Looking Back: Bart on Leadership

I was on a cleaning blitz today, and I finally decided to look through a three-ring binder I'd saved from a leadership class I took in 2004. At that time, I was still living in Northern Virginia, working for Radian Inc (subsequently bought by ESSI, which was bought by Finemeccanica) as a proposal writer. Among the items in the binder was my look at the future 25 years out.

Bart, A.D. 2030

Overview

• Writer/Intellectual
• Artist/Filmmaker
• Outdoorsman
• Executive/Entrepreneur/Consultant
• Husband
• World Traveler
• Wise Counselor
• Good Friend
• Happy Wherever I Am

What is Needed to Get from Here to There?

Education
Business, filmmaking, drawing, painting

Money / Material
Better investments, more savings, better position, side/consulting income, art/travel supplies/gear

Behavior
Better health, better diet, more exercise, stress reduction, caring for others, more self-confidence, romance, sociability

Deliverables
Books, articles, blogs, op-eds, stories, scripts, paintings, drawings, movies

Results
Better balance, more clarity, more confidence, bravery, self-awareness, financial security, ability to take care of myself and those I care about, happiness, peace

All in all, an interesting vision. It's not far off from the trajectory I've been pursuing. If I haven't become more of an "outdoorsman," I've at least spent more time in the gym than I used to. And I have managed to get some traveling done, here and abroad. I haven't pursued my artistic side as much as I probably would have liked, but I have pursued travel and outside writing. Things to work on and look forward to, anyway.

Another thing I worked on in this class was a statement of leadership philosophy. The concepts evolved a bit over the course of the six-week class. Here's what I had to say:

11/8/04
I am fascinated by leaders and the practice of leadership because, in my reading experience, a leader is an individual who is able to get others to do things they might never have accomplished otherwise. Leaders have specific goals in mind and are able to tap the best abilities of each team member in order to accomplish these goals. Ideally, leaders act as teachers or facilitators of a working body of professionals, assuming the mantle of authority only to solve problems, arrange compromises, or break logjams within the group. They respect the concerns and demonstrate loyalty toward others upward, parallel to, or below them in the organization, even to the point of being the "loyal opposition."

11/15/04
Leaders are imbued with a powerful vision of the end result and are able to tap the best abilities of each team member in order to accomplish those goals. In order to ensure success, leaders must facilitate an environment that thrives on and encourages individual autonomy, learning, and courtesy. Ideally, leaders also inspire a working body of professionals through leading by example, living by a recognizable code of integrity, and working hard to accomplish the group's goal, even if that work requires performing tasks "below their station." Leaders should assume the mantle of autority only to solve problems, arrange compromises, or break logjams within the group. They should respect the concerns of, and demonstrate loyalty toward, others in the organization, even to the point of being the "loyal opposition."

12/1/04
Leaders should be imbued with a powerful vision of an end result and are able to tap the best abilities of each team member in order to accomplish that result. In order to achieve success, leaders must facilitate an environment that thrives on and encourages individual autonomy, learning, and courtesy. Ideally, leaders also inspire a working body of professionals through leading by example, living by a recognizable code of integrity, and working hard to accomplish the group's goal, even if that work requires performing tasks "below their station." Leaders should assume the mantle of authority only to solve problems, arrange compromises, or break logjams within the group. They should respect the concerns of, and demonstrate loyalty toward, others in the organization, even to the point of being the "loyal opposition." A good leader's commitment to excellence and personal respect should be reflected in his actions and in the attitudes of those whom the leader seeks to lead.

Again, an interesting set of comments. I recognize the attitudes because that's more or less how I tried to run ISDC. I can't say I succeeded in all those ways. For instance, there were situations where I wanted to give someone more autonomy, but I couldn't because I had no budget for them and thus no prescribed boundaries or "rules of engagement," which meant that I had to do a lot of things myself until the budget became clear.

