Innovation and Leadership

Innovation is a new way of doing things. For an organization it is creating or doing something that is outside of their comfort zone. it is taking chances, asking "why not?" or "what if?" It is finding a way to do it better, faster, cheaper, and more exciting than anyone else in the marketplace. This can be a product, service, design, or attitude.The first and most important guideline, I think, to be innovative is to have strong leadership.

It is hard to find a good leader within the company. Many people misconstrue leadership with management. This is very wrong. Management is being able to delegate to the get the job done. Leadership is acting, doing, and inspiring in such a way that people want to follow you. Leadership is a lifestyle. If you have to tell people that they SHOULD follow you or that you are a GOOD LEADER than you are not.People who are leaders are inspiring. They are exciting. They take chances. Others in the organization want to be them.

In order for an organization to be innovative they have to be that leader who stands out front and says "let's figure out, and if it doesn't work - blame me!" Because a leader draws strength off of mistakes. A leader knows that the only way to make it better is to make mistakes - lots and lots of them.The leader will stand out front of a crowd and say "Come on everybody - we can do this!" And everyone will get so excited that they will just say yes. Why? Because you have inspired them. You are willing to take the chance and push ahead, and they are excited to get on that road with you.

Confession time: I feel that I have not been a leader lately. I am finding myself turning into a manager - and I hate it. I am going to go back to the basics and figure out how to get my leader MO JO back. I will check back soon....

Personal SWOT

Right now I am studying SWOT Analysis as it has to do with a business organization. SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. As I was finishing my paper I realized that we should all take a moment, every once in a while, and inventory our own SWOT in our own personal and professional lives.

What are my strengths?
· Strong Work Ethic
· Driven
· Always on time
· Loyal friend
· Loving Mother
· Not afraid of anything
· Love to take risks
· Tons of energy
· Always up for a challenge
· Love working with new and interesting people

What are my Weaknesses?
· Zero patience
· Talk too much
· Want to do too much at once
· Horrible writing skills
· Spend money frivolously
· Procrastinate with my school work

Opportunities
· I can always find a better way to do things
· I can start a new business
· I can start a new organization
· I can find new ways to improve my weaknesses
· I can find a new adventure
· I can empower others to do better
· I can learn to prioritize better

Threats
· I will get myself into debt
· I will lose focus on the task at hand because I will be working on too many things at once
· I will bore and lose interest
· I will trust too much

It is funny because when you sit down and take SWOT inventory of yourself like this, it makes you appreciate the good things about yourself that you can bank on. It also lists the things that you need to really look at improving on.
If you are interested in creating a SWOT analysis of your business I highly recommend the following:
http://www.markintell.com/swot-analysis-tools-templates/

http://www.marketware.biz/swot_analysis_chart.htm

http://www.rapidbi.com/created/SWOTanalysis.html

Meanwhile, I am going to go look for a Project Management or Budgeting class!