The Benefits of Learning Martial Arts for Leaders

 Leaders must possess a variety of qualities and skills in order to be successful. Many of these qualities, such as self-discipline, focus, and decision-making, can be developed through the practice of martial arts. Martial arts can be an invaluable tool for leaders as they provide a physical and mental workout that can help to hone and sharpen the skills necessary to be a great leader. Here are some of the ways in which martial arts can benefit leaders:

1. Self-defense: One of the main benefits of learning martial arts for leaders is that it can give them the skills necessary to protect themselves in the event of danger. In an unpredictable world, it is important to be able to protect yourself from potential threats. Martial arts can provide the knowledge and confidence needed to do this.

2. Improved physical fitness: Martial arts require physical strength and agility in order to perform the necessary movements. As such, regular practice can help to improve overall physical fitness. This can benefit leaders in a variety of ways, including improved energy levels, better mental focus and clarity, reduced stress, and more.

3. Improved mental focus: Martial arts require practitioners to stay focused and present in each moment. Through the practice of martial arts, leaders can learn to focus their attention on the task at hand and stay in the moment. This can help to improve their decision-making capabilities and ability to stay calm under pressure.

4. Improved decision making: Martial arts require practitioners to think on their feet and make decisions quickly. Leaders who practice martial arts can improve their ability to think strategically and make decisions based on a variety of factors. This can be a valuable asset in the business world.

5. Improved self-confidence: Martial arts can help to build self-confidence by providing a sense of accomplishment. As practitioners become better at their martial art, they will gain a greater sense of self-assurance and poise. This can be beneficial in a variety of areas, from interpersonal relationships to public speaking.

6. Improved discipline: Martial arts require practitioners to follow strict rules and guidelines. This can help to instill a sense of discipline in leaders, which can be beneficial in terms of improving their work ethic and commitment to their team. 

Overall, learning martial arts can be a great way for leaders to hone their skills and improve their self-discipline, focus, and decision-making capabilities. It can also increase their self-confidence and provide them with the necessary skills to protect themselves in the event of danger. By practicing martial arts, leaders can become more effective in the workplace and be better prepared to lead their team to success.

The Virtue Leader: Sustainability and Martial Arts in Leadership

In today's world, sustainability is more than just a buzzword. It's an essential part of responsible leadership. And as it turns out, martial arts have a lot to offer when it comes to cultivating sustainable practices.

At its core, sustainability is all about finding ways to create long-term value while preserving natural resources and avoiding negative impacts. In the context of leadership, this means building organizations and teams that can thrive over the long term, while minimizing harm to the environment and society at large.

So how can martial arts help with this? Here are a few key lessons that martial arts can teach us about sustainability:

Respect for Nature

In martial arts, practitioners learn to respect and appreciate the natural world. They learn to move in harmony with their environment, and to use their energy and resources wisely. This mindset can be applied to leadership as well. By recognizing the interconnectedness of our actions and their impact on the environment, leaders can make more sustainable choices, such as reducing waste and carbon emissions, conserving natural resources, and supporting environmentally-friendly practices.

Discipline and Self-Control

Martial arts require a great deal of discipline and self-control. Practitioners must learn to channel their energy and focus their attention in order to achieve their goals. This same discipline can be applied to leadership, helping leaders stay focused on their long-term vision and goals, while avoiding short-term temptations so many times used in management and distractions that may harm the organization or the environment.

Resilience and Adaptability

Martial arts also teach practitioners to be resilient and adaptable in the face of challenges. They learn to stay calm and focused under pressure, and to quickly recover from setbacks. This same resilience can be applied to leadership, helping leaders navigate complex and unpredictable situations with confidence and creativity, while staying true to their values and vision.

Community and Collaboration

Finally, martial arts are deeply rooted in community and collaboration. Practitioners work together to improve their skills, support each other's growth, and celebrate their achievements. This same spirit of community can be applied to leadership, fostering collaboration and teamwork within the organization, and building strong relationships with stakeholders and partners in the wider community.

