Introduction to Launching a Leadership Revolution

This is found in the book Launching a Leadership Revolution by Chris Brady and Orrin Woodward.  It is the introduction.  I loved it and wanted to share with everyone.


"Just before the Great Depression a man named Ira Yates sold his profitable business to return to the ranching life he had known growing up.  He bought a thousand acres in west Texas and struggled through the years of the Depression, barely able to make a living.  As he heard rumors of Texas oil fields being discovered, he decided to drill on his ranch, but had difficulty getting oil companies to assist him with the complicated process.  Finally, Yates set up a test rig and found that he was living on one of the largest oil fields in North America.  His fortune was made.

Leadership ability is a lot like the drilling equipment used by Yates and his partners to discover the richness of oil that already existed beneath him.  Each of us has a natural wellspring of talent and ability buried within. The drill of leadership is required to tap into the geyser of our potential.  As with Yates's drilling equipment, leadership ability will take effort to attain, but the rewards and incalculable.

Everyone is called upon to lead in some capacity sooner or later in life. Some of the issues involved are big, some are small.  Sometimes the responsibilities requiring leadership last a lifetime, and somethings they are needed only for a moment.  Leadership, then is something each of us should strive to understand better and utilize more fully.  Whether in a corporate setting, a business of our own, a church environment, a volunteer organization, or in the home, improving our leadership abilities through the development process described int his book is key to unleashing the potential hidden within.  Helping to guide others through the same process is the secret to collective greatness and organizational victories.

Increasing our ability to lead requires change.  Vital to tapping into our inner wells of potential are the willingness and ability to grow personally and organizationally.  James C. Hunter wrote, "I never cease to be amazed that organizations do not insist that their leaders be continually improving and persistently working toward becoming the best leaders they can be.  With the awesome responsibility of leading others and the high stakes involved, it seems obvious to me that organizations would focus their attention on helping their leaders develop their leadership skills and thereby their character."

We wrote this book because our work with tens of thousands of entrepreneurs across North America for more than a decade has convinced us that most people (and their organizations) have much more potential locked away inside of them than they realize.  Leadership is the key that opens the lock on that potential.  Time and again we have seen people come alive and achieve things they never thought possilbe, once they started learning to take responsibility. The results, quite frankly, have been revolutionary.

Noel Tichy wrote, "In a broad sense, what leaders do is stage revolutions."  The term revolution is defined by Websters as "an activity or movement designed to effect fundamental changes."  In the beginning, revolutions begin with unrest on the part of one person or perhaps a small group of individuals.  These early leaders begin working to influence events in a direction that assaults the status quo.  Things can no longer remain as they were.  Changes must be made.  Usually because of their passion for the ideals espoused by the leaders, other people are drawn into the effort.  Gradually, the strivings of these early "initiators" gain momentum, attracting talent and support from broader and broader areas.  As a tiny campfire grows into a large bonfire with increased fuel and oxygen supply, so too does a revolution grow in power and ptency as fundamental changes are made and results of those changes begin to surface.

Sometimes a bonfire ends up engulfing the woods around it as it grows into a forest fire.  It can never be forgotten, though, that all big fires start with a tiny spark.  Similarly, all revolutions start as small rebellions  The root cause can always be traced back to a single individual or idea.  Fundamental changes are wrought because somewhere, somehow, someone provides leadership.  One person can decide to lead.  One person can make a difference.  One person leading makes a difference.

True leadership can bring radically positive change to a stagnant environment.  It can revitalize old relationships, poorly performing organizations, and underachieving individuals.  Leadership blows in like a fresh wind and clears the cobwebs of complacency.  For most organizations, management is common and leadership is rare.  Our experience has been that, all too often, where good leadership is needed, poor management is there as an impostor.  Leadership and management are two very different concepts.  Leadership is about doing the right things; management is about doing those things in the right way.  Both are vital, but each has its place.  Any group, any organization, any cause can be revitalized with proper leadership, but never with great management.  Leadership must come first.  Therefore, whether initiating a new venture or turning around an existing one, Launching a Leadership Revolution is the firs tand most important step to success.

In this book, ideas and principles of leadership will be presented in ascending "levels" to illistrate the crescendo effect of increased leadership ability.  It will become clear that as an individual or organization grows in leadership effectiveness, so too will the results, which will gain power and force like a first burning brighter and brighter, - or more illustratively, like a revolution.  Additionally, each chapter is punctuated with an example from history to show how its principles have been applied in real-life situations.  As author Barry Lopez wrote, "Sometimes a person needs a story more than food to stay alive."  The stories that history tells are often more interesting and enlightening than hours of expository teaching.

Life should be about purpose and meaning and cause and fulfilling our personal, God-given destinies.  Without exception, this is achieved through, with and for people.  In other words, it's done through leadership.  Writer Ken Kesey states, "You don't lead by pointing a finger and telling people some place to go.  You lead by going to that place and making a case."  It is our intention that this book will go to a certain place and make a compelling case.  The place is the wellspring of your personal potential, and that of your organization.  The case we wish to make is that your potential is bountiful and sufficient to fulfill your life's calling.  It sits there now, waiting to be tapped.  This is accomplished by taking responsibility to lead in the areas of your life where you have been called.  As you grow in your leadership ability, you will revolutionize your life.

May the pages that follow serve to enlighten, instruct, edify, teach and encourage, but most of all may their inspire you to set up a drill rig of leadership in your life and/or orgaization and harvest he abundance buried within.

We wish you all the succes you are prepared to earn.

Happy drilling.

Let the revolution begin."