Trivia Question: Considering players in the history of the 4 major professional team sports in North America (NFL, MLB, NBA and NHL) only one player has won the Championship in that sport and was named MVP of the playoffs before even playing his rookie season. Name that player.
How many times have you heard the statement, ‘He/she is a born leader’?
That statement is pure nonsense. Leadership, however defined, is a learned behavior and can be developed over time and with the right set of circumstances and experiences. That’s not to say two people with the same circumstances and experience will both develop into leaders. No, the defining factor is what the future leader does with those circumstances and experiences. How many times have you seen the resume of someone and said ‘Wow, this person is a real leader’ only to find the reality is that they’re a dud?
There is a movie called ’12 O’clock High’ starring Gregory Peck as a newly appointed Commanding Officer of a failing, rag-tag military aviation unit. The movie is really about leadership and how it is applied (amazingly enough the movie is also entertaining).
It shows Peck’s character as someone who has the wisdom, foresight and leadership ability to discern when to crack down, when to loosen the reins, when to praise, when to counsel, when to correct and when to ignore. The unit went on to become very successful thanks to his leadership.
Sure, he is in a formal leadership position but often the true leader is not the formal leader. I’m sure most, if not all of you, has seen situations in your agency where a very junior person is clearly the informal leader. The opposite can also be true where the formal, designated leader is someone who couldn’t lead the cattle into the barn with the doors open. Think; ‘I’m their leader, where did they go’? Hint; they’re following the informal leader.
There is also a trend in police work, as well as other endeavors, to assume that the best Officer would be the best Sergeant or the best Sergeant would automatically be the best Lieutenant. That is sometimes true but often that line of thinking leads to the phenomenon of ‘promoting someone to their level of incompetence then promoting them again’.
Another thing that sometimes occurs is something that borders on misuse of public funds; the ‘gift’ promotion, i.e. promotion of an individual leading up to a planned retirement as a gift (status, higher retirement pay) for his/her long service to the agency, not for any real qualification for the position. This kind of thing can cause serious damage to the morale of the agency, especially if that person chooses not to retire as planned.
The whole concept of leadership is the stuff of deep thought and diverse opinions but most of you, thankfully, have the insight and ability to know true leadership when you see it. During these times of economic upheaval the true leaders must step to the fore and guide the agency on the right path to solvency and enable the agency to carry out its mission.
InTime Solutions has earned the leadership role in staff scheduling with a long history of adapting our products to meet the needs of our clients. We value that role and continue to work to recognize the changing times that affect both our current and future partners. We encourage those of you who are not yet on our partner list to ask a simple question of our current partners; Would you recommend InTime Solutions and it’s products to my agency?
I’m confident you will get a resounding ‘Yes’ response.
Be safe out there.
Trivia Answer: Strange but true. It happened to Montreal Canadiens (NHL) goalie Ken Dryden who was called up a few games before the playoffs began in 1971. He led the Canadiens to their win of the Stanley Cup and was named the MVP of the playoffs but he hadn’t played enough regular season games to qualify as a rookie until the next season when he was named NHL Rookie of the Year.
In your heart you just knew I’d get hockey into this, didn’t you’?