So how can you incorporate these lessons into your own leadership practice? Here are a few practical tips:

• Make sustainability a core part of your vision and values, and communicate this clearly to your team and stakeholders.
• Take steps to reduce waste, conserve resources, and promote environmentally-friendly practices within your organization.
• Stay focused on your long-term goals, while avoiding short-term temptations that may harm your organization or the environment.
• Build resilience and adaptability into your leadership practice, by staying calm and focused in the face of challenges, and seeking creative solutions to complex problems.
• Foster a spirit of collaboration and community within your organization, by supporting teamwork, growth, and celebration.

By applying these lessons from martial arts to your own leadership practice, you can cultivate a more sustainable and responsible approach to leaving and leadership, while building a stronger and more resilient organization for the future. So why not start today, and see where the journey takes you?

Building a Team of Leaders: A Guide

 

Building a team of high-performing leaders is crucial for any business seeking success or other organization. As a business leader, you have the responsibility to identify, select, and develop individuals with the potential to lead your team to new heights and taking some responsibility from you. Below is a short guide that provides practical tips and examples to help you build a team of leaders with confidence and authority.

Identify Leadership Qualities

The first step in building a team of sub-organizational or department leaders is to identify the qualities that are essential for success in your organization. Do you need an assertive, innovative problem-solver, or an organized, detail-oriented person? Is interpersonal communication and collaboration essential, or do you prefer an independent leader? Knowing the qualities you are looking for will help you narrow your search and selection process.

Recruitment

Once you have identified the leadership qualities, it is time to start the outside or internal recruitment process. Tailor your recruitment efforts to fit the desired skills of the ideal leader. You can utilize human resource department for internal personnel or online job boards, attend job fairs and participate in local events, or conduct employee referrals. As you find candidates, evaluate their soft skills and determine how they fit into your business and leadership culture.

Interviewing

As you bring in candidates, you will need to evaluate them to find the right person for the job. Develop a set of questions that will help you get a better understanding of their capabilities and whether or not they are a good fit for your team. Be sure to ask open-ended questions that require more than a “yes” or “no” answer. Additionally, allow the candidate to get to know your company and ask questions of their own. Important issue is to give them a small task or a problem to solve.

Training and Development

Once you have chosen the right person for the job, you will need to train them and help them develop the skills they need to be a successful leader in your organization. Consider investing your time to guide them and in training and development programs to help them hone their skills. You could also look into mentorship programs or career development opportunities, such as certifications or workshops.

Empowerment

To ensure that your team of leaders is successful, you need to empower them to take ownership, make their own decisions and take responsibilities for them. Create an environment where employees can think and act independently with confidence, and give them the resources and support they need to be successful. Encourage them to take risks and experiment, and celebrate successes but never blame them in front of others.

 

Building a team of leaders can be a challenging task, but with the right selection process, mentoring, training and development opportunities, and empowerment, you can create an effective leadership team. By understanding what it takes to develop leadership skills and finding the right candidates, you will be well on your way to creating a strong and successful team. Remember that building a team of leaders is an ongoing process, and it requires time, dedication and commitment. Keep refining your approach and never stop searching for talented individuals who can help your business grow and succeed.

Effective Strategies for Team Leadership

 

Team leadership is an essential aspect of running a successful business or organization. It involves creating a unified, innovative and cohesive group of employees who are as much as possible all working towards a common goal. It also requires having an effective leadership that encourages collaboration, motivation, innovation and communication among team members.

To ensure that your team is the best it can be, here are some strategies for successful team leadership.

1. Set Clear Goals and Objectives

Before you start leading your team, it is important that you establish a clear vision and set of goals and objectives. These should be specific and measurable, and they should be communicated to the team in a way that is easy to understand to each member. Having a well-prepared plan with specific goals and objectives in properly defined periods, will help to ensure that everyone is on the same page and working towards the same end.

