The Quintessential Leader

The current focus of the majority of humans, including those in leadership positions, is metrics. Metrics, put simply, is numbers. Quantity – how much – is increasingly valued over quality – what kind.

We humans have, in general, bought into an erroneous – with often disastrous results – more, more, more shallow and indefensible mindset that deceives us into thinking that the bottom line of success is determined by a numerical value.

We see this attachment to and preoccupation with metrics, to the total exclusion of quality, everywhere in our lives.

In our personal lives, we focus solely on having a lot of money, having a lot of things, doing a lot of things, and living a lot of years. Because numbers are what we care about, we will – and do – sacrifice quality – and integrity (truth, honesty, and moral excellence) – to get quantity.

In our organizational lives, the endgame is having a lot of money (profits and income, personally and organizationally) and having a lot of customers (who presumably will bring us more money). Again, because numbers are what we care about organizationally , we will – and do – sacrifice quality – and integrity (truth, honesty, and moral excellence) – to get quantity.

Most of what we take for granted as our everyday world is based on metrics.

The internet, for instance, is a numbers game, both on the back side that most of us don’t see (everything’s manipulated using a numerical foundation, from web analytics to search engines to the actual bits – the 0 or 1 structure – that define the code that runs every part of the internet) and the front side that we do see.

Modern project management is another example of a metrics-based system. In the end, numbers are what matter: time and output.

Numbers are not unimportant. However, they are only important in the context of quality, not quantity.

This is what quintessential leaders understand and that is why they realize that the process is the key to real, verifiable, and sustainable successful outcomes.

If our processes are comprehensive, well-defined, and well-implemented, then the quality numbers will follow.

Quantity is just quantity. One of the most maddening things about modern life is this desire to have quantity of life versus quality of life.

It makes no sense. Who in their right mind wants to live extra years if those years have no quality? To me, that would be far worse than death. Yet, that is exactly what modern medicine is designed to and strives to achieve.

We buy lots of stuff – way more than we could ever use or need – simply to have it and to have more than anyone else. Yet most of what we buy now is cheaply made so it doesn’t last and we keep having to buy more because the quality just isn’t there.

It would be far less expensive, in the long run, to buy less but high-quality things that would last over time and to buy only what we absolutely need. But consumerism and materialism, which we’ve, in general, wholeheartedly bought into, is also a numbers game.

In the organizational context, quantity, in general, has become more valuable than quality. Because of this shift in focus, many people in leadership positions overlook or completely ignore the key element of quality: the process. Succumbing to the superficial and, in the long run, meaningless numbers (metrics) game has led to lots of quantity, but very little quality in most organizations.

Quintessential leaders, on the other hand, put the process, which ensures quality (and, in the long term, produces viable, sustainable, and meaningful quantity) first and keep that in focus at all times.

Too often, those in leadership positions blame people when things are not working well or not working at all. The reality is that if things are not working well or working at all, then the problem is really with the process and that is what needs to be reviewed and either revised or redone altogether.

When the process is the key to everything, then the focus is on quality first.

The simple reason that most people, including those in leadership positions, don’t make the process the key factor in successful outcomes is because a good process requires a lot of time, effort, planning, and training up front to implement it successfully.

This means, in practical terms, that numbers (metrics) are slower in materializing. Because we’ve become a metrics-based society, this “slow start” is unacceptable. However, the numbers that come quickly without a process of any kind, with a poorly-defined and poorly-implemented process, or with the wrong process lead to long-term negative and, often, unrecoverable failures as outcomes.

So what does having the process as the key to quality look like for quintessential leaders?

1. The project is well-defined with detailed planning agreed upon by all the stakeholders and thoroughly documented before the project begins. In other words, the process is delineated up front and all parties involved are in complete agreement with the scope, the work, the execution (the how), the timeline of execution, and the outcome. It is here that no stone must lay unturned and it is here that the details must be hammered out and consensus reached on each of them.
2. Once the process is defined and documented, then the people executing the process must be thoroughly trained (i.e., walked through the process step by step to understand it and be able to do it consistently and correctly) in using the process. This takes time and effort, but it is the most critical (but most often ignored) part of ensuring quality. When people understand what they’re doing, why they are doing it, and what successful completion looks like, they become invested in the process and invested in quality outcomes. When people are simply trying to hit metrics targets, they care only about numbers (quantity) and not the process (quality).
3. Throughout the project, the process is monitored and reinforced to ensure that it is the focus of each of the people involved in the project. Numbers (metrics) are never the goal, although with a great process that is implemented well, numbers will meet and exceed objectives further along in the project, but they will be quality numbers, not just quantity numbers.
4. The process as key ensures a successful and quality project completion. This includes satisfied customers who will come back again and again because they know they will get the quality results they expect, not just quantity with no inherent quality.

As we strive to be quintessential leaders, we must look at ourselves to see whether we have the process (quality) as the key to every aspect of our lives professionally and personally or we have fallen in the numbers (quantity) trap as a way of being.

We must ask ourselves if we’ve become focused on “how much” instead of “what kind.” We must ask ourselves if we even care about quality anymore. We must ask ourselves if we’re willing to make the intense upfront effort to ensure quality in every aspect of our lives.

In many ways, quintessential leaders now swim against the tide in this area of life. That swim is worth it in the big picture and in the long term. Unfortunately, because of the effort, the diligence, and the commitment – sometimes in the face of fierce opposition – it seems fewer and fewer of us are willing to make that swim consistently and continually.

How are we doing?