Lead

12

LEARN

“I HAVE not failed 10,000 times. I have successfully found 10,000 ways that will not work.”

THOMAS EDISON

THE TWELFTH ABSOLUTE FOR LEADERS:

Business professor and management guru Gary Hamel says that the most driving question for today's leaders is, “Are you learning as fast as the world is changing?” I've got a ready answer: No. No matter how smart you are, how adaptable, how agile-minded, how keen, you're still only one person who can absorb and process only so much. The only thing that intellectual or experiential bona fides really earn you today is an opportunity to play the game. But to win, you can't cling to the past, not for a minute; that's a dead end.

It's not failure, it's called learning.

Here's your salvation: You're not a leader because of what you know. You're a leader because you have the wisdom to acknowledge what you don't know, and find answers in your most valuable resource—people. In other words, you are always and forever ready to learn from the very people you're charged to lead. The most successful leaders tap the collective intelligence of their entire organizations and co-commit them to the kind of constant reinvention through learning that translates into improving their businesses each and every day.

In Practical Radical, William Taylor shares ...