Einstein, The Universe and Leadership

Article by Brent Filson

Ever since serving a hitch in the military, I have been nagged by the question that’s been hanging around leadership since time immemorial: How can some leaders persuade people to believe in them and follow them and other leaders can’t? But it wasn’t the military that provided me with a framework to answer that question. It was Albert Einstein and his quest for the unified field theory of the universe.

Einstein is well known for his special and general theories of relativity, two of the crowning intellectual achievements of the 20th century. But what he is not so well known for is a magnificent quest that he carried on for some 30 years — and ultimately failed in. That was his quest for a unified field theory of the universe. And it was a quest that inspired me, in my small way, to find an answer to the leadership question.

Einstein’s special theory combined space and time into a single concept known as the space-time continuum. He spent the rest of his life failing to develop a unified field theory that incorporated gravity into the electromagnetic field. But it wasn’t his trying to solve the conundrums of physics that inspired me. It was his trying to unify the grand forces of the universe that’s so compelling.

Just as there are grand forces driving the activities of the universe, I’m convinced that there are grand forces driving the activities of leadership. Whether we are talking about small or large organizations, organizations of butchers, bakers or candlestick makers, the same leadership forces — leadership laws, if you will — apply. Or at least that I was my theory, that was my quest: to find the laws of leadership, if they did indeed exist, and then show how those laws can be applied in any organizational challenge. In short, we can have a “unified field theory of leadership.”

I won’t go into the details of how I came to develop the theory — only that after a quest of several decades, working with leaders of all stripes, I developed what I call the Unified Field Theory of Leadership Success. I’m certainly not unifying such grand concepts as gravity and the electromagnetic field; but my theory, in its small way, has helped many leaders around the world raise their leadership effectiveness to much higher levels.

Here then is the Unified Field Theory of Leadership Success. It is not magic dust to transform you into a great leader. It is instead a polestar to guide and help you invigorate your leadership and communication efforts.

The UFTLS is expressed as a series of four propositions.

• Business success happens when people get results. Clearly, this is not some strange, UFO- like concept. Instead, it is a BFO a Blinding Flash of the Obvious. Yet obvious or not, it is ignored by many leaders

• too many leaders. Too many leaders focus on enabling such drivers as quality initiatives, re-engineering projects, and cost-cutting programs

• at the expense of the people who must animate those drivers. For instance, I know of a company that is engaged in the fourth major restructuring in the past half dozen years.

• Three of those initiatives have failed, mainly because they ignored the human/leadership aspect. In fact, I propose that the new initiative is doomed to fail too.

It’s obvious why: instead of being driven by a compelling market strategy, strong products, or a vision of marketplace leadership, this new restructuring is being driven by a new computer system! The officers are restructuring the company primarily to better employ that system, not to better employ people for results. I dare say the light that they may perceive to be at the end of the tunnel will turn out in truth to be a search party looking for survivors.

Leaders do nothing more important than have people get results. Another seemingly obvious statement. Yet when I give talks to leaders around the world, and ask them, “What is the most important thing you do as a leader?” some 95 percent of them give every answer but this one. This is the only right answer.

Understand the power in the seeming passiveness of “have.” Leaders cannot get results by themselves. They need others to help get those results. Today, with speed, flexibility, and teamwork being driving competitiveness, the control-freak order-leader who must tyrannize and micro manage can’t compete against the leader who can build and motivate teams to get results. In short, the leader who can “have” others get results.

The best way to have people get results is not to order them but to motivate them. Like leadership purpose, motivation is another concept that is misunderstood by many leaders. If we misunderstand the concept of motivation, how in the world can we motivate anybody to do anything? Here are the four “eternal truths” of motivation:

1. Motivation is not something people think or feel but what they physically do. Only when people take physical action can they in truth be defined as “motivated.
2. Motivation is not something we can do to anyone. We as leaders can only communicate. The people we want to motivate must motivate themselves. The motivatee and the motivator are always the same person.
3. Motivation is driven by emotion. In fact, the words emotion and motivation come from the same Latin root, meaning “to move.” When we want to move people, motivate people, to take action, we engage their emotions.
4. Motivation happens best when it is triggered by face-to-face speech.

We lead well only when the people we lead are leading well. Let’s throw out the old concept of leadership. That concept is based on the idea of “followership”

— successful leaders being the ones who got people to follow them. Baloney! Today, the speed and scope of change in the marketplace demand a new vision of leadership, leadership that can not only deal with that change but actually speed it up and make opportunities of it. That vision is this fourth proposition. How many times have we heard this seeming praise, “They’re such great leaders, they can’t be replaced!”

Within the terms of the new leadership dynamics, those “great, irreplaceable leaders” are in truth poor leaders that should be gotten rid of! If the leader’s function is to have others get results, then the best way is not simply to motivate them but to motivate them to lead others to get those results. When we challenge our leaders to truly lead, we change their world and ours. Only then are we leading well.

