So this wasn’t the post I was planning on writing today. In fact, I had another one 3/4 finished, but on the way home from work I was listening to a Harvard Business Review IdeaCast, as I sometimes do, and I had a bit of a “light-bulb” moment. Through Divine intervention, or too much caffeine, or both, I connected some dots in my head and had to pull over to scribble some ideas down on my hand so I could share them with you. Hopefully this is as enlightening in print as it is in my head.

Leadership and Algorithms

The podcast was an interview with a fellow named Marcus Buckingham. The topic of the day was whether leadership could be taught through algorithms. He made the point that in most of our media outlets, the provider does some legwork in terms of figuring out what a person will like before even providing the content. He argued that personal development, and especially leadership development should be the same way. Think about it; iTunes will suggest albums based on what other people bought, Amazon will offer books you might like, Facebook’s ads are targeted to you based on your likes and dislikes, and Netflix runs you through a questionnaire when you sign up so that they can point out movies you might like when you’re browsing. Why couldn’t leadership training be the same? Buckingham argues it can and should be the same.

Buckingham’s vision is for leaders in a given company to be able to slowly but regularly take in media (audio, video, pictures, text, etc.) recorded by more senior leaders that they respect and admire. That way, a young leader isn’t forced to read a manual or training video that they may or may not respond to. Rather, they can draw from a reservoir of media from people that “match”. He argues that this will lead to better leadership development for junior leaders, because the developing leader relates better to the senior one. He invokes the imagery of an intravenous drip. You get a slow drip, drip, drip of leadership development over time, and after a while, you end up retaining a lot of that information and can start practicing it.

I agree completely.

So What?

All that being said, what does this mean for you? This is where the light bulbs started going off for me. I recently read a book from Tom Rath called Strengths Finder 2.0. Rath argues that people spend way too much time trying to fix their personal deficiencies (i.e. introverts trying to be more extroverted or analytical people trying to be more creative) and nowhere near enough time developing those things that we already have a natural strength in. The idea being that you’ll perform better in life and be happier if you focus your energy on things you’re really good at. It struck me that this idea lines up beautifully with what Buckingham was saying in his HBR IdeaCast. Both of these guys are suggesting that you focus on what works for you. Buckingham’s version was to emulate leadership styles that jive with you, through media that jives with you, and Rath is suggesting developing skills and aptitude that jives with you. The take home message is that you have your own personal current – don’t work against it. Work with it.

An Hour a Day to Expertise

Now, the next piece of the puzzle comes from an interview I heard with Yanik Silver. Yanik is something of an internet business genius. He was being asked about his success in internet business and how he got his start. His response was that he had heard if you spent an hour a day reading something on a certain topic, in five years’ time, you’ll be an expert. So, his strategy to get into internet business was to read about it for two ours a day and to take some kind of action on what he had read.

That’s when it struck me – what if you took in an hour a day of leadership-related media every day for the next five years? This is where things get really interesting, because it’s 100% possible to do this, and do it in exactly the way Buckingham suggests in his interview. You can find this media on your own, from people you admire and respect, do it on your own time, and best of all, do it for free.

How Do You Actually Do This?

As St. Paul writes, test everything and hold fast to what is good. Go check out podcasts, YouTube channels, blogs (try alltop.com and search for leadership), look up audio books on iTunes or from your local library (that’s right, your library can lend MP3 audiobooks). Just go take it a TON of stuff for the next two weeks. After that, ditch what you’re not into, but make a habit of taking in those things you like. I especially like audio because I can listen to it while commuting, working, doing the dishes, laundry, cutting the grass… you get the idea. “Not having time” is no problem with audio.

Closing Thoughts

So there you have it. Go start your own intravenous leadership media drip, and start implementing what you learn. Be sure to et the community know what your favourites are in the comment section below.

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