In this podcast episode, I talk the essence of authentic leadership. What is it? Is it simply influence or is it something more.

I have always been fascinated by this topic. Perhaps because I enjoy creating models that try to explain something people want to know about.

Click to Listen

Podcast: Subscribe in iTunes | Play in new window | Download

Several years ago, I had lunch with a prominent, formerly best-selling author. He was angry that his sales had been in steady decline for several years. Unwilling to accept any responsibility, he poked his finger in my chest and hissed, “My job is to write the books; your job is to market them.”

In the old world, he was right. Authors created the product and relied on their publishing company to market it. But that world is dead. That doesn’t mean that publishing companies expect you to do everything. But it does mean that they are more effective if you have a platform already in place. It provides something for them to leverage.

Last spring, Jim Bradford, Dean of Owen Graduate School of Management at Vanderbilt University, interviewed me on my leadership philosophy and practice. He asked some tough questions. I tried to be as candid as I could be.

I intended to share the video here on my blog a few months ago, but it got lost in the shuffle. However, I thought about it today and thought you might enjoy seeing it.

Continuing in my series of “20 Leadership Questions,” we come to the third question that Michael Smith asked when he interviewed me. This is one that every leader inevitably faces as his organizations grows.

When we think of leaders from America’s revolutionary era, our minds jump to military commanders like George Washington, political organizers like Samuel Adams, and rousing orators like Patrick Henry. In the hierarchy of the Revolution, these men stand atop the loftiest rungs. For good reason.

Many people have written on what it means to be a leader. Almost everyone identifies influence as the primary characteristic. By definition, this means that leadership and position are two different things. You can have a title, and a position of power, but this does not mean that you are a leader. Even people without these things can exert influence and thus leadership.

Bad customer experiences can be great opportunities to transform not-wow into wow. When people have a bad customer experience, their expectations are lowered. Usually, this results in the customer abandoning the product or service and moving to a competitor.