2. Provide Support and Encouragement

Leading a team requires providing support to each and every employees. Encourage them to take initiative, offer feedback, think creatively, and are not afraid of bringing “bad news”. Giving praise and recognition when it is due will go a long way in helping to boost morale and productivity. It is also important to be available to answer questions and address any issues that arise.

3. Foster Collaboration

Creating an environment of collaboration is key for a successful team. Encouraging team members to work together, share ideas, and communicate them can lead to breakthroughs that individual work cannot achieve. Setting team-based goals, using interactive techniques, and encouraging peer-to-peer communication will help to increase collaboration.

4. Develop Your Team

Effective team leaders understand the importance of providing their team with opportunities for growth. Providing access and stimulating to develop professional knowledge via courses and seminars, will help to increase the skill level of the team. Stimulate team-building opportunities, such as team outings and activities, can also be effective for fostering better communication, relationships and understanding.

5. Delegate Responsibilities

Delegation is one of the key components of successful team leadership. You should divide tasks among team members in a way that will best utilize their skills and abilities. It is also important to delegate authority to staff members so that they can take initiative and make decisions on their own and do not blame them for mistake.

 

Fostering an effective team leadership will help to ensure that your team is able to reach its full potentials. By setting clear objectives, providing support, fostering collaboration, developing the team, and delegating responsibilities, you will be on your way to creating a successful team.

Why ownership matters?

I was reading the article The Seven Deadly Sins of Economic Liberalism a friend of mine Lucas Juan Manuel kindly sent to me. The article describes private ownership that generates wealth as:

Economic liberalism triggers a socio-economic system based mainly on financial speculation jointly with inappropriate economic measures and structural/social reforms.  Let’s take Euro area as an example.  The EU implemented painful austerity measures in order to reduce the high level of government debt in many country members.  But it was, and still is, a wrongly-conceived austerity

There are many ‘enterprises and entrepreneurs’ arising from political clientelism (crony-ism and patronage), and those kind of enterprises and entrepreneurs do not generate wealth and prosperity in our societies because they are not competitive.  This kind of capitalism is deeply disappointing for the real entrepreneurial spirit (genuine enterprises).

 In this way, wealth, well-being and prosperity are being concentrated in the hands of a few and the income gap between a country's richest and poorest people enlarges dramatically. “Obviously, this way of capitalism is inherent to political corruption and prevents equal opportunities in the economic and social spheres.”

Although somehow hidden, ownership nevertheless matters in all the above described topics. There are different approaches to ownership of a property. The question is whether all of them are sustainable for the advancement of a society as a whole?

Let’s define different ownerships and their (potential) effects.

‘Personal ownership’ is where assets and property is belonging to an individual, also known as individual ownership. Contrary, the ‘collective ownership’ assets and property belongs to a collective body of people who control their use and collect the proceeds of their operation. Very similar is ‘common ownership’ (or non-ownership) where assets and property are held in common by all members of society. Any country owns property (‘state ownership’) where assets are state owned or owned by certain state agency consequently having jurisdiction over in terms of use. And finally, assets owned by a government or a state and available for public use to all their constituents are called ‘public property’.

Steps to Turn Control into Delegation

In my blog ‘Can Obedience nurture Trust?’ my thoughts were about shifting from blind obedience to trust. Control and delegation are a part of the same story. Let’s challenge them here now.

Control is the act or power of controlling or regulating people's behavior … or to exercise restraint or direction over; to dominate. All responsibility is with a control-holder.

History has repeatedly shown how problematic is to effectively restrain power from someone once it has been granted to if a strong system of control, checks and balances is in place. People tend to – when given control or power – exercise them far beyond the legal, actually given, authority. Such anomalies are not excluded in business.

What is Delegation?

