Be a winner in 2012.

Why Mubarak Fell: Lessons From Leaders

February 11th was a historic day for Egyptians and indeed the continent of Africa. As the numerous news agencies look back over the regime under Mubarak, I am particularly interested in 3 key leadership mistakes Mubarak made, that you may be making also!

Secret Police

President Mubarak’s right hand man, VP Omar Suleiman, was the head of Egypt’s fearsome secret police. Mubarak could effectively ‘quell’ dissidents silently using the secret forces’ violent tactics. While these were feared by the public, they did as he commanded, but not willingly.

As a leader, we all wish that certain problems could go away, including dissenting views if we firmly believe that they are holding an organisation back from achieving its potential. But an idea’s strongest dissident could also become its strongest and more effective proponent if you manage to convert their view. Using sly, underhanded or back-room tactics to ‘eliminate’ their resistance will never achieve this. Example of such strategies include changing employee job roles to ‘rotate’ them out of the conflict zone, dropping people from committees and suggesting that their career may be harmed by pursuing such views.

Stubborness in the face of popular ideology

Egypt’s leader of 30 years has been credited with some achievements, and cited for some terrible breaches of human rights, but when the end came and the people spoke, one man simply said ‘no’ to the thousands waiting in Tahrir Square. Being denied the opportunity to participate in the running of their country, through proper elections, consultations and the sort, drove the Egyptian people into a fury that didn’t diminish until he eventually slipped out of the back door.

As a leader, we may often be faced with difficult, even unpopular decisions. However to stand in the way of an almost unanimously supported idea from your employees is worst practise, and should be a red flag. Are these employees all wrong… or have you actually made a tragic misjudgement? An employee rebellion isn’t just a riot for riots sake, see it as a giant check and balance in the process to ensure management don’t make mistakes on a grand scale.

Perceived Corruption

In his first speech as president, Mubarak pledged “‘not to commit myself to what I cannot implement, hide the truth from the people, or be lenient with corruption and disorder.” A welcome promise, but by the end of Mubarak’s reign, his family fortune was estimated at around $5bn. The fact that the Egyptian president and his sons profited from his power during the past 20 years is clear.

In modern business, employees hate corruption. It destroys trust and an employee’s pride and loyalty to a company. People want to think of their workplace as a set of values, a valuable service, a ‘thriving business’. They don’t want to see it as a cash generation tool for senior management and ownership. When you consider the real shape of an employee pyramid, with shop floor workers at the bottom, and senior management at the top – you are reminded that the sheer volume of subordinates that will be in opposition to corruption vastly outnumbers the minority at the top facilitating such activities.

MeetTheBoss.tv Exposed (Review)

While the likes of Youtube and Vimeo have been struggling to attract professional content onto their networks, other websites have been busy creating their own, in an attempt to attract senior managers and executives to be users of their content instead. One such example is MeetTheBoss.tv, which in the last year has grown to an impressive 200,000 registered users. In this article, we will give our opinion on this upstart and recommend whether or not it is worth checking out.

Price/Subscription Costs

A quick look on their website should give a hint at the price tag associated with access to this content. I found a polished and attractive design, Web 2.0 colour scheme and oodles of premium videos. I also couldn’t watch more than teasers of videos without registering. This all suggested that this website could be charging upwards of $20 per month for full access to its content. However I was traitored by my first impression, as I have been in talks with the owners of MeetTheBoss.tv, and they have provided me with a signup link that will allow my site visitors to create a full-access & permanent account for FREE!

http://www.meettheboss.tv/Register/?promotioncode=LEEX01

Slightly taken aback at this promotion, I analysed the site more thoroughly. There are clearly visable advertisements in the right sidebar, however I don’t find these detract from the user experience, and they appear to be useful to the average manager. Perhaps MeetTheBoss.tv could survive without membership fees.

Content

This is where I believe MeetTheBoss.tv has it’s greatest strength. The shear quality and consistency of the videos, to be quite frank, blew me away. Most content is shot and viewable in High Definition, and the sound is sharper than any web video content I see on other websites.

The calibre of the speakers and interviewees on the videos is self-evident. As I glance across the homepage, several high profile executives catch my eye, including Patrick Doyle (CEO of Domino’s Pizza), Scott Thompson (President of PayPal) and Steve Odland (CEO of Office Depot) to name but a few. The thought of being able to gain HR insights from the head of people at a giant corporation such as McDonalds is one that excites me.

Usability

There are a few features of the website that show me that the designers at MeetTheBoss.tv really had busy executives in mind. One such feature is the ‘skip-to’ chapter feature. MeetTheBoss.tv videos are often between 10-20 minutes long, and like many YouTube videos, sometimes only a specific segment really interests us. In MeetTheBoss.tv videos, handy chapter captions hover below the streaming video, allowing you to skip to the key information at any time. This allows you to extract only the vital information without hassle.

