Leadership Legacy

As a leader what do you want your legacy to be?

Do you want to be remembered as a leader who delivered great change, significant improvements or fantastic results, or do you want to be remembered for something else.

One of the things I always strive for is that any changes I implement will still be in use after I leave.

Why is this important to me? It’s important because it means the changes were perceived as beneficial, not just change for change sake.

I have worked with many leaders, who as soon they left, the changes they implemented were replaced, removed or forgotten.

This means that people were only following the new process because of that leaders position, not because they believed the change was an improvement.

If the changes I implement, are rejected the day I leave, then these were the wrong processes.

To ensure that the changes are actually improvements and not just changes, I try to focus on simplicity, simplifying complexity or even better removing it. Making it easier for people to be able to do their jobs and be successful.

I often find where we eliminate complex unnecessary processes they tend to remain eliminated.

Also, given that success leads to success, if you make changes which mean that people are more successful than they were previously, then it’s very likely that people will stick with these changes, as most people like to be successful.

I am a strong believer in stewardship, which means I believe that it’s my responsibility to leave things in a better shape than what they were when I joined them.

I’d like to be remembered as someone who made a positive difference.

What would you like your legacy to be?