To delegate means to give to another person a task or duty or activity meanwhile retaining responsibility for the outcome. The latter is the key since while delegating, you are still responsible for the outcome!

So, where lays the difference between the two if responsibility still remains in the same hands?

Well, control, as we have seen, can be misused when delegate hardly.

Reasons why Leadership is not about manipulation

After recently a puppy joint our household once again it proved that from the moment we are born we have been predestined and taught how to manipulate. All small kids (the same goes for puppies) use basically 24 hours per day to watch, observe and consequently ‘calculate’ what is good for them and how to achieve it.

Well, assuming that is so and also knowing that manipulation has a bad reputation, how could we distinguish manipulation from a persuasion (does not have a bad reputation) that we use as well?

In my view a manipulation is, by definition, a form of persuasion and vice versa. Might be that manipulation is more of a short-term strategy, but consequently, manipulation and persuasion are all about getting someone to do something that you want them to do. Isn’t it?

From persuasion point of view I would say that it distinguishes from manipulation in a small detail: influencing someone because of something that is ‘good’ for the person or, better said that the person may be persuaded to perceive such doing as beneficial or good. Therefore, in this relation the trust in the persuader is the fundamental element for the effective persuasion. And trust is mostly missing or abused in manipulation.

Who is the greatest leader of all time and why?

If you ask the question publicly expect nothing less than argumentative and disagreeable discussions.

We may consider leadership politically, historically, from the business prospective and many more aspects and settings.

This topic has been rolling in my mind for a long time now because I am looking for the best leadership practices and also the people performing them. I was amazed by people’s approach to this question on the internet. It has almost nothing to do with leadership but rather about personalities that important people have or had.  You may find ‘answers’ under the titles like ‘XYZ Things the greatest leaders all have in common’,  ‘Who are the greatest leaders of all time?’ or ‘The greatest leader of all’ and similar.

Are they describing basic leadership methodology and then, based on it, show who the great leaders were (are)? No, they are not! Do these articles have anything in common then? Absolutely yes!

Most of the researches are listing what a leader should not lack. See what I wrote in the blog Added value of leadership names or labels: “Is it all about different behaviors, different styles, or just to give a new label in front of the word leadership?” Those articles just state the “names” (mostly applied in western societies while forgetting the other parts of the world) and what those leaders were great for. Some go deeper and explain what leaders contributed to their societies.

How can I change my personality for the better???

In the post Leadership and Charisma I stated that leadership is all about personality. What exactly did I mean?

Merriam-webster dictionary offers a definition of ‘personality’ as:

• the set of emotional qualities, ways of behaving, etc., that makes a person different from other people;
• the condition or fact of relating to a particular person;
• a set of distinctive traits and characteristics.

American Psychological Associations offers a ‘personality’ definition as it refers to individual differences in characteristic patterns of thinking, feeling and behaving. The study of personality focuses on two broad areas – first, understanding individual differences in particular personality characteristics, such as sociability or irritability and second, understanding how the various parts of a person come together as a whole.

Leadership and Mindset

Does a leader need a special mindset to lead?

Gap International consulting firm conducted in-depth interviews with more than 500 global executives to get a sense of a leader's mindset. These interviews revealed that leaders accomplished great things when they envisioned a larger sense of purpose they contribute to. They become more energized and could better motivate followers to keep pushing for results.

Leadership, unlike management, cannot be reduced to a set of skills although many contemporary authors are just doing that (see Labeled leadership). But, while styles of a leader may vary, successful leaders share very similar mindsets. A personality radiating a proper mindset is then a defining factor for an exceptional leadership. Lacking it the leader’s chances of being effective aren't very good. Without a proper mindset a leader could be as well seen as powerful dictator but hardly a well-regarded or accepted person in charge.

The next issue in mindset research is represented by work of Warren Bennis who interviewed great leaders and found out that they all agreed in that leaders are made, not born. But they are made more by themselves than by any external means. This shows that mindset has to be properly attuned.

