My Analogy

[mr_will]

This is a half story half analogy; in the end you will see how it relates to the story at the end.
So here we stand, looking back on what used to be and looking forward for what might be. My life has been through a lot of changes through out the years, some good, some not so good. I learned from my mistakes and changed what needed changed. Over the years I have been in a few leadership positions. Over time you realize some things and this is one of those things.

Well anyway, lets move on to my story. I have always been a huge fan of go fast things, meaning cars, trucks, motorcycles or anything else that has wheels, floats or flies; so we will use that as the analogy

Lets take 100 people all of these people love to go fast and are always wanting to go faster. Lets put these 100 people in go-carts with a goal of 125mph. The first trip out they get up to about 75 mph and 50 of them will flat out piss themselves and want off right then. The ones that got off, these are the followers in life. They want to lead but they can’t because they will always need someone over them to show them the way of life.

We take the other 50 this time and they get up to 100mph. Now another 25 ask to get off, the other 25 of those people say they really want to hit the 125mph goal. Now we take those 25 people left and take them to 100mph and it almost crashes, 15 more ask to get off.
Now some would say these 15 people that got off were pretty determined. That is not entirely true, I say these are the ones that don’t truly know the consequences of their doings just yet. These are the people that will do anything to get a management position. Once they get it they don’t know how to run the business because they don’t realize the impact of their decisions.

Now we take the 10 that wanted to continue for a serious run of our goal of 125mph. On their way to the goal but at 115mph they wreck and roll the cart. Now they are safe because this is an analogy and plus they were using the correct protective gear and the cart is caged, but they still got some scrapes, bruises and overall they got pretty banged up. There are 8 people that gave up after the crash. These people make good sells managers but not leaders. They know consequences of not having a perfectly tuned team to do the job at hand, and they will do anything to keep from failing. These managers usually are up tight and sometimes have a high turn over rate on their teams.

The 2 of them that come back, they went to work figuring what the cart needed to reach the 125mph goal. They spoke with experts on site to help them. With the knowledge gained and a big trial and error process they went to work on their go-cart adjusting suspension and altering the go-cart to handle the higher speed. These 2 people continued to ride again and again and finally made the 125mph goal. These 2 guys did not give up after falling or failing at some point, they kept at it determined to meet their goals. They continued to push the edge a little bit at a time at everything they did from racing to becoming the best project leaders at their jobs. These two people are not naturals at what they were doing. They got there because they had a striving talent many people do not have. It’s called dedication, the dedication to succeed. That is what makes someone seem like a natural leader because with dedication comes heart, if you have the heart and dedication to do something you will accomplish it. You have to keep trying until you get what you are after. You cannot train a good leader because its part of their life, you can only mold them into better leaders by pushing them harder and giving them challenges they haven’t faced yet in life.
So the moral of the story is there are a lot of people capable of being managers, but only about 2% of them are capable of being true leaders. Leaders produce the information that is needed to meet a goal. A manager is only a dissemination point for this information.
So the question is; do you have the heart and determination of a leader?


Mr. Will

[SigsRule]

A real leader wouldn't have left 98 of them behind.

[mr_will]

A real leader wouldn't have left 98 of them behind.

thats a Ranger not a leader

good point but its my story

[Great-Kazoo]

after the 1st crash delegating the work load to make it safe @ any speed would have weeded the weak ones from the herd.
a leader would have taken charge and not wasted time and effort dicking around seeing who would stay or go when it got tough.

i tackle the task at hand w/out waiting for others to decide if they're along for the ride.
waste time and money.

[mr_will]

good point and i agree with that actually

its rough and was written as an analogy from stuff i have seen and observed. thats all.

[Great-Kazoo]

good point and i agree with that actually

its rough and was written as an analogy from stuff i have seen and observed. thats all.

sounds like you work for the state too!.
more dead wook jerking off because they passed their proby period w/out a fuckup.
the level of mental masturbation with any gov system is enough to have me look in the private sector again. However the bennies are worth the job bs.
and even though there's dead wood some supervisors actually appreciate a good work ethic.... we'll see.

[BadShot]

No No No .. the leader is the one who said .. "Hey, who wants to ride a go-cart at 125MPH?" and then gave them the means and opportunity to succeed or fail and didn't stop them from doing either, then encouraged and mentored the successful at each level.

[mightymouse]

Well, the original, went something like thus:

Of every one hundred men, ten shouldn’t even be there; Eighty are nothing but targets;
Nine are real fighters….We are lucky to have them….They make the battle.
Ah; but one; one of them is a Warrior….And he will bring the others back.”
Heraclitus (Circa 500 B.C.)

[Mtn.man]

well,,, I been 200+mph..

[mr_will]

Hrrrmmm

In most business situations, imo, the leader needs at least some experience in every task they relegate (and a leader must do at least some of these tasks themselves, occasionally) and a leader must have at least half a brain handy - which, by my calculations, leaves more than 95% of the population ineligible. The main reason for this, is the leader that knows how everything should be done, will know who needs praise and who needs canned. This does not mean they have to micro-manage, but any leader that is clueless of the tasks assigned to his underlings will never have any concept of where the go-cart is even driving - its like pedal to the metal ignoring that your missing the steering wheel.

In terms of virtues, you illustrated determination and loyalty - there is far more to leadership than determination and loyalty alone. Having the ability and experience to know in advance that, for instance, the suspension needed upgraded would have saved the entire operation from a potential liability would be a very desirable virtue.

Some of the best leaders are the ones that know the in's and out's of their teams ability and doesn't micro-manage them.
Also, one of the overlooked traits of a leader - someone that can read a person like a book, and will have a damn good idea how someone will help the team before they even sign them on, and not hesitate to remove anyone that isn't helping - a leader is dependant on his team after all, and five of the best are worth two hundred of the worst. Having a good idea which people fall into each category will make or break something like nothing else.

you are exactly right. My analogy isnt everything it was just something i put on paper at 2 am because I was bored. I write a lot when im bored. When it is finished it will be refined and tweaked. I like different opinions thats why i posted it.
I 100% completely agree about micro managers, that is one of my pet peeves. I don't like it. If you have to micromanage a team to make them run right, get a new team.
when I get motivated and finish it i will post it again it will be broken down.