I had an interesting conversation yesterday with someone who asked the question, “Why does leadership matter in building a business?” To be honest, I was taken aback with the pointed question and even more so when I realized they were seriously questioning whether leadership was relevant at all and they were a so called “industry expert” qualified in business matters.
Orrin Woodward’s famous quote is that “Everything rises and falls on leadership!” It is the quintessential building block for success in any organization, business, or endeavor. If you have goal and a leader helping you get there then you have a shot at achieving success. If you have a goal but no leader you are destined for failure. Warren Buffet has proven this point over the years as his investment strategies have always been to invest in companies that have strong leadership and stay away from any company that have poor leadership, no matter how good the opportunity might look.
I can only speculate that this individual I mentioned earlier probably thought that in business one should focus all energies on issues like product offerings, distribution, market saturation, profit margin, inventory control, and a litany of other related areas. These are all important and must be studied but in the proper order. Just as you have to lay the foundation before you can build the house, you must start with leadership and then move into the other areas if you really want to build a successful business or organization. The Orrin Woodwards and Warren Buffets of the world focus first and foremost on leadership and then worry about the rest. Why? Because leadership dictates success!
Leaders provide the vision, the dream, the goal, and the motivation to achieve against all odds. A leader with a goal and a vision is what makes a world class restaurant different from an average restaurant. Good leaders spawn new industries that are successful while poor leaders run old industries into bankruptcy and failure. A leader can take a great sports team and win a championship while teams full of talented players with no true leader get left behind. Business is no different!
Orrin Woodward has an example of the difference between a business with a leader and one without. A business or organization without a leader is like a stagnate pool of water. Slowly over time it gets dirtier and filled with filth. It stinks, there is no movement of the water and bacterial starts to grow. So to, an organization without a leader providing a vision, goal, and direction and the motivation to achieve it will start to stagnate and problems will eventually arise. Standards will slack, people will have problems, quality will drop, and performance will suffer. The business is doomed to suffer until a leader comes in to fix the problem.
The opposite is true as well. An organization with great leadership is like a flowing stream or river. There is a current that keeps the water fresh and moving in the right direction. The leader is that current. They provide the direction that everyone else follows. They provide a vision, goal, and the motivation to get there. If you are following along you get swept away by the current. Achieving success is easier because the leader is helping by being the current and pulling and pushing everyone along and keeping everyone focused on the end result.
Is leadership important in business? Absolutely! Orrin Woodward and Warren Buffet have proven this and have the results to back up their analysis. Leadership is the core building block of success no matter what occupation, business, or industry you find yourself in. Those who think otherwise are destined for failure or at best mediocrity and everyone knows if you are not moving forward you are getting stagnate!
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