Entrepreneurship and Leadership

Does a leader need to have entrepreneurship knowledge and/or attitude?

In my times I was an entrepreneur as well as a leader. It didn't take much to figure that those two roles have both: differences and similarities which are evident from the behaviors, in the strategies and achievements across a wide range of settings.

Summarizing the differences they fall into some of the categories:

• an entrepreneur builds a vehicle; a leader builds a superhighway on which it travels;
• an entrepreneur gets excited about innovative ideas; a leader creates creative work environments and supports brilliant ways to get things done;
• a leader keeps promises; an entrepreneur is excited by opportunities and may not always consider the time and effort it takes to follow through on their promises;
• a leader values and develops personal relationships at all levels; an entrepreneurs often tends to jeopardize important relationships for an idea to come through;
• an entrepreneur dances with failure; a leader with vision, strategy and policy tries to avoid failures;
• an entrepreneur mostly feels comfortable being alone in his/her mission; a leader attracts and develops the followers to lead.

To lead people

Have you heard of many great managers of the past? Probably much less than about great leaders. That is why “to manage” and “to lead” are two distinguishing roles. They are both needed in society and organizations.

The verb “to lead” has a great history down to the philosophical writings from Plato's Republic to Plutarch's Lives in which he explored the question “What qualities distinguish an individual as a leader?” In one of my previous posts “China’s history and culture impacting Leadership – 1” (and following ) I've written about the Far East’ perception on leadership. And what internet has to say about the verb “to lead”?

The Free dictionary 

• To show the way to by going in advance
• To go first as a guide.

MerriamWebster 

• To direct on a course or in a direction
• To guide someone or something along a way.

Dictionary.com 

• To go before or with to show the way; conduct or escort: to lead a group on a cross-country hike
• To take the initiative; begin.

Learning Leadership from Martial Arts - III

Let me continue this blog miniseries with a leadership methodology.

In one of my previous posts - “The Way” of Leadership I compared two fundamental Chinese philosophies Daoism and Confucianism, the Yin and Yang of Chinese culture. They are well routed in Chinese everyday life, culture, politics and as well in martial arts of which two Wing chun (blog Wing Chun basics 4 Leadership) and Tai Chi (blog Tai Chi Quan Leadership)  I already explained. These philosophies are used as a background to describe ideas on how to use old martial arts wisdom, explained more in previous blog (Learning Leadership from Martial Arts – II), and are now transformed in a leadership.

• Control: We said that only when relaxed a person may possess a self-control. A wise leader, for that matter, creates an atmosphere of clarity, of purpose and a sense of unity. Leader works selflessly and simply allows the team to do what needs be done. Through self-control a leader can influence (control) the outcome and not directly the people.

• Trust: The saying we used in martial arts was about trust in practice. A good leader understands the processes in the team and the fact that leadership does not require the application of force or pressure. There is no room for mistrust either. A remarkable leader trusts his/her people and is consequentially trusted by them. A well led team is not a battlefield of egos, as in teamwork there is no place for individual ‘victories’ or ‘defeats’.
• Stability: Being ‘on the ground’ (well grounded) reflects our terms and our values -- those that a leader expects from subordinates. A respectable leader is focused, firmly and confidently on the ground with his/her decisions and with clear aim in the mind. He does not flip-flop his decisions.
• Adjustment: if you drive yourself too much, this does not produce fruit, if you try to rush into things, this does not lead anywhere. The same is true for leading a team. If the leader is too aggressive, subordinates ‘are suppressed.’ If a manager is too soft, he is not taken seriously. A virtuous leader adjusts correctly to the circumstances and leads by example.

