Entirely too many leaders refuse to lead. The evidence? They refuse to sequence priorities and share the reasoning of that sequence with all employees to use in making decisions. If leaders don’t make the hard decisions, they abdicate them to those with less information and vision.
Afraid if you sequence them the lower ones won’t get done? Well, there’s nothing wrong with that. You’ve just identified too many priorities for the organization’s capacity. Wouldn’t a good leadership team rather see Priority One completed and Priority moving along the path, than to see none of them completed?
You want an aligned organization? How will you ever obtain that if the leadership team isn’t aligned? If you provide sequenced priorities and explain the reasoning behind them, your team can make aligned and higher quality decisions day in and day out.
Yes, the leader who “owns” the lowest priority may not get what he wants when he wants it, but the most important priorities for the future of the business will be satisfied.
Leverage one set of sequenced priorities by (1) gaining leadership team commitment and alignment on them, (2) sharing those with the entire team, and (3) do not change them every time the phone rings!
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