As you know, one of my favorite questions for leaders is, “Does it matters who’s sitting in the chair?”

The question helps tease out how well a leader knows who is on the team and what each person brings to the table.

Most leaders look to their organizational charts and each specific job description to describe the make-up of their team. But such a view is only half the picture.

Less than half the picture actually.

How would you evaluate an employee who understood less than half of the issues related to their job? Who didn’t have an in depth knowledge of their firm’s assets?

Negligent? Incompetent? A failure?

Sadly, many leaders not only don’t know who is on their team, but boast of the fact. They call such intentional blindness “maintaining objectivity” and “staying focused on the bottom line.”

It is, in fact, negligence. The most astounding failure in modern business history.

These leaders are making decisions of huge significance without an awareness of the specific talents, skills, styles and passions each unique person brings to the enterprise. They are flying with blinders on. They are only looking at part of the information.

What would you think of an airline pilot who ignored the instrument panel and relied on being able to see out the window? On a clear day, maybe. But not all days are clear, are they?

What would you think of a repair person who did not know what tools were in his or her tool chest? Are you really paying them by the hour to take multiple stabs in the dark until they happen upon the tool that does the job?

How would you describe an artist who merely paints by number? Not creative, that’s for sure. At this tumultous juncture in business history we more than ever need leaders who have the creative vision to imagine work differently. Yet all we promote are MBA’s who are trying to paint by number. Apply the latest formula that worked in one case where it doesn’t quite fit in every other case.

It’s time for change. It’s time for boards and shareholders to remove management that stays willfully ignorant of their most dynamic assets. The very assets who possess the creativity, energy, learning, competencies, values, resources, and potential for making or breaking your company.

These people are not our adversaries. These people are not merely expenses to be kept a minimum. These people are not merely additional arms and legs for ourselves to accomplish more.

If you can honestly see no alternative to these three perspectives, then please do us all a favor and resign today. You are flying blind. You are groping through the tool chest. You are painting by numbers.

Instead of merely quitting, though, as you walk through the office today ask yourself how well you know who’s in each chair.

The knowledge will transform your ability to lead.

On your side,

- Karl

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 2nd, 2009 at 9:31 am and is filed under Musings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.