Learning Leadership from Martial Arts - II

 The principles I’m sharing today are not rules or steps that most of the times are offered and used separately instead of integrally in Western leadership teaching methodology. The Eastern principle has it usually all interlinked. Therefore, bellow you will see elementary pieces of a whole personality of a martial artist. They are refined and presented separately only for the purpose of a more straightforward understanding:

• Control: The martial arts teach self-control of the body and the mind (ego). Martial art practice starts with hard training, where a student (e.g.: karate, kick boxing, tai chi chuan, wing chun, savate, escrima, aikido, sambo etc.) normally has to endure the threshold of pain from received and given punches. Only when relaxed, one is in control of oneself and of pain, consequently of others too.
• Trust: There is a saying in martial arts: “Trust your friends to beat you so that your enemies cannot!” A martial artist has firstly to trust in himself not to injure others – only then others trust him not to be injured by him.
• Stability: A person cannot fight successfully and master the opponent without stability and balance in place. It means that we should properly adjust our stance: how we ‘shape’ our body to ‘adjust’ our bones that have to support the muscles in a relaxed way. With our stance, gaze and movements we communicate our mental, physical and emotional state to those that are able to read it. Should or not we show what our thoughts are?
• Adjustment: Not only a Chinese proverb says “The grass abates in the direction from which the wind blows!” A martial artist has to keep adjusting to the surrounding and to the opponent. Any hesitance on his part will result in time lost and thusly giving to the opponent an opportunity and the advantage to attack.

Teaching coupled with Leadership

A teacher should by default be a leader: he/she teaches new things, influences others, has listeners, defines personal growing path, can define task and workload. Anything wrong with it?

Teacher as a leader ensures improvements in instruction he or she gives and thus enhance learning process. But a teacher can (unfortunately) lack autonomy in workplace issues like: (architecture and equipment of lecture rooms), the choice of curriculum material, the scheduling of classes and other resources. Previous teacher training (mostly for university ones) is not the only obstacle they have. Once hired and in the pipeline, young teachers often find that what they have learned in their four or more years of preparation has not equipped them for what they may encounter in their new classrooms say at the Institute for Educational Leadership, Inc. Then the burden of publishing papers and research instead of learning new teaching approaches add to the direct implication of productivity and affect teaching style and capabilities.

On the other hand, teachers lead and assume a wide range of roles in school(s) and in interactions with students, whether these roles are assigned formally or shared informally. Throughout the research process they have to engage in, lead of the research group(s). Within their lecturing there may always be also some student project works that a teacher has to supervise. Teachers teach to collaborate and have to plan their lessons in advance or if needed in partnership with fellow teachers or visiting lecturers. Those are typical leadership roles too.

EGO and Leadership?

“The ego” – a positive or a negative feature? Is it a necessary ingredient, an essential to had by an exceptional leader?

We all seem to be able to spot a strong ego in others. Brain studies cannot point to the place in a brain where ego could exist, what could it be? Outside of a few technical papers ego, is still a very poorly defined concept. Animals don’t have it, for them it is only an awareness of self. Studies show that awareness of ‘self’ in humans is allocated to the left brain. Could this be the ‘true’ place for our ego?

A research showed that at least 99% of all human problems are caused by the false opinion of ‘self’. The most obvious and known falsities are about our perceptions of doing right to environmental, in economic and in political issues. There are others false opinion like the ones generated among and within families, different groups or societies, friends and enemies. But does a self-important demonstration of power or ego always give the result one expect by being egocentric? I’m positive that in most cases it does not.

The ego presents one of the biggest barriers for people to work together effectively. When people get caught up in their egos, it erodes their compatibility, emotions, reasoning. It blurs the understanding and cooperation. And we mostly get just the unproductive clash of egos.

Leaders and Self confidence

Why, if self-confidence is so important in nearly all aspects of our lives, do so many people struggle with it?

A child playing with the father who throws him in the air: does a child laugh and ask for more? Then, when a child is high above your head you ask him “Would you be a star fighter pilot?”  Child won't hesitate to say yes! However, why then most adults are so fearful of choosing a career that could provide them a professional satisfaction and leave those they are not satisfied with? Is it because of a vicious circle in which people who lack self-confidence can find it difficult to become successful and consequently self-confident?

