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The Inverse Leadership Triangle
Why “Top-Down” Leadership Fails and “Servant-Leaders” Succeed
Business leaders, civic leaders, and, yes, we guild leaders often sacrifice our own money and free time
in order to make our organizations successful. However, we love doing this, otherwise, we stop time
and expecting 0% (and sometime less) in return. An MMORPG setting sometimes requires that you
lead by serving your people in an extreme fashion and expecting nothing (and sometime less) in return.
And does this format ever test your mettle to lead in this manner! The job can certainly be thankless to
be sure. And, as if that's not enough, being a GM is a position that is often the target of ridicule and
criticism.
With that, I submit the concept of the "servant-leader".
Traits of the “Servant-Leader”
1) You lead by serving and meeting the needs of others in you community primarily and yourself
secondly.
2) Servant-leaders aren't comfortable with the title "boss". Servant-leaders always perceive
themselves, indeed as the “servant”, “employee”, or even “slave” of their followers. Servant-leaders
work for their followers; the followers do not work for the servant-leader.
3) Servant-leaders, rarely, if ever, ask for help on their own individual projects, unless it’s from a
superior. (That DOES NOT mean you don't call for aid when it comes to projects that you're doing to
help the community. What it does mean is that you don't do things like ask for gold or beg for run-
thrus.)
4) Servant-leaders almost always jump at the chance to teach or work along side their followers to help
them accomplish their goals. (You give gold, but are sure to teach the member how to earn it. You go
on run-thrus, but teach people about LFG!)
5) Servant-leaders virtually never tolerate someone who is so self-centered that they detract from the
progress of the community. They take on the difficult role of reprimanding, disciplining, and even
removing such members.
6) Servant-leaders virtually always displace blame for mistakes or wrong-doing onto themselves and
displace praise or success to someone else. The buck stops with the servant-leader. @#$% never
rolls down hill with the servant-leader! Every failure is a failure in leadership and every success is a
success due to the efforts of the members of the community.
I could go on, but hopefully you get the idea. The minute you take on the concept as a leader that your
followers should be serving you, you’re doomed to the failure of the “top-down” leader. Traditionally,
businesses are set up with a man at the top and his underlings below him, and those underlings’
underlings below, and so forth. Like a triangle. The inverse leadership triangle suggests to us that a
guild built for success is to be set up with the guild master at the bottom and her officers above her,
and the members above the officers in the pecking order. Hence the “inverse triangle”. Granted, as
you will note, I use the terms “often” and “almost always” and while there are exceptions where your
authority must be flexed as the guild leader, the overwhelming majority of your leadership transactions
as a servant-leader will fall within these traits.
Note the folloing illustration:
How to Become a Leader
Axioms of a Leader
Axiom – Leaders are the Leader
Sounds ridiculous right? But are you doing it? I am so often baffled even by my own staff when they
wonder why something isn’t being done by the membership when they as leaders aren’t doing it
themselves! And not only doing it, but persisting as one of the best, a leader, in the guild. This
principle ranges from soup to nuts in a guild setting. If you expect people to be civil toward one
another on the guild chat channel, and you spend a good deal of time making insulting and abrasive
remarks to others, guess what? Your members are going to follow suit! If you want people to be on
time to your raids and you show up five minutes late – just ONE time – you guessed it, they are going
to feel free to show up anytime they please. If you expect your people to be well educated and geared
at elite levels and you’re still running around in common gear, they won’t take your directives seriously
to learn about and acquire needed gear. Again, and it must be stressed, that the effective leader not
only maintains the status quo on such issues, but is indeed the MOST cordial on the guild channel, the
one who shows up FIRST to raids and is the LAST to leave, and maintains the HIGHEST level of
knowledge when compared to guild members.
It may sound difficult, but you MUST be one of the leaders, if not THE leader in virtually every
category among your guild. This is especially critical in the focus point of your guild. If you raid, then
you as the GM or officer need to be a top-notch, reliable raider. Does that mean you’re at every raid?
No, but that means the raids you do attend you are the leader, (and not necessarily the RL, although
this applies to her as well!). You must be the prime example to your people concerning expected
behaviors. Again, it is difficult to tell someone to increase a statistic or his raid output, when you’re
slacking on yours. This is akin the old principle of leading by example, but with a twist. You, as the
GM, RL, or other officer, need to be one of if not the leading toon in your class, so yes you can set an
example, but more importantly so you can pull your team to success by demonstrating to them where
the bar of expectation lies.