Conclusion

I think that by this point, the conclusion is clear. MeetTheBoss.tv is a well-designed website, offering high quality and empowering video content for absolutely no fees! These facts alone have secured it’s place as my favourite leadership video source on the internet so far. Remember, you can create your own full-access account in 30 seconds using the link/promotional code that I have received from the site administrators:

http://www.meettheboss.tv/Register/?promotioncode=LEEX01

Feel free to share this link with friends, collegues, students or whoever you think may find this resource useful! It will provide any visitor a free-for-lifetime full-access account. Why not check it out?

How To Build A Responsibility-Driven Culture

By Emmett C. Murphy, Written for Leadership Expert.

In 2003 Lego lost $238 million due to overly complex designs, failed forays into new markets, and costly licensing ventures.  In 2004 they took previously untried steps to restore integrity and profits.  Lego engaged a group of devoted fans to help them redesign a lagging product—Mindstorms, the company’s customizable robotics kit.  This move broke with the creative team’s history of privacy and exclusiveness.  The “Mindstorms User Panel” wanted to be paid in Lego blocks.  They purchased their own tickets to Denmark for meetings.  They routinely replied to single-line queries from the company with multi-page emails.  They enabled the creation of wildly new and unconventional robots, such as toilet scrubber robots and bulldog robots.  After experiencing the pitfalls of insularity, Lego’s decision to partner with the customer was an act of humility.  It was also an act of responsibility.  Leaders who admit they have a lot to learn, that they make mistakes, and that they can’t run the company alone earn respect and engender responsible attitudes in others.  Three key practices of good leadership stem from humility—and inspire responsibility.

Partner with the Customer—Achieve a Shared Vision

Before Lego partnered with its customers, it was at risk of alienating them. Users had begun losing interest in products they considered too complex.  Leaders who do not believe in the partnership model often act out a predatory model, subordinating the customer’s interests; Lego was heading in that direction.  Instead Lego executives traveled to the world outside the organization to guide the customer to the center of organizational life.  This act overtly recognized the organization’s dependence on the outside world and helped build a stronger ethical relationship between customer and organization.  By “traveling outside” to gain new knowledge, Lego executives created a dynamic organizational model that embraced the “constant” of change and the need for continual adaptation.  By working in close back-and-forth contact with their customers, the leaders at Lego also found that partnering with customers meant achieving a consensus.  Rather than compromising or seeking to win, the customer-partner model describes a synergy that comes from achieving a shared vision.

Connect with the Frontlines—Learn From Those Who Know

Leaders who act with humility aim to achieve a shared vision with everyone in the organization.  They want to understand the perspectives of those at the frontlines and adapt to accommodate those perspectives.  Recently Brian Dunn, the chief executive of Best Buy, expressed his faith in following the frontlines—he had been a frontliner himself once.  As a teenager working at a grocery store he had interacted with customers on a daily basis.  His manager regularly asked him what he thought of new policies—for example, the store’s policy of having customers load their own groceries.  “I know it seems simple,” Dunn said in a recent interview with The New York Times, “but just that notion of learning from people who are actually doing the work, and the encouragement he gave me to tell him exactly what I thought really stayed with me.”  Leaders motivated by fear or arrogance remain aloof, removed from their employees.  Those motivated by humility remain physically present and personally connected; they fear ignorance more than they fear confronting mistakes or problems.  Humility drives responsibility:  when leaders focus on customer needs, they train others at the frontlines and elsewhere to move beyond self-interest too.

Understand Work Roles—Don’t Place Blame

Strong leaders respect the careers of others as much as they respect their own. Rather than assuming they know what’s going on in the workplace, leaders driven by humility make a practice of asking questions to understand what others do and what they need.  They practice active listening and seek out quiet environments to interact with others without distractions.  They empathize with their associates and ultimately empower them by reinforcing strengths and resources.  When problems arise, worksheets and scripts can help a leader chart an individual’s work life in a pragmatic and open-minded way.  The work-life map then serves as a tool for learning what changes need to be made.  When a leader finds misalignment in an individual’s work-life map, he or she practices humility by avoiding blame.  The goal of assessments is to transform problems into opportunities and to encourage others to take responsibility for their work, not to engage in a blaming game.

The most responsible leaders don’t let pride get in the way of progress.  They seek a purpose for leadership beyond self-interest, which helps them create partnerships—with customers, frontliners, and associates.  You might say that when Lego solicited its staunchest fans to help with product development, it pioneered one of its best designs yet.

Emmett Murphy, Ph.D., is Founder and President of Murphy Leadership (www.murphyleadership.com), a global leadership consultancy.  Murphy is the author of several books including Talent IQ.   He is currently at work on his new book, Entrepreneurial IQ.