12 JUNE 2013 5 key mindsets of great leaders by Walter Baets and Nosakhere Griffin-EL What aspiring entrepreneurs can learn from great leaders and game changers. What if your Twitter feed was busy only with the thoughts and conversations of the most influential and powerful people in the world? And if every single tweet only came to you in the moment you most needed it, how would that change your life? One often hears the saying: “surround yourself with successful people.” And this is good advice for leaders and entrepreneurs, because attitudes are contagious. If you had to spend time with Nelson Mandela you may begin to feel the courage he exemplifies. If Richard Branson were a close friend of yours you’d possibly become as adventurous as he. If Edward de Bono were a regular dinner guest you’d quickly start thinking about things more laterally, and become more creative at finding solutions to even the toughest problems. By unpacking the strength and practicality inherent in the mindsets of great men and women, their wisdom starts to emerge and it is a wisdom that entrepreneurs and leaders can learn from. While each of the great leaders, business pioneers and game changers of today and yester-year stand unique, taken together, they share five key mindsets: achievement excellence; courageous commitment; intellectual imagination; personal initiative; and a spirit of significance that, if emulated, can help shift aspiring entrepreneurs and leaders to the next level. 1. Achievement excellence The first of these five shared mindsets is achievement excellence, and people who embody this place emphasis on the importance of discipline, learning, passion, and planning. It is discipline that enables you to maintain control over tough situations, to be organised, detail-focused, goal-directed, and single-minded. Dr Mamphele Ramphele exudes discipline in her constant striving for a better, more inclusive South Africa and in her work to establish Agang, a new political party, even in the face of strong criticism and negativity. Ramphele is also an avid advocate of learning, saying to CBS anchor Charlie Rose recently at Newsweek’s Women in the World summit: “Know what you don’t know and don’t confuse not knowing with being stupid”. Knowing that you don’t know is the first step in learning. The ability to learn allows one to build knowledge and a comprehensive awareness, to grow expertise and find opportunities. When confronting tough times or situations it is passion that keeps you positively indignant, intolerant of sub-standard outcomes, motivated to improve, and yearning for the change you want to see. And there are obvious strengths in planning: improved ability to decide, mapping, and sequencing, strategising and writing clearly. Writing clearly and confidently is something personified by a man like George Orwell. 2. Courageous commitment The people who live by courageous commitment are determined, resilient, resourceful, and willing to take risks. Trevor Manuel has made some of the biggest decisions that affected the South African economy. It was his determination in this role that enabled him to make even the toughest choices and stick by them. Likewise, it was determination that gave paralympian swimmer Natalie du Toit the tenacity she needed to succeed in the face of disability. The resilience and fortitude of Abraham Lincoln changed an entire nation for the better in times of adversity. It is resourcefulness that allows you to remain patient while giving adequate attention to long-term goals, to stay focused on a particular task with discipline and resolve like inventor Nikola Tesla – inventing everything associated with radio and wireless transmission as well as designing the Alternating Current (AC) motor that replaced the Direct Current (DC) motor. 3. Intellectual imagination People like Hugh Masekela, with his ability to create beautiful music that inspires, or TV journalist Debora Patta, and her keen sense of reviewing and evaluating the facts, and Mark Zuckerberg with his ability to think big, embody intellectual imagination. Having the intellectual imagination mindset means trusting in the powers of creativity, evaluation, synthesis, and visioning, powers that allow you the space to find solutions in alternative ways: blending ideas, innovating, questioning, and thinking laterally. It allows you to make decisions, even if the information you have is incomplete, improves your ability to be discerning, make judgements, test, watch and review, and it allows you to spot gaps and opportunities harnessing intuition and visualisation to make things work. 4. Personal initiative Having personal initiative is an approach to life and business personified by Patrice Motsepe with his gift of persuasion and knack at closing the deal, but also his self-motivating attitude and proactive drive. To succeed as a leader and entrepreneur one needs to be action-driven: committed to the mission and to the highest possible standards, working hard to get on with the job. But success also requires that you persuade others to believe in your vision, motivating them to work hard to achieve it. Leaders also need be proactive, initiating ideas and seeing them through, remaining realistic in assessing situations and outcomes. To be confident while being proactive requires research: foraging for important information amidst the clutter; being open-minded and embracing different ideas, methods and opinions; spotting trends and scanning the horizon for emerging realities. 5. Spirit of significance The last of the mindsets, but not the least of them by any measure, is a spirit of significance. This contains the attitudes needed to adapt, connect, to stay healthy and grounded. Adapting is finding alternative solutions, being flexible, trying again and again even after failing, in fact learning from failure like Steve Jobs, refining and reworking until you have an unstoppable product or service. For anyone in a leadership position, leadership is nothing without other people. In the same way, entrepreneurs have little reason for doing business if not to somehow serve others. Connecting is the art of inspiring and enthusing others – Barack Obama pulsates with this attitude in his mobilisation of a nation, negotiating with people, networking with them, teaming up with them, following up on loyal supporters and staying people-oriented. To be able to do this however requires energy, calm, self-control, humility, all traits of the Dalai Lama – and the world loves him for it and many follow his example. These five mindsets are so important and so pervasive and powerful they cannot be learned in any classroom setting, or through reading. They can only be actualised through focused seeking, deep questioning, and critical thinking. These days, people hardly have the time for introspection and reflection, for focusing on developing themselves, not only as leaders and successful entrepreneurs, but as exceptional human beings. A small step in this direction may be to immerse yourself in the attitudes that have propelled those who have walked the path already – and distinguished themselves in the process. Everything flows from a source, and the question therefore is: “If the source is not strengthened, will the river make it to the sea?” The five mindsets form the basis of the introductory module to the UCT Graduate School of Business free online learning platform – Free-for-All - designed to empower and equip entrepreneurs across Africa with the basics of business and mindsets to create and grow exceptional businesses. Dr Nosakhere Griffin-EL is the Programme Manager of Free-for-All and lecturer at the GSB. Prof Walter Baets is the Director of the UCT Graduate School of Business and lead developer of Free-for-All.
Posted on: Thu, 20 Jun 2013 05:29:18 +0000
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