In the context of our community, I demand of myself as the GM/RL to have the best gear (and, yes, I
don’t have to short change members to get it), the most knowledge, the greatest raid output, a strong
pvp presence, and the strongest cash flow in the guild. Our officers do the same and we enjoy
members who try to catch up with us. This also applies to the intangibles, such as upholding the values
of our guild. All a member has to do is look to any officer to see the example par excellence of what
the expected behavior of people in our community is.
Leaders are the leader. Are you the leader in your guild or a follower? If you hold the title and aren’t
THE leading toon in virtually every area, are you really the leader or just some guy who holds the title?
If you want to lead your people to the next level, attract quality new members, and retain the members
you have, start leading in this, albeit difficult, but simple manner. Lead by being the best. Lead by
being the leader.
© 2008, www.guildleadershipportal.com
Building A Cohesive Leadership Team
Is Your Guild Leadership Team Cohesive?
By Razail, Order of Ancients, Malygos-US
Adapted from Patrick Lencioni’s The Four Obsessions of an Extraordinary Executive
Cohesive teams build trust, eliminate politics, and increase efficiency by:
· Knowing one another's unique strengths and weaknesses.
· Openly engaging in constructive ideological conflict.
· Holding one another accountable for behaviors and actions.
· Committing to group decisions.
The Essence of a cohesive Leadership team is trust, which is marked by and absence of politics,
unnecessary anxiety, and wasted energy (also known as drama llama attacks). Every officer wants to
achieve this, but few are able to do so because they fail to understand the root of these problems, the
most damaging of which is politics.
Politics is the result of unresolved issues at the highest level of a guild. Attempting to curb politics
without addressing issues at the officer level is pointless. Although most officers I've worked with are
aware of the existence of some political behavior within their teams, they almost always underestimate
its magnitude and the impact it has on the guild and its members.
This blindness occurs because what officers believe are small disconnects between them and their
peers actually look like major rifts to members. And when those members try to resolve the differences
among themselves, they often become engaged in bloody and time-consuming battles, with no
possibility for resolution (this means no loot drops people). And all of this occurs because officers
failed to work out minor issues, usually out of fear of conflict.
The commonness and severity of this problem make the point worth repeating. When an officer
decides not to confront a peer about a potential disagreement, he or she is dooming guild members to
waste time, gold, and emotional energy dealing with irresolvable issues. This causes the best members
to start looking for positions in less drama-laden guilds, and it creates an environment of
disillusionment, distrust, and exhaustion for those who stay.
Cohesive leadership teams, on the other hand resolve their issues and create environments of trust for
themselves, and thus for their people. This ensures that most of the energy expended in the team is
focused on achieving the desired results for the guild. What is more, I have found that outstanding
members rarely leave these guilds.
What does a Cohesive Leadership Team look Like?
More than anything else, cohesive teams are efficient. They arrive as decisions more quickly and with
greater buy-in than non-cohesive teams do. They also spend less time worrying about whether their
peers will commit to a plan and deliver.
One of the best ways to recognize a cohesive team is the nature of its meetings. Passionate, Intense,
Exhausting, Never boring.
For cohesive teams, meetings are compelling and vital. They are forums for asking difficult questions,
challenging one another's ideas, and ultimately arriving at decisions that everyone agrees to support
and adhere to, in the best interests of the guild.
Within the cohesive teams that I work with, members hold their peers accountable for behaviors that
are not conducive to team performance. No one is running a raid, pvping, or grinding during meetings,
even when the issues on the table are not directly related to them. Everyone is involved and awake. If
an issue hits the agenda and it is not compelling or critical, team members question whether it is worth
their time.
Finally, cohesive teams fight. But they fight about issues, not personalities. Most important, when they
are done fighting, they have an amazing capacity to move on to the next issue, with no residual
feeling. In those instances when a fight gets out of hand and drifts over the line into personal territory-
and this inevitably happens- the entire team works to make things right, No one logs from the meeting
harboring unspoken resentment.
