Character - A Leadership Essential

I'm not sure how many of you were on the call last week when I was talking about APIs or Application Program Interfaces. I'm going to piggyback off that for this talk, so just to mention what I did say. I was talking about APIs and the information glut that we have or are giving out each and every time we get on to different web sites or use different applications. We talked about how APIs are really apps that interface with each other and take information from one app so that companies can then offer various other services that they themselves don't have. We looked at how Expedia, Orbitz or MakeMyTrip are able to offer beyond flight data and bookings for which they really started out, but also now offer hotel bookings and even car rentals and train bookings as well.

All of them use these Application Program Interfaces to add these value services to clients. But along with that, we find that a huge amount of information, or personal information, is being passed on to these companies. They hold all this information. Last week we looked at the company Uber – their cabs have the information of where they picked us up, at what place of business they dropped us off, whether it was a social call, what time of the day it was, the location, the time duration that the cab was used, all of that – the information is available.

 

Finally, we ended by saying that with this repository of information, we need good caretakers. We need good people who will make sure that this information is not exploited. I ended by saying that more and more we need to see that it will be men and women of character who find themselves in places of leadership and influence in the years to come. Because of the fact that there is so much of information that needs to be guarded and used judiciously, and not exploited.

So it was interesting that, as I was looking at the April issue of the Harvard Business Review, to see an article that said, "Measuring The Return of Character." Basically, the article went on to look at character and how it was beginning to be front and center in business dealings and in the kind of people companies were looking for. So I began to probe a little deeper and I found another article that said, "When you look at hiring people or developing leadership character, as the article was called, there are three things that most organizations will look for.

1.     Do they have the competency to be a leader? Do they have the knowledge, the understanding of key concepts, facts, and relationships, etc?

2.     Do they have the commitment to be a leader? They may aspire to be a leader, but are they prepared to do the hard work, engage with others in fulfilling the organizational mission?

3.     Do they have the character to be a good leader and to strive to be even better? Do they have values, traits and virtues that others will use to determine if they are good leaders?

Character seems to be once again coming to the fore, especially in view of the fact that many leaders are falling because of a lack of character. But, the question is also: Does good character in leaders turn into better dollars/better rupees for the company? This particular research organization, KRW, a Minneapolis-based leadership consultancy, had researchers look into this very aspect. They found some very interesting statistics. Basically they tried to see how they could categorize character. They based their questionnaire on anthropologist Donald Brown, who in his studies had said that there are 500 behavior patterns that are recognized and displayed in all societies. From this, they distilled it down to four moral qualities – integrity, responsibility, forgiveness, and compassion. They said that these were four corners for character.

So they measured these qualities – integrity, responsibility, forgiveness, and compassion by going to about 84 US companies and nonprofits, and asked the question, whether these traits were found in leadership. The amazing thing was that in the whole spectrum of people that were polled, they found that the answers showed: "CEOs, whose employees gave them high marks for character, had an average return on assets of 9.35% over a 2-year period; that's nearly 5 times as much as what those with low character ratings had."

As somebody said, "Scratch the surface of a true leader, or look beneath his/her personality, and you', find character." So true! Character is beginning to be so important. As we begin to look at information that is out there, information that needs to be guarded, companies are going to be looking for men and women of character. In fact, they already are. It is beginning to be very much on the radar, as we saw just now in those 3 areas that companies look for.

Martin Luther King once said, "I have a dream today. I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character." That is beginning to be the yardstick. He made this statement in 1963, but it seems to be that character is coming back.

Johnson & Johnson, world leaders in healthcare products, use character as a leadership essential.

Former chairman, Ralph Larsen believed that people with character can give a company a significant competitive advantage.

According to Francis Hesselbein, the author and chairman of the Drucker Foundation, "Leadership that achieves results goes beyond 'how to be' and becomes 'how to do'. This type of leadership is all about character."

Consider these quotes, my friends.

G. Alan Bernard, President, Mid Park, Inc. says, "The respect that leadership must have requires that one's ethics be without question. A leader not only stays above the line between right and wrong, he stays well clear of the gray areas."

Abraham Lincoln said, "Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power."

This from a school headmaster, "We need to develop physique, mentality, and character in our students. But, because the first two are menaces without the third, the greatest of these is character."

"In each human heart are a tiger, a pig, an ass and a nightingale. Diversity of character is due to their unequal activity." Words from Ambrose Bierce – we each have a tiger, a pig, an ass and a nightingale. The tiger to prowl and pounce on unsuspecting things, a pig that will often go into places that you don't want to go, an ass that may every now and then, do a stupid thing, and a nightingale that will sing and soar above these things. All of us that these attributes within us. The question that we need to ask ourselves is: How do we build character? Maybe you've made a couple of mistakes early on, but now is the chance to build. Self-awareness always is the beginning. As Warren Bennis says, "The leader never lies to himself, especially about themselves. They know their flaws as well as their assets, and deals with them directly."

You are your own raw material. When you know what you consist of and what you want to make of it, then you can invent yourself. Or, as I would like to say, reinvent yourself, because it is never too late. Maybe today is the time to take a good look at ourselves and say, "Character is so important. Do I have what it takes to be a man/woman of good character?" that's what the world is going to be looking for and already is. We need to be men and women of good character.

I love to always bring in a spiritual thought and this is what came to me. Our Scriptures say that we need to look for these attributes. And I think that these nine attributes are key to good character:-

·       Love

·       Joy

·       Peace

·       Kindness

·       Goodness

·       Faithfulness

·       Gentleness

·       Patience

·       Self control

If we can take a good look at our lives and how we rate in these areas and then honestly see in which areas we need to improve, I believe that we would be on the path to making sure that we are men and women of good character. Let's look at our own raw material today and ask ourselves the hard question, so that in the days and months to come, we will be known as men and women of outstanding character.

Let me pray with you. Almighty God, to You we turn and ask that You would turn the spotlight on us, on our hearts, on the things that drive us, on our motivations, and point to us those things that are flaws in our character. Help us with Your strength to rectify it, so that we will be men and women of character.

So, help us, Lord, we ask in the name of Jesus. Amen.

•       Cecil Clements, "Information Glut--Use it Well.'  http://corporatecapsule.blogspot.in/2015/04/information-glut-use-it-well.html

•       "Measuring the Return of Character." https://hbr.org/2015/04/measuring-the-return-on-character

•       Kevin Cashman, "Character-Driven Leadership," http://www.forbes.com/sites/kevincashman/2015/03/17/character-driven-leadership/

•       Mary Crossan, Jeffery Gandz & Gerald Seijts, "Developing Leadership Character." http://iveybusinessjournal.com/publication/developing-leadership-character/

•       Quotes: http://www.leadershipnow.com/characterquotes.html

•       Bible reference: Galatians 5:22-23