I also know that I was not as courteous as I would have liked at all points. I lost my temper on a couple of occasions because people were not sharing information with me or things were not happening the way I had planned or was told they would happen.

However, those two examples aside, the conference itself ran very smoothly because I managed to get good people in the right positions. After the first couple days (of five), I found myself able to hide in a corner somewhere and let my team do their jobs. I was brought in--as expected--only when there were high-level problems. I found out about little things afterward, and they were little, for the most part. The last "executive action" I took during the conference was at the end of the last luncheon on the last day, when I had to calmly and jokingly direct people to the basement for a tornado warning ("Folks, much as I'd like to say I'm kidding...").

Are those sirens I hear?

So I suppose, as a leadership experience, ISDC was successful as I define leadership: the team did most of the work and I was there to make the ugly/tough calls. Anything I couldn't handle got kicked upstairs, which wasn't much. Bottom line: I suppose I learned a few things about leadership in seven years. That doesn't mean I like being the boss, but I at least have a consistent philosophy of how I should behave if I'm forced to be one.

The Amateur's Guide to Event Management
Part I: The Whole Shebang: Who, What, Where

John Smith and Mary Jones

invite their friends and family to share their wedding vows

at the Lamb of God Lutheran Church

11716 County Line Road, Madison, Alabama

May 22, 2012

Formal reception, dinner, and dancing to follow at

Embassy Suites Downtown

800 Monroe Street, Huntsville, Alabama

When you receive a party invitation, you are looking at a very simple event summary, or plan. You have all the important information you need to attend the event: who's inviting you, who's attending, where the event is, when it is, and what sort of food and entertainment are involved. This who-what-where equation drives any event you are likely to host.

Who
The who of an event drives nearly everything. Your audience has a specific set of interests in mind, and you, as the host, have the job of appealing to those interests. Mind you, the audience for a wedding is a little simpler--family or friends--and their interest might simply be to see you happy and to have a good time. But even something "simple" like a wedding takes time to plan (ask my sister, a serious planner, about how long her relatively low-key wedding took). Your event is about people and providing something that interests them.

Audiences can vary by size, age, associations, and any other way you can think. If you're going to bring them together, they must have common interests, right? So you've got to get them in the room (church, hall, etc.). People require persuasion, engagement, patience. Events are about people and appealing to their interests. That means having a little insight into what motivates people.

What
The what of an event is the event itself--a wedding, a speech, a ceremony, a convention, a performance. You might be the main attraction (the bride or groom) or you might be the host or hostess while someone else is the center of attention. In any case, the odds are good that the center of your event is sufficiently different, interesting, or important that formal planning is required to get people into the room to appreciate it properly.

Event programming can be simple or complex: a single speaker or performer showing up for an hour or two or several days' worth of activities. Consider all the moving parts involved in a typical American wedding: bachelorette party, bachelor party, rehearsal dinner, wedding rehearsal, wedding, reception, honeymoon. Or a convention: keynote speaker, track speakers, meals, receptions, exhibits, entertainment. The details include funding, scheduling, booking rooms and meals, and a bunch of other things that can jump up to surprise you.

Where
The where of an event is driven by the who and what: how many people are coming? What are they doing? If you're hearing a singer, you need a concert hall (or maybe just a room big enough for the performers and a few friends); if you're hosting a wedding, you need a church or a park or a hall of some sort; if you're hosting a convention, you need a hotel and function spaces for anything ranging from formal speeches to meetings to meals to exhibits.

Locations have their own special challenges: do they have the space to accommodate all the people you plan to invite? What sort of audio-visual equipment do they have? Is their food any good? How late can events run? What do they cost? When do they want the money? How big is their staff? Do they have any house rules that will affect how you run your event? These are important questions, and they become more so the more money you or your group are spending.

If you're going to host an event, you need to have an idea in your head of who's coming, what you plan for them to do, and how big a space you'll need them to do it in. These three factors will drive most of your event activities. The devil, as they say, is in the details.