Help Your Front Line Leaders Move Beyond Snoopervision Toward High Impact Leadership

Develop High Impact Leaders

The level of engagement below is determined by the level of engagement above.

“Often, organizations focus only on the value of developing new leaders and neglect the development of seasoned leaders. A few will take their thinking to the next level and continue to invest in seasoned leaders. Organizations that invest in both new leadership and seasoned leaders will clearly create the most competitive workforce.” ~ Dee Ann Turner, Chick-fil-A? VP Talent (Ret.)

As you develop individuals and help them become high impact team players, you’re actually beginning to fill your leadership pipeline. That’s why I say personal development is the foundation for leadership development. You shouldn’t expect someone to be able to lead others well until they’ve proven they can lead themselves well. However, in many organizations, there’s little, if any, focus on leadership development at any level.

Most often in blue-collar industries, someone who demonstrates their ability to do a job well is the one promoted into a leadership position. Then, the vast majority of them struggle at leading others well. Most can manage their team, but few can lead their team.

Often, the people who have the courage to step up when asked end up being bashed and blamed by their boss when they struggle. A boss who likely hasn’t had any leadership development.

The lack of leadership development above always leads to frustrations below.

The best leaders were always the best followers first.

Blue-Collar Leadership: Leading from the Front Lines and Blue-Collar Leadership & Teamwork: 30 Traits of High Impact Players will help team members at every level learn how to follow well as they learn how get exceptional results by leading themselves well. Those who are the best at leading themselves well will also be best at modeling and teaching others to do the same.

You will no longer have to search for good people because you’ll be developing great people. Your challenge will not be finding the next person on your team to promote when a leadership position needs to be filled. It will be deciding who deserves it most.

High performance teams have leader-follower relationships instead of boss-worker relationships.

My personal friend and mentor, Jimmy Collins, Chick-fil-A? President/COO (Ret.) had this to say about the boss-worker relationship, “We must clearly understand the difference between the role of a worker and the role of a follower. A worker is someone who does a job. A worker is not a follower, although a worker could potentially become a follower. A worker works for a boss. A boss is the person with positional authority over workers. Being a boss has nothing to do with how well or how poorly a person does his or her job. All the word boss signifies is the person who oversees the activities of the workers.”

Note: You can listen to a 3 part interview I conducted with Jimmy Collins at his home in 2019 on my Blue-Collar Leadership Podcast. Episodes 119, 121, and 123.

The boss-worker relationship is the most common throughout blue-collar industries. In Jimmy’s example, I refer to the boss as a manager of people. There is no leadership. There is only snoopervision and directing.

Bosses don’t take responsibility for how their workers are performing. Instead, they blame them.

Workers work for a boss because they feel they have to. Followers work with a leader because they want to.

Research has shown that followers are 40% more productive on average than workers.

High impact individuals on your front line, who have been developed and are leading themselves well, expect and deserve to be led well. It’s the top leader's responsibility to ensure they have leaders worth following at every level. The #1 reason people quit is the relationship with their boss. Leaders are responsible for turnover and retention.

My book, Blue-Collar Leadership? & Supervision: Unleash Your Team’s Potential, is a foundational resource for you to use as you begin developing your formal authority leaders. It serves as an introduction to high impact leadership and will help them attract more followers, improve morale, gain buy-in, and maximize productivity. All formal leaders at every level need to learn and apply the principles they’ll discover in it. It’s the starting point, for developing the habits of high impact leaders who consistently deliver results with and through others.

You should also introduce Blue-Collar Leadership & Supervision to those in entry-level positions who show potential as you begin to prepare them for their first formal leadership role. Consider inviting them to development sessions with the formal leaders too.

“Whether in the military or a civilian organization, the culture of the first organization a young person joins has tremendous impact. And, his or her first immediate supervisor significantly shapes that person’s understanding of the organization and the role of supervisors and managers.” ~ Colonel Tom Connally, USMC (Ret.)

“My first words are, GET SIGNED UP! This training is not, and I stress, not your everyday leadership seminar! I have never been a part of anything like it. After 30 years in technology and two years in Concrete Construction, I have attended dozens and sent hundreds to the so-called ‘Leadership-Training.’ I can tell you that while all of the courses, classes, webinars, and seminars, had good intentions, nothing can touch what Mack and Ria Story provide. I just wish I had it 20 years ago…I could go on-and-on…100% of the team that attended said that they were ‘blown-away, they did not see that conviction and passion coming.’ Many thanks, Mack and Ria!” ~ Sam M. VP, COO

About Blue-Collar Leadership...

Blue-Collar Leadership? provides leaders with a platform for training and developing their workforce to unleash their potential by taking powerful leadership concepts and packaging them in easy to understand and apply resources. Founded by Mack Story, Blue-Collar Leadership? is uniquely designed content specifically created to engage and develop the front line workforce, those who lead them, and those who support them.

We understand your biggest frustration as a leader is likely disengaged team members. We specialize in helping leaders engage the front line to improve the bottom line.

Mack Story has logged over 11,000 hours leading leaders and their teams through organizational change. He is the author of the extremely popular Blue-Collar Leadership? Series books.

Ria Story is an author, TEDx speaker, and expert in leadership and life skills for women. Ria has nearly 20 years of experience in leadership and management. 

Mack and Ria are certified leadership speakers and trainers and have published 23 leadership development and personal growth books. 

Highlights for them have been:

• Helping train 20,000 Guatemalan Leaders with John Maxwell
• Speaking at Yale University about Blue-Collar Leadership: Innovation in Talent Development
• Offering leadership development support for the U.S. Military, Chick-fil-A, Auburn University, Chevron, and many other organizations

Are you in the USA? We will come to you! Checkout our "2020 Special Offer" below.

If you're willing to invest in your team, we are too. What do we mean?

What we will do…

We’ll provide 200 (any combination) of our six Blue-Collar Leadership? Series books to you at NO COST. WE’LL PAY ALL OF OUR EXPENSES to travel anywhere in the USA to conduct up to 2 hours of on site leadership development training or speaking for any size group at any level.

What you must do…

Invest in your team. Take advantage of our “Special Offer” reduced speaking fee of ONLY $3,600, which happens to be the exact cost of the 200 books. Distribute the 200 books to your blue-collar workforce, those who lead them, and those who support them. Note: Our speaking fees normally range from $5,000-$20,000 in the USA.

Call Mack Story at 334-728-4143 and make it happen!