Leadership is solving problems. The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help or concluded you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership. - Colin Powell

I've been a leader of people for many years across various roles; I believe some are built for it, have natural attributes that lean them towards leadership, and others are followers. All good leaders will be able to learn from others, evaluate good and bad examples, and apply that knowledge to becoming a better leader. This new series is designed to expose great quotes by various leaders and to investigate how they may relate or apply to myself or others. _{original im src}

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This week's leadership quote

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Leadership is solving problems. The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help or concluded you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership.

_{- Colin Powell -}

I've known people to confuse confidence with arrogance despite them being two totally different things. I can see how it happens though, as those with less confidence often see those with it as arrogant; a foolish misjudgement of course.

During the many years I've spent in a leadership role, and operating within a chain of command, I've come to understand the importance of confidence in respect of the leaders themselves and those being led. Leadership isn't simply issuing orders and directives for underlings to follow, it's so much more than that, and one element is problem-solving. A leader is responsible for reaching an objective, and understanding and overcoming obstacles in the path towards it, so solving problems is a critical step towards gaining success.

Similarly, the leader faces obstacles, (and opportunities), within the team and the individual members of it and solving problems that may arise there are equally important to mission-success as is solving external problems.

I've always maintained an open door policy with my teams and encouraged the team members to bring me their concerns that I may assist them, offer direction and expertise or simply support them. It's brought an increased work-rate, more effort, passion, accountability, team-spirit and has inspired the team to support and empower each other - an all-over good result.

A word on accountability though...In having an open door policy and being accepting of the team bringing me problems, I've always asked that a solution comes with it, or several.

I give them ownership of the solutions and hold them accountable for the process and results; sometimes they take charge of the decisions also, that can be a very advantageous thing to promote.

I call it, providing support without removing responsibility, which ultimately empowers the team and allows me the scope to reward them for their efforts, processes, thoughts, attitudes, actions and outcomes. It also, over time, brings them a degree of confidence in themselves, and a whole lot of confidence in me as they know they're supported, and that their achievements will be recognised.

Not every workplace or team is a democracy; few really are I think. That means orders, directives and instructions will come down the chain, and there's situations in which they must be followed whether the team agree or not; a great deal relies upon it sometimes, in battle or in business.

It's at those times the team must feel confident in the leadership team and that is not something a leader can order the team into, it's built over time and with a lot of consistent, effort. Discussion on the path forward isn't always collective, it doesn't always involve the entire team, but supporting and empowering the team should be widespread and being a problem-solver and empowering the team to do the same, is one way to empower a team. The result of not doing so will result in a lack of confidence, bad attitudes, counter-productivity and often insubordination...so failure...of the leader.

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If you have any thoughts on this leadership quote, experiences of your own, or questions please feel free to comment below.

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