The Royal Navy's First Serving Mother Publishes a Book on Leadership

The Mindful Command framework simplifies the journey for leaders treading the path to developing real leadership skills.

Sally-Anne-Airey, who in the 1990s became the first woman to continue to serve in the Royal Navy after becoming a mother, is publishing her first book, Mindful Command, this month, September. 

The title shares in a clear and accessible way the lessons Airey learned as she rose to the rank of Commander in the Navy and later built on in a second career as a leadership coach. Introducing her original Mindful Command framework, she simplifies the journey for others treading the path to developing real leadership skills.

Airey spent 23 years in the Royal Navy and saw all kinds of leadership, good and bad. Observing these leaders and the outcomes they achieved gave her huge insight into what works and also what doesn't.

Highly effective leaders express who they are through their thoughts, words and actions. They are inwardly directed and outwardly aware, realistic and astute. They consistently align who they are with how they lead, no matter what is happening around them. In this way, they embody the self-mastery necessary to inspire and lead others well in all situations.

Why did Sally-Anne Airey write her book? She explains why: “I decided to write Mindful Command because many of the leaders whose lives the framework has changed have urged me to. It’s the basis of Evolving Leadership, my nine-month leadership programme, and now that it’s been tried, tested, and refined many times over, I’m finally ready to share it with the rest of the world. I’ve made the book as practical and concise as I can, for busy people who want to be better leaders, or who simply want to improve their own personal presence and impact.”

Airey’s Mindful Command leadership framework has four foundations which she calls Balanced Awareness, Clear Purpose, Fearless Compassion and Inner Stability. Mastering all four of them helps leaders cultivate the capacity to show up, whatever the circumstance, as their clear, calm, centred self, confident of doing the right thing.

Brian Garish, President, Mars Veterinary Health International, says: “The best leaders do not leave their humanity at the office door and Sally-Anne understands this better than most people I know.”

After her successful career in the Royal Navy, Sally-Anne Airey founded Skilful Leaders, where she coaches leaders and their teams to become who they really want to be, to do the work they really want to do.

Mindful Command is published on 28 September 2023 by LID Publishing, available as a paperback and e-book.

https://www.lidpublishing.com

This book will make an ideal Christmas gift for the leader or aspiring leader in your life.

Narcissistic leaders cause employees undue stress in crisis situations

Vulnerable, narcissistic leaders are especially likely to make employees irritated and stressed during crisis situations, reveals new research from NEOMA Business School.

Birgit Schyns, who is a distinguished Professor of People and Organisations at NEOMA, and co-authors analysed survey data on workers in the UK education sector during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Respondents reported their levels of irritation and Coronavirus-related concerns and worries in five weekly surveys, as well as their experiences with vulnerable narcissistic leadership, an unstable form of leadership characterised by covert feelings of entitlement.

The study learned employees subjected to this kind of behaviour reported feeling more irritation in general, and this irritation worsened in weeks when they were exposed to higher amounts of vulnerable narcissistic behaviour from those who were in charge.

“Resources are often already stretched thin in crisis situations. Vulnerable narcissistic leaders strain them further, for instance they might not give employees guidelines on how to accomplish goals or blaming others for their own shortcomings. 

"Employees already short on time and energy are required to invest more in making sense of their leader’s behaviours,” points out Professor Schyns.

The researchers suggest organisations need to be aware of potential red flags of narcissistic leadership, such as punishing others for taking the initiative, as the irritation this causes followers can lead to more severe mental health impairments.

“Followers can be protected by implementing checks and balances and adjusting HR practices to better deal with these behaviours,” says Professor Schyns.

https://neoma-bs.com

(Image courtesy of OpenClipart-Vectors from Pixabay)

1st Annual Advances in Leadership Conference in London

Dr Nigel MacLennan

Leadership: the route to recovery?

19 speakers, all of whom have led advances in leadership are gathering together to share their progress at the 1st Annual Advances in Leadership Conference in London, from 18th - 20th April 2012.

By encouraging our leaders to advance their skills and knowledge, recovery can be quick, and probably very engaging.

The more leaders have knowledge of the advances, the faster will be our recovery. If the leaders of UK companies performed just a little better, by say 5%, we could be back to growth in months.

In a time of economic woes - growing unemployment, "of an entire generation of young people out of work" - that has lasted 4 years, so far, there comes a point when it is clear that we need to do more to recover. What? Leadership.

Currently 70% of people who leave their jobs do so because of their boss; bad attitude, poor or non-existent leadership, etc. Of those who stay, 80% report being less than fully engaged at work; again, poor leadership.

Can there be anyone who does not know that we all perform better when we are motivated; when our work has meaning; when we are engaged? How much better do we perform when we are inspired? 10%? 20%? 30%? Whatever the figure, it makes a difference.

What would be the effect on our economies if leaders knew how to better engage their staff; If every organisational leader in the struggling western economies could create the environment for a mere 5% improvement in staff performance? We would be thriving in a matter of months - back to growth.

"Growth is not "magic-ed" out of thin air. Most growth comes from advances in products and services; providing solutions never before available (innovation), or tweaking existing products and services to provide solutions faster, better, or cheaper than before (process innovation). If more leaders knew how to harness the creative and innovate thoughts of their staff the results would be amazing," says Dr Nigel MacLennan, author of 58 publications in the field of leadership, and one of the speakers at the conference.

That's just one of many leadership routes to recovery. Here's another:

We can never hope to cut our way to recovery, particularly when cuts are not based on return on investment (ROI) - you don't cut costs that trigger reductions in valuable revenue, or cause further costs to be incurred. You cut what is producing the least return on investment (in the widest sense of that phrase) and put the savings into what produces the best ROI. Here's a question that might reveal a truth? When have you ever heard a political leader express that point?

We can lead our way to recovery, if and only if, our leaders have the techniques to improve performance. One of the many techniques now available is the ability we have to better judge ROI.

Many more leadership techniques are available, that, if applied