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Leadership Lessons For SBO Managers

By on Oct 8, 2009 in Issue of the Week

Leadership Lessons For SBO Managers
Leadership, Like Class, is Hard to Define, But Easy to Spot!
The Issue:  Not all of the SBO stalwarts we write for and about on Freestyle Entrepreneur are lone guns struggling to build their businesses from a spare bedroom. Some of you lurch uncontrollably into conspicuous success, and find yourselves with actual employees! And good for you! But with employees comes a brand new responsibility: Management!
What I Think: Managers get results by setting goals and working with and through people to achieve them, But if running a business takes management skills, creating a vision of success and getting people excited about attaining it takes leadership. That means, the better leader you are the more successful manager (and SBO) you’ll be.
Leadership Makes Businesses Work
Happily, most leaders are made, not born. They are cultivated, shaped and strengthened by education, training and real-world experience. Understanding leadership AND management is a good way of becoming more proficient at both.
What is leadership? What does it take to be a leader? Here’s a short course:
· Leadership means having a mission and inspiring others to be committed to it. The mission is everything; leaders approach it with enthusiasm. From it flows a business’ strategy and tactics
· Leaders are agents of change; they make decisions based on a vision of the future, not just on an established direction.
· Leaders take risks to make things happen that would not otherwise happen.
· Leaders need a combination of competence, integrity, credibility and authority. They’re seen as being involved in a lot of things and able to answer a lot of questions.
Leadership, in short, is a collaborative, not individual, process. It’s the ability to get people to do what you want them to because they want to do it! That especially goes for SBOs who employ family members, or who come to regard employees as family. For the sake of the business, those close relationships are best kept separate from that of employer/employee.
Why? Because leadership often begins when people disagree. Leaders recognize that performance and progress are forged on the anvil of constructive conflict. That means leaders are willing to be unloved! In the words of Admiral John S. McCain (the late father of the Senator): “People may not love you for being strong when you have to be, but they will respect you for it and learn to behave themselves when you do.”  Try it; it works!
Bill Willard is a freelance writer in Clearwater FL. He has been a high-impact writer and editor for over 30 years. In addition to his byline pieces, Bill’s beat includes ghostwriting and editing for businesses of all types and sizes, professional practitioners and individuals, and is a www.thefreestyleentrepreneur.com Contributing Author. Visit his Website: www.writergazette.com/WillardAssociates.shtml
Or contact him at billw15@tampabay.rr.com.
Leadership, Like Class, is Hard to Define, But Easy to Spot!
The Issue: Not all of the SBO stalwarts we write for and about on Freestyle Entrepreneur are lone guns struggling to build their businesses from a spare bedroom. Some of you punch your way through to conspicuous success, and find yourselves with actual employees! And good for you! But with employees comes a brand new responsibility: Management!
What I Think: Managers get results by setting goals and working with and through people to achieve them, But if running a business takes management skills, creating a vision of success and getting people excited about attaining it takes leadership. That means, the better leader you are the more successful manager (and SBO) you’ll be.
Leadership Makes Businesses Work
Happily, most leaders are made, not born. They are cultivated, shaped and strengthened by education, training and real-world experience. Understanding leadership AND management is a good way of becoming more proficient at both.
What is leadership? What does it take to be a leader? Here’s a short course:
  • Leadership means having a mission and inspiring others to be committed to it. The mission is everything; leaders approach it with enthusiasm. From it flows a business’ strategy and tactics
  • Leaders are agents of change; they make decisions based on a vision of the future, not just on an established direction.
  • Leaders take risks to make things happen that would not otherwise happen.
  • Leaders need a combination of competence, integrity, credibility and authority. They’re seen as being involved in a lot of things and able to answer a lot of question
  • Leadership, in short, is a collaborative, not individual, process. It’s the ability to get people to do what you want them to because they want to do it! That especially goes for SBOs who employ family members, or who come to regard employees as family. For the sake of the business, those close relationships are best kept separate from that of employer/employee.
Why? Because leadership often begins when people disagree. Leaders recognize that performance and progress are forged on the anvil of constructive conflict. That means leaders are willing to be unloved! In the words of Admiral John S. McCain (the late father of the Senator): “People may not love you for being strong when you have to be, but they will respect you for it and learn to behave themselves when you do.” Try it! It works!
Bill Willard is a freelance writer in Clearwater FL. He has been a high-impact writer and editor for over 30 years. In addition to his byline pieces, Bill’s beat includes ghostwriting and editing for businesses of all types and sizes, professional practitioners and individuals, and is a www.thefreestyleentrepreneur.com Contributing Author. Visit his Website: www.writergazette.com/WillardAssociates.shtml
Or contact him at billw15@tampabay.rr.com.

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