Unfortunately, many teams never achieve this. They yearn for easy, peaceful guild meetings as a
retreat from their hectic lives. What they end up getting are tedious and uninspiring show-and-tell
sessions where officers review the details of their responsibilities.
Is achieving cohesiveness difficult? Sure. A better question would be, “ is it worth the effort?” Whether
you measure the results in terms of increased productivity, rescued turnover, higher quality of guild life,
or simply less time in unproductive meetings, they answer is always a resounding yes.-
See Next Article – How to Build a Cohesive Leadership Team, part 2.
How to Build a Cohesive Leadership Team
By Razail, Order of Ancients, Malygos-US
Adapted from Patrick Lencioni’s The Four Obsessions of an Extraordinary Executive
The most important activity is the building of trust, and one of the best ways to do this is what I call
“getting naked.” (AH HAH! I knew this guy was a hippy druid) This is not a New Age exercise involving
group hugs and holding hands, but rather a general process of getting to know one another at a level
that few groups of people – unfortunately, even families – ever achieve.
There are many effective ways to “get naked” (macros?). No single method is enough, but none is
specifically required. What is most important is that the team members get comfortable letting their
colleagues see them for who they are. No pretension. No positioning.
Although there are certainly unstructured approaches to building a cohesive team, I suggest taking a
look at some of the proven methods and philosophies first.
Myers-Briggs Type Indicator
Often referred to as the MBTI, this is a profoundly effective tool for helping team members understand
one another's behaviors and avoid dangerous misattributions. It has been tested and used by millions
of people, and there is no shortage of material relating to applying it to teams. I have found that even
the most skeptical teams find significant, lasting benefit from using this tool. [url=http://www.
myersbriggs.org/my-mbti-personality-type/]Myers-Briggs Type Indicator.[/url]
Katzenback and Smith The Wisdom of Teams and Teams at the Top
Jon Katzenbach and Douglas Smith wrote one of the most compelling, no-nonsense approaches to
building teams that I have seen.
Lencioni The Five Temptations of a CEO
Lencioni wrote this book to help members of a leadership team self-identify their temptations and
discuss how they might go about addressing them in the context of the team. It provides unique
insights into the strengths and weaknesses of colleagues, especially as then relate to leadership within
the context of a guild.
Personal histories. Although it might sound like a “touchy-feely” exercise, I have found that it is
remarkably helpful for members of a leadership team to spend time talking about their backgrounds.
People who understand one another's personal philosophies, family histories, educational experiences,
hobbies, and interests are far more likely to work well together than those who do not. And given the
large portion of our lives spent at work, getting to know peers on a meaningful level can go a long way
toward making your game and guild more fulfilling.
Now, achieving cohesiveness does not happen only during the dreaded five-hour meeting or on a fixed
schedule. In fact, a key part of building trust is about living through difficult times. Like a marriage or
any other meaningful relationship, the only way to build strength is to share experiences that require
everyone to rally and overcome obstacles. The most cohesive teams I know have faced ugly issues
and even come dangerously close to dissolutions. But by surviving, they develop a level of trust that is
hard to break. The key for a leader is to remind team members why difficult times are worth tolerating,
and what the rewards will be.
Once a team has achieved some level of cohesiveness, its ability to maintain it rests on its willingness
to continually address core issues, and its discipline around having regular, frequent, and as close to in-
person meetings as possible. While schedules and the demands of RL make it more difficult to get
together regularly, it is nevertheless critical that a leadership team not give in to the temptation to scale
back meetings. Failing to honor meeting schedules, something that is all too common in most guilds, is
the first sign that a Leadership team is about to experience problems. I think this is by nature one of
our big challenges in Order of Ancients (OOA), we cannot meet in person, and we simply cannot
expect that absolutely everyone will be at all of our meetings, it is after all a game and RL takes
precedence.
In terms of the effectiveness of a particular team, my experience indicates that a group's cohesiveness
has far more impact on success than its collective level of experience or knowledge. I have worked
with leadership teams filled with industry luminaries and accomplished executives who could not
compete with those less experienced and relatively unknown teams that were able to create
environments of trust and passion. Quite simply, cohesiveness at the officer level is the single greatest
indicator of future success that any guild can achieve. -
See Next Article – Assessing Team Cohesiveness
| .....the air the community breaths..... |
|
| Featured Articles 1) The Inverse Leadership Triangle 2) Leadership Axiom - The Leader Leads 3) Building a Cohesive Leadership Team, part 1 & 2 4) Effective Over-Communication |
| .....helping guild masters become better leaders in-game and in-life..... |
Are You Over-Communicating Organizational Clarity?