Those are the four propositions of the Unified Field Theory of Leadership Success. Einstein failed in his quest for a unified field theory; but the success or failure of this Theory of Leadership rests with you. Put it into action. Guided by its ideas, develop strategies, processes, and leadership skills.

When you do, I can’t promise that you will develop an e=mc2-like revelation, but you will start on the road to being a better leader. Because the four propositions do provide defining differences between leaders. Those differences are not as grand as the differences between gravity and electromagnetic fields, but they can help you do that very simple, down-to-earth thing that your career, that any career, rests on: lead.

Contact Information:
Brent Filson
Founder & President
The Filson Leadership Group, Inc.
413-458-4403
http://www.actionleadership.com/

Secrets Blocking Your Success

What is Genius?

by Dr. Tony Alessandra

What is Genius?

Paul MacCready is a writer and inventor who has carefully studied genius and the ways people understand that concept. MacCready has evolved several categories of what genius seems to mean, and these can be useful starting point for defining what genius really is.

In the first category is what Paul MacCready calls the “everyone agrees” geniuses. These people are the great icons of civilization, including Einstein, Leonardo daVinci, Shakespeare, and Michelangelo.

Is there anybody who believes Einstein wasn’t a genius? I don’t think so — so this category is for the geniuses who are elected by unanimous consent. These are many of the same people who were mentioned in my own informal research. We’ll have much more to say about them in this session and throughout the program. In fact, most of our models for the various genius categories will be drawn from this group.

MacReady’s second category is the officially designated geniuses. These are the people who have won Nobel Prizes or other highly respected awards. Whether or not we understand what they’ve accomplished, we think of them as geniuses based on their recognition by people who are supposed to know one when they see one.

A third category includes people who haven’t yet gained national or international prominence, but who have done something so remarkable that they seem to be in a different realm from ordinary mortals. Some of these are the prodigy young people I mentioned earlier in this session — students who have won national science contests or gotten perfect scores on standardized tests.

Often they’re not the best in the day to day conduct of school or business, but they have some special gift that eventually reveals itself. Quite often, these people are underachievers who struggle with Shyness and low self-esteem. Their surprising success is surprising only because they’ve deliberately tried to stay in the background.

I think you can see how each of these three categories seems quite Legitimate — but it’s the fourth one that’s really most important for this program. And you may be surprised to learn that the fourth category questions or even completely refutes the other three. Because the fourth category includes everybody.

It’s based on the idea that we all have the potential for achievements that are wrongly considered possible for only a few. And there’s plenty of evidence for this. After all, the physical and mental challenges of learning to walk and talk are more difficult than anything we face later in life — yet the vast majority of human beings meet these challenges successfully. True, it’s been argued that these primary skills are hardwired into our genetic makeup. But there are many things that the genetic argument can’t account for.

In the 17th and 18th centuries, for example, it was simply expected that every member of the educated class would be able to read and speak several different languages, write poetry, play a musical instrument, and know much of the Bible by heart. Furthermore, all these skills were performed at a very high level and at very early ages. In other words, thousands of people routinely displayed abilities that today would be considered truly amazing — and perhaps even evidence of genius.

But in those days what we call genius was just the fulfillment of society’s expectations. When we speak of everybody being a genius in this sense, it doesn’t mean everyone has to get 800s on their SATs or have an IQ of 150 or above. It doesn’t mean everybody can play the violin or create beautiful oil paintings. Those are other ways of looking at the concept of genius. But right now, let’s go back to the origin of the word itself.

A researcher by the name of Thomas Armstrong has done some excellent work on this. He points out that the word genius is closely related to the word genesis. It comes from Greek and Latin words meaning “beget,” “be born,” or ” come into being.” It’s also related to the word genial, meaning “festive” or “jovial.”

In the Middle East, the term has been linked to the word jinni, or genie, the magical power that lay dormant and hidden in Aladdin’s lamp until a secret method released it. Combining all these roots leads to a very powerful and beautiful definition of genius. It means “giving birth to your joy.” In this sense, genius is a word for an individual’s hidden potential. It also includes the process of discovering that potential and transforming it into action.

But the first step is belief. The first step is certainty that you have greater capabilities than you thought. Not only do you have those capabilities — you also have a responsibility to develop them and put them to use.

Dr. Tony Alessandra has authored 13 books, recorded over 50 audio and video programs, and delivered over 2,000 keynote speeches since 1976. The ideas in this article, and many others, are adapted from Dr. Alessandra’s book, The Sales Professional’s Idea-A-Day Guide (Dartnell). If you would like more information about Dr. Alessandra’s books, audio tapesets and video programs, or about Dr. Alessandra as a keynote speaker for your group, call (800) 222-4383 or visit his website at http://www.alessandra.com.

The Platinum Rule

Tony Alessandra. Grand Central Publishing 1998, Paperback, 304 pages, $4.49