CRM - Empowering Leaders

Take The Risk 

The freedom to risk is directly correlated with the freedom to innovate. All innovation, all creativity, all new ideas are inherently risky. In fact, in a world that is changing so rapidly, even doing what has been tried and true in the past can be risky. There are no guarantees of success. Therefore, it is critical to build a culture where there is freedom to fail. When someone truly has the freedom to fail without undue fear of personal repercussion, then they have the freedom to risk.

We say more about what is acceptable by who we choose to honor than almost any other behavior. Therefore, there is probably a need to honor people who failed in spite of the quantity or quality of their efforts. This is profoundly different than honoring people who failed out of laziness or carelessness.

It is important to note that creating an environment that nurtures risk will challenge the ability of leadership to release control. It will challenge the willingness of leaders to trust other people. And it will surface the character - based issues of reputation and ambition: What will others think of me if our organization stumbles? What if we release people to try new things and they succeed better than I would have? What if someone else's new idea diverts attention and resources from my agendas?

Without a culture of risk:

• There is a lack of freedom to innovate or pioneer what's new.  
• People live in fear of judgment, failure, or disapproval, rather an in the confidence of support and encouragement.
  
• The size of an organization's collective comfort zone actually decreases... we move further away from the edge.
  
• Potential leaders are not discovered or appreciated... leadership cannot be developed without the freedom to lead.  
• There is a steady loss of leaders. Leaders want a place to serve that will allow them to lead, an opportunity to enlarge the tent, a place where they are trusted to use their gifts. Over time, organizational "leadership" positions are filled by those committed to the status quo.