Leadership Provides the Blood to the Lifeblood.
If you think you are a leader look behind you and make sure you have someone following. If no one is following then you are not a leader. Too many who earn their way to higher positions within their company think that automatically makes them a leader. This couldn't be further from the truth.
Your people are your lifeblood and leadership administers the transfusions. Meaning, leadership is continually pouring information, appreciation, demonstrations, encouragement, and opportunities into their people. An organization that lacks good leadership lacks a blood supply sufficient to sustain the lifeblood of the organization. If the blood supply is too low your tissues (a group or a team of people functioning together as a unit) or organs (tools and resources needed to accomplish the goals) may not get enough oxygen (Leaders reproducing themselves helping people grow, reproduce, and turn the intentional efforts into more horsepower). The lack of good leadership will produce symptoms similar to that as anemia, fatigue and shortness of breath. This leads to a lack of energy, effort, morale, tools/resources, and horsepower needed for a company to perform at higher levels.
When someone is elected to a government position like a state representative, mayor, congressmen, or president they become a leader because of the position they hold. Meaning, we start out following them only because we have to. No one becomes a leader because another person is compelled to follow by law to obey or else. That is a dictator. You become a leader when someone by their own free-will chooses to follow. Leaders are made during their process of serving and adding value to others.
To become an even greater leader to help move your company forward you must begin by forming, serving, and developing teams for the purposes of advancing and moving them and the company forward. Moving forward means together accomplishing the goals, meeting objectives, accomplishing the vision and mission while following the core values set by those who lead.
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The next step in the development of a leader is to create and develop more leaders within your organization. This must be done with intentionality and purpose. People who have benefitted from the intentional efforts of a leader tend to follow those leaders and get others to do so. The leader and follower together will increase the companies horsepower not because they are asking people to do more with less but because each person realizes how much more untapped power exists inside of themselves and each other.
Increasing company horsepower is like the the miracle of compound interest. When you save or invest, your money earns interest or appreciates. The next year, you earn interest on your original money and the interest from the first year. In the third year, you earn interest on your original money and the interest from the first two years. And so on. It's like a snowball -- roll it down a snowy hill and it'll build on itself to get bigger and bigger. Before you know it avalanche! This is how growing horsepower within your workforce works too! But too earn this kind of interest or gain this kind of horsepower you have to begin to invest and never stop.
Too many people in the workplace when the workload seems to be growing want to grow the workforce rather than the horsepower. These are not leaders. They are usually managers. But you, as a leader must be wiser than that. At times of course you may need to hire people. But don't neglect investing in people to draw out the potential and to pour in the interest.
Just like your bodies need oxygen for your tissues and organs to be healthy and thrive so does your workforce need leaders who provide daily transfusions of leadership to create a culture where everyone will be better. Become the leader your people are longing for.