By Razail, Order of Ancients, Malygos-US
Adapted from Patrick Lencioni’s The Four Obsessions of an Extraordinary Executive
Once the officers team has achieved clarity, it must then communicate that clarity to
members. This is the simplest of the four disciplines, but tragically, the most
underachieved. Why is this tragic? Because after having done all the work associated with
disciplines one and two, it is a shame not to reap the benefits of those achievements.
Especially when it is so simple.
Within guilds that effectively over-communicate, members at all levels and on all the
teams understand what the guild is about and how they contribute to its success. They
don't spend time speculating on what officers are really thinking, and they don't look for
hidden messages among the information they receive. As a result, there is a strong sense
of common purpose and direction, which supersedes any team, class, or ideological
allegiances they may have.
Members in healthy guilds may joke, or sometimes even QQ, about the volume and
repetition of information that they receive. But they'll be glad that they are not being kept
in the dark about what is going on.
Healthy Guilds align their members around organizational clarity by communicating key
messages through:
Repetition: don't be afraid to repeat the same message, again and again.
Simplicity: The more complicated the message, the more potential for confusion and
inconsistency.
Multiple Mediums: People react to information in many ways; use a variety of mediums.
Cascading Messages: Leaders communicate key messages to direct reports; they cycle
repeats itself until the message is heard by all.-
See Next Article – How to Effectively Over-Communicate
How to Effectively Over Communicate
By Razail, Order of Ancients, Malygos-US
Adapted from Patrick Lencioni’s The Four Obsessions of an Extraordinary Executive
The first step is to embrace the three most critical practices of effective organizational
communication: repetition, simple messages, and multiple mediums. Ironically, these have
nothing to do with presentation style or speaking ability.
Repetition. The issue here has to do with the fear of repetition. Most officers I work with
don't like to repeat the same message again and again over time. This is because they are
relatively intelligent people who don't want to underestimate the intelligence of their
audience. And so they make the dangerous assumption that once a message has been
heard, it is both understood and embraced by members.
Other officers complain about repetition because they are bored with a message after
communicating it once or twice, and want to move on to solve the next problem within the
organization. They enjoy the problem solving and find little intellectual stimulation in
repetitive communication.
Unfortunately, effective communication requires repetition in order to take hold in an
organization. Some experts say that only after hearing a message six times does a person
begin to believe and internalize it. Even if that number is just three, consider how many
times an officer would have to communicate a message before every member in the guild
will have heard it three times.
This problem is extremely common in organizations where I have worked. Almost without
exception, officers lament having to repeat the same “tired” messages. In the next breath,
they complain that members are not hearing and acting on the messages they
communicate.
One of the keys to successful communication, I remind them, is getting used to saying the
same things again and again and again, to different audiences, and in slightly different
ways. Whether they are bored with those messages is not the issue, whether members
understand and embrace them is.
Simple Messages. Another key to effective communication is the ability to avoid over
complicating key messages. Years of education and training make most leaders feel
compelled to use all of their intellectual capabilities when speaking or writing. While this is
certainly understandable, it is only serves to confuse members.
That is not to say that members are simple people, but rather that they are inundated with
information every day. What they need from leaders is clear, uncomplicated messages
about where the organization is going and how they can contribute to getting there.
How does a leader go about providing the detail and context for those messages? That
brings us to the final communication challenge: the use of multiple mediums.
Multiple Mediums. All too often, executives feel comfortable using just one form of
communication to convey messages to the rest of the organization. Some leaders prefer
live communication, either to large groups or in more intimate settings. Others feel more
comfortable writing messages through e-mail or intranet postings. Still others prefer to
communicate primarily to their direct reports, who are then charged with relaying
messages to employees deeper in the organization.
Which of these methods is best? All of them. Relying on one or two channels of
communication within a guild will guarantee that some parts of the member population will
miss key messages. This is because guildies want to hear their leaders in person, and still
others are fine with an occasional update from their leader.
