Sunday, September 12, 2010

Bring Back Jeff

I have been an ardent Jeff Kennett supporter and went into mourning for weeks when he lost the last election.

I had the pleasure of meeting him last week and sharing the stage with him at the recent leadership conference held on Hamilton Island.

It was fantastic to see a politician who was passionate and most of all had a vision which we have seen so lacking with the two current leaders.

He spoke about his 5 fingers of leadership and gave us an insight into Beyond Blue. He also provided a reminder not to become complacent in life, to wake up every morning and say thank you for another day; and before you retire for the night reflect on what you did well, what you could have changed and learn from your mistakes. Because no matter what life still goes on.

He talked about his rock and when he compared various incidents in his life to his rock how bad was it really.

He urged us to look after our health and ask is my lifestyle delivering me the health I want? And that when you plan to succeed in biz you plan to succeed in life; we spend a lot of time separating work from life yet work is part of life; how well can we really separate it?

Jeff’s 5 fingers of leadership were:

  • Setting goals long term and short term

  • Developing a strategy to deliver on these goals

  • Man management -recognise your strength, plug your weakness and hire people with good value; inspire your employees, your clients

  • Consistency of message – review strategy on a regular basis and if it is wrong then adjust/fix and move on.

  • Reward – yourself and your people, reward can be in different forms, ensure that you look after the welfare of your employees and they have fun when at work and enjoy life when they go home.

Leadership = risk, Jeff certainly took those in his time, lets hope that someone has the vision to appoint him as a mentor and coach and help them work towards leading this country.