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Leadership Is About Empowering Others To Lead

ID: 50V101231002311715 Leadership is no longer about following others or having power over others. William George explains why true leadership comes from encouraging others to take the lead, regardless of their position in the organization.

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Jan 19, 2008

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When I was a young person, I used to read books on great leaders, and I developed this philosophy of trying to be one of those great leaders. We thought in those days that leadership was following the great man over the hill --most of them were men, coming out of two World Wars and a depression-- people like General George Patton, in spite of all their flaws and negative characteristics. I think we finally realized in the 21st century that leadership is not about following someone else. It's not about having power over other people. It's about empowering people to step up and lead. Everyone says, 'Where have all the leaders gone?' That's because they're looking for the perfect leader. There are no perfect leaders. Certainly, I was anything but perfect. But what they do have is leaders who empower other people. You look at the great leaders in business today. (For example, CEO of Avon Products) Andrea Jung, who has 5.5 million people working for her; she's incredibly empowering. Anne Mulcahy of Xerox. Jeff Immelt at GE. Sam Palmisano at IBM. A.G. Lafley at Procter & Gamble. These kinds of leaders realize they need thousands, maybe tens of thousands of leaders inside their own companies, and they empower people to step up and take the lead. And that's how they get much more out of people, get them to be much more creative, much more committed. Because when you're empowered, you're committed. When I first went to Medtronic, I was talking about empowerment a lot. And people said, 'It's not very empowering when you ask us all these tough questions.' I said, 'It's really those tough questions that are allowing us to perform....