THE FIVE PRACTICES OF EXEMPLARY LEADERSHIP
In undertaking the transformation at Zeno, Barby Siegel seized the opportunity to change business as usual. And although Barby’s story is exceptional, it is not singular. We’ve been conducting original global research for more than thirty years, and we’ve discovered that such achievements are actually commonplace. When we ask people to tell us about their personal-best leadership experiences—experi- ences that they believe are their individual standards of excellence— there are thousands of success stories just like Barby’s.2 We’ve found them in profit-based firms and nonprofits, agriculture and mining, manufacturing and utilities, banking and health care, government and education, the arts and community service, and many, many others. These leaders are employees and volunteers, young and old, women and men. Leadership knows no racial or religious bounds, no ethnic or cultural borders. Leaders reside in every city and every country, in every function and every organization. We find exem- plary leadership everywhere we look.
And we’ve also found that in the best organizations, everyone, regardless of title or position, is encouraged to act like a leader. That’s because in these places, people don’t just believe that everyone can make a difference; they act in ways to develop and grow people’s talents, including their leadership capabilities. Joon Chin Fum-Ko, director of people development and engagement at Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore, underscores this thinking when she explains how they are “working to build an organization and culture where everyone feels that they are leaders, regardless of what they do, and appreciates that what each one of us does has an impact, even a legacy.”