Cowboy Caleb the liberal arts, grown-up stuff & random mischief

He Always Did His Best

Being a leader is tough. The first thing you learn about being a leader is that when it all goes to hell, you go to hell with it.

Of course not everybody understands. When you stop going into details, you get accused of being incompetent or not caring enough about your job. But the devil is in the details. For an example, when a document is being verified for accuracy and there are 3 pairs of eyes reviewing it - a leader is only as good as the people he works with.

As more and more items start piling up in your in-tray, you have to learn to trust your people to deal with it so you can deal with issues at a higher level.

A leader cares about the people in his team. They are his family, and he is a hovering ghostly father. He likes to know about their background, family, if they’ve eaten and what’s bugging them today. He buys them food, magazines and generally tries to keep them happy while working them to the bone.

The person that takes care of everybody else has nobody to take care of him - a leader.

A good leader never says “that’s not my job”, instead he says “Everything is my job unless you tell me to stop”.

But a leader has to fall back on his people when he starts falling behind. Leaders have many bad days. A leader has to face the music from management and still continue smiling while the sky is falling because if he didn’t, the team would notice and get discouraged.

A leader usually has a bad leader (or maybe more than one) in charge of him. This may not such a bad thing, because a leader learns what not to do by observing his superior and doing the exact opposite.

Chin up. Eyes open. Ready smile. Open door. Warm tones.

Damn, you remind me of the drudgery of my job now.

A lousy manager says …I’m in charge but you’re fully responsible. A lousy leader says… I’m fully in charge and responsible for everything you do, so don’t screw up. One needs to be a lil of both I guess?