Although I believe that any guild needs to establish standards about how most information
is disseminated, it should not do so at the expense of using all types of media to convey
key messages. Even if members could somehow be retrained to use and embrace the
same forms of communication, all methods should be used because each provides an
officer with a unique opportunity to reach members and make messages clear.
For example, live communication provides opportunities for meaningful interaction and
emotional context; e-mail allows for later reviews; and relayed communication from a
coach creates an opportunity for in-depth discussion about how the message will affect
people's daily jobs.
In spite of the validity of each of these mediums, there is one form of communication that I
have found to be the most powerful and underused within organizations of all sizes from
twenty-five to ten thousand employees. I call it cascading communication.
After virtually every officer meeting that takes place in any guild, there are key decisions
that have been made and issues that have been resolved, which need to be
communicated. Unfortunately, the officers often leave those meetings with different
interpretations of what has been decided and what is to be communicated.
I once witnessed an executive team leave a staff meting after deciding to establish a hiring
freeze throughout the company. Fifteen minuets after the meeting had ended; an e-mail
message went out from the head of human resources to all employees, informing them
that all job requisitions were to be placed on hold until further notice. Five minutes later,
two executives’ from the staff meeting were in the HR VP's office, protesting that they
thought the hiring freeze did not apply to their divisions.
The key is to take five minutes at the need of staff meetings and ask the question, “What
do we need to communicate to our people?” After a few minutes of discussion, it will
become apparent which issues need clarification and which are appropriate to
communicate. Not only does this brief discussion avoid confusion among the officers
themselves, it gives members a sense that the people who head their respective
departments are working together and coming to agreement on important issues.
Even when officers agree on what has been decided, there may be a wide range of
viewpoints about how and how much to communicate to members. Some officers sit down
with their direct reports within a day of the meetings and fill them in on all the issues that
they need to carry down to their people. Others leave in-game mail, or private messages
on the website highlighting a few points. Still others communicate messages individually,
on the basis of which items are relevant to which people.
This discrepancy in approach causes inevitable problems. Eventually some members hear
about officer decisions from their fellow guildies, and they wonder why they are not kept in
the loop.-
See Next Article – Are We Reinforcing Clarity Through Human Systems?
By Razail, Order of Ancients, Malygos-US
Adapted from Patrick Lencioni’s The Four Obsessions of an Extraordinary Executive
Once the officers team has achieved clarity, it must then communicate that clarity to
members. This is the simplest of the four disciplines, but tragically, the most
underachieved. Why is this tragic? Because after having done all the work associated with
disciplines one and two, it is a shame not to reap the benefits of those achievements.
Especially when it is so simple.
Within guilds that effectively over-communicate, members at all levels and on all the
teams understand what the guild is about and how they contribute to its success. They
don't spend time speculating on what officers are really thinking, and they don't look for
hidden messages among the information they receive. As a result, there is a strong sense
of common purpose and direction, which supersedes any team, class, or ideological
allegiances they may have.
Members in healthy guilds may joke, or sometimes even QQ, about the volume and
repetition of information that they receive. But they'll be glad that they are not being kept
in the dark about what is going on.
Healthy Guilds align their members around organizational clarity by communicating key
messages through:
Repetition: don't be afraid to repeat the same message, again and again.
Simplicity: The more complicated the message, the more potential for confusion and
inconsistency.
Multiple Mediums: People react to information in many ways; use a variety of mediums.
Cascading Messages: Leaders communicate key messages to direct reports; they cycle
repeats itself until the message is heard by all.-
See Next Article – How to Effectively Over-Communicate
How to Effectively Over Communicate
By Razail, Order of Ancients, Malygos-US
Adapted from Patrick Lencioni’s The Four Obsessions of an Extraordinary Executive
The first step is to embrace the three most critical practices of effective organizational
communication: repetition, simple messages, and multiple mediums. Ironically, these have
nothing to do with presentation style or speaking ability.
Repetition. The issue here has to do with the fear of repetition. Most officers I work with
don't like to repeat the same message again and again over time. This is because they are
relatively intelligent people who don't want to underestimate the intelligence of their
audience. And so they make the dangerous assumption that once a message has been
heard, it is both understood and embraced by members.