In martial arts, when you face the opponent your level of self-confidence is shown in many ways: by your posture, your movements, your reactions, your behavior during the combat, your body language and your verbal language (if you speak, what you say etc.). Everything reflects your (lack of) confidence. If you hesitate, you lose. A well-known truth is that self-confident people inspire confidence and/or respect in others.

Inspiring the confidence in others is one of the key ways in which a leadership process perpetuates. A leadership is all about having the confidence to make decisions, to show to your followers the vision, to communicate good and bad news, to inspire others. If someone is afraid to make and commit to a decision, all of the communication and empowerment in the world won't make any good to get confident.

Virtue - driven company

What YOU put up with is what YOU have to live with!

Modern corporate culture

Although companies today dispose of all kinds of employee assessment systems, the employees are still managed by managers rather than lead by leaders. Being treated as a cost, even expendable or hopeless, the staff, normally, acts in the same way.

Banks or financial service companies analyze the companies’ performance. For the writing of “the analyst reports” normally young people, freshly out of the school, are used. The report which mostly does not make any significant sense is then solely used by management as a base to steer the staff and processes the way they always wished but were ‘afraid’ to do. So we begin to work to live rather than live to work.

I might also say that in companies “a terrible job” is done when screening and matching people to tasks. Thousands of low level employees are hired but not empowered to actually change anything even in their own field of expertise for which they were hired. Their work is just to do the job (execute higher level decisions). Companies do not dispose of a long term plan to keep best people engaged; they don’t reward them for exceptional actions. No incentive is provided to those that are willing to be innovative. The incentive, if at all, is meant for those that do fewer errors and are willing to compel to the system. The employees are not empowered to solve problems. They are required to rather avoid them (by punished errors). Thusly, companies create a symptom of “someone else's problem”, certainly not my problem, not my responsibility.

In the companies that are not just managed but being lead by true leaders the employees come first and are encouraged to stand up and do it differently.

Organizational success and failure

An organization exists because of participation of employees who work in it. It is like a living organism: the brains are represented by the board of directors; vital organs are main managerial posts. The rest are employees. However, when one organ fails in a human body it is a problem for the whole body. If it works perfectly, the importance of each and every part goes unnoticed.

The organizational success or failure is hardly a one man game. The days of a single great decision maker at the top have shifted to strong decision making skills at all levels and across groups. No organization succeeds or fails based on the responsibility of only one individual. Yes, the leader holds the power to make the decisions and has the ultimate (not sole) responsibility. But a leader can only be held responsible within a reason for that which was in his/hers control.

We know today, supported by research, that the capacity to exercise control does enhance results. Also well explored is the fact that a company's culture is pushed down from the top. Companies that have failed, such as ENRON, have had management that abused the trusted power. The employees simply did what they were told to do. This proves to be a rigid culture lacking of transparency game. Another example of a rigid culture and leadership vision deficiency can be perceived in Kodak’s case where leadership somehow didn’t notice the shift coming in the technology related to films used for photographs.

Leadership and responsibility

Responsibility translates into commitment to finish something. People mostly like and tend to hide from responsibility for their deeds, actions, and decisions.

When learning to master martial arts one is encouraged to think about the responsibility and how to use it in all techniques. Depending on energy, force, and power used a martial artist may kill, immobilize or cure a person - the body point to which it is applied is the same. It is a heavy and sole responsibility what and how to use the accumulated martial arts knowledge.

The responsibility is, by all means, one of the most demanding requirements in leadership. “Good leadership involves responsibility to the welfare of the group, which means that some people will get angry at your actions and decisions. It's inevitable, if you're honourable. Trying to get everyone to like you is a sign of mediocrity” are the words of General Colin Powell on leadership’s responsibility.