Leading from the Inside Out - The Success Sequence

Have you ever thought about what makes a leader successful? There are countless and varied stories of how people rose to prominence as leaders, but I believe they all had at least one thing in common – they lead from the inside out.

True leaders have the ability to take vision and turn it into reality. Whether it’s a childhood dream, or something embedded in an organization’s mission statement, the successful leader is able to translate that vision into something tangible. Everything we see around us was once an idea that someone saw in his or her “mind’s eye,” and through desire and determination was able to bring that idea into fruition.

In the book, 9Things a Leader Must Do: Breaking Through to the Next Level, John Cloud wrote, “Leadership success is the process of digging up the treasures of the invisible soul in order to bring dreams, desires, and talents into the visible world.” This statement defines what leading from the inside out is.

There is a process that takes place to bring vision from the inside out into existence. That process is what I call the “Success Sequence.” Basically, the success sequence follows this order: vision - doubt/fear - go for it/take risk - fall - get up - try again - succeed ( if the fall occurs a second time: evaluate - revise - try again). To give an example of the success sequence in action, just track the path of any entrepreneur who developed a novel idea into a successful business.

James Dyson is a perfect example of how the success sequence works. Dyson had an idea (vision) that the cyclone technology he saw used at a saw mill could be used to create greater suction in vacuum cleaners. With the vision often come thoughts of doubt or fear that the vision might not be worth pursuing. Dyson said he wanted to give up every day (doubt), but he kept working (go for it) to develop his idea. Dyson developed many prototypes that did not work (fall, get up, evaluate, revise, try again). Finally, 5,127 prototypes later the Dyson Dual Cyclone vacuum cleaner was born.

By using the success sequence, a leader can transform vision into reality.