Other officers complain about repetition because they are bored with a message after
communicating it once or twice, and want to move on to solve the next problem within the
organization. They enjoy the problem solving and find little intellectual stimulation in
repetitive communication.
Unfortunately, effective communication requires repetition in order to take hold in an
organization. Some experts say that only after hearing a message six times does a person
begin to believe and internalize it. Even if that number is just three, consider how many
times an officer would have to communicate a message before every member in the guild
will have heard it three times.
This problem is extremely common in organizations where I have worked. Almost without
exception, officers lament having to repeat the same “tired” messages. In the next breath,
they complain that members are not hearing and acting on the messages they
communicate.
One of the keys to successful communication, I remind them, is getting used to saying the
same things again and again and again, to different audiences, and in slightly different
ways. Whether they are bored with those messages is not the issue, whether members
understand and embrace them is.
Simple Messages. Another key to effective communication is the ability to avoid over
complicating key messages. Years of education and training make most leaders feel
compelled to use all of their intellectual capabilities when speaking or writing. While this is
certainly understandable, it is only serves to confuse members.
That is not to say that members are simple people, but rather that they are inundated with
information every day. What they need from leaders is clear, uncomplicated messages
about where the organization is going and how they can contribute to getting there.
How does a leader go about providing the detail and context for those messages? That
brings us to the final communication challenge: the use of multiple mediums.
Multiple Mediums. All too often, executives feel comfortable using just one form of
communication to convey messages to the rest of the organization. Some leaders prefer
live communication, either to large groups or in more intimate settings. Others feel more
comfortable writing messages through e-mail or intranet postings. Still others prefer to
communicate primarily to their direct reports, who are then charged with relaying
messages to employees deeper in the organization.
Which of these methods is best? All of them. Relying on one or two channels of
communication within a guild will guarantee that some parts of the member population will
miss key messages. This is because guildies want to hear their leaders in person, and still
others are fine with an occasional update from their leader.
Although I believe that any guild needs to establish standards about how most information
is disseminated, it should not do so at the expense of using all types of media to convey
key messages. Even if members could somehow be retrained to use and embrace the
same forms of communication, all methods should be used because each provides an
officer with a unique opportunity to reach members and make messages clear.
For example, live communication provides opportunities for meaningful interaction and
emotional context; e-mail allows for later reviews; and relayed communication from a
coach creates an opportunity for in-depth discussion about how the message will affect
people's daily jobs.
In spite of the validity of each of these mediums, there is one form of communication that I
have found to be the most powerful and underused within organizations of all sizes from
twenty-five to ten thousand employees. I call it cascading communication.
After virtually every officer meeting that takes place in any guild, there are key decisions
that have been made and issues that have been resolved, which need to be
communicated. Unfortunately, the officers often leave those meetings with different
interpretations of what has been decided and what is to be communicated.
I once witnessed an executive team leave a staff meting after deciding to establish a hiring
freeze throughout the company. Fifteen minuets after the meeting had ended; an e-mail
message went out from the head of human resources to all employees, informing them
that all job requisitions were to be placed on hold until further notice. Five minutes later,
two executives’ from the staff meeting were in the HR VP's office, protesting that they
thought the hiring freeze did not apply to their divisions.
The key is to take five minutes at the need of staff meetings and ask the question, “What
do we need to communicate to our people?” After a few minutes of discussion, it will
become apparent which issues need clarification and which are appropriate to
communicate. Not only does this brief discussion avoid confusion among the officers
themselves, it gives members a sense that the people who head their respective
departments are working together and coming to agreement on important issues.
Even when officers agree on what has been decided, there may be a wide range of
viewpoints about how and how much to communicate to members. Some officers sit down
with their direct reports within a day of the meetings and fill them in on all the issues that
they need to carry down to their people. Others leave in-game mail, or private messages
on the website highlighting a few points. Still others communicate messages individually,
on the basis of which items are relevant to which people.
This discrepancy in approach causes inevitable problems. Eventually some members hear
about officer decisions from their fellow guildies, and they wonder why they are not kept in
the loop.-
See Next Article – Are We Reinforcing Clarity Through Human Systems?
© 2008, www.guildleadershipportal.com