4. The best leaders increase the amount of support in their life each time they increase the amount of leadership they take on.
  5. Leading well includes being appreciated every day by the people you are leading.
  6. Leaders will inspire if they lead from joy, not from duty or from the drug of frenzied drive.
  7. Making mistakes is one of the requirements of good leadership.
  8. Good leaders regularly review their leadership with people who can speak to them honestly, maintaining a 10:1 ratio of appreciation to criticism.
  9. Good leaders know everyone in their group, understand how the world has treated them and their people, and interrupt any acts, words or policies of prejudice towards them.
  10. A leader’s ideas can be presented in such a way that even better ideas come from others.
  11. The quality of a person’s public life is only as good as the quality of their solitude.
  12. Leaders need at least one thinking partner who has no connection whatever with their work.
  13. The art of resting deeply is essential for sound, durable leadership.
  14. A leader’s work will stay fresh and effective if she periodically starts from scratch and asks herself, ‘what do I really want?’
  15. Leadership is sometimes offered to women as a way of silencing them.  Astute female leaders refuse to agree to this.
  16. There is more than enough leadership opportunity to go around.
  17. Effective leaders develop, celebrate and champion others in their leadership whilst never abdicating their own.
  18. The best leaders bring their values with them.
  19. The issues that victimise you in intimate relationships are the same issues as will victimise you in leadership.
  20. When convening a meeting, an effective leader will make concrete proposals, assuming they will be discussed and changed, rather than open the meeting by asking, ‘what does everybody want to do?’
  21. Thinking goes better if leaders begin each meeting or event by having everyone say something about themselves  and end each meeting with a word from everyone about what has been achieved.
  22. Periodically during a meeting leaders do well to stop and hear from the quiet people.
  23. Our progress as women leaders can be measured not only by our political gains but also by the decreasing amount of time each day we spend as victims.
  24. Good leaders listen far more than they speak.
  25. Women and men grow as leaders when they allow their primary leadership role model to be a woman.

 

I am not sure I fully understand all of these statements, but they all give pause for thought.  I have put the ones that resonated most with me in italics.