Some really good coments over on Scoble’s post about leadership.  I’ve never been a big fan of the term management, I prefer leadership.  Managers have subordinates, leaders have followers. In one of the comments Jeff Erwin recommends Patrick M. Lencioni’s books on leadership. 

He writes:

“My best advice is to go purchase all five books written by Patrick M. Lencioni and read them each twice. This will take you about one day to do, they are fast reads and very interesting.

Follow the books to the letter.”

1. Listen, do not pontificate. You are not necessarily the smartest person in the room.

2. Remember that when you render your opinion in a meeting as the ‘manager’, you are dictating. This will lead to many wrong decisions as your team blindly follows in an attempt to make you happy.

3. Learn to ask questions, not render opinions.

Awesome advice.

Robert has said some pretty kind things about me lately on his blog, I’m not sure if they are all deserved but they are nice to hear.  To be truthful, I still have plenty to learn about leading team even though I’ve been doing it for quite sometime. 

I like to think of it as practicing leadership though as opposed to being a leader.  Similar to how a physicians say they practice medicine leaders practice leadership. The climate, conditions, people and environment are constantly changing. So leaders need to be continuously learning and changing themselves.

I’ll be picking up Lencioni’s library next time I’m at Borders.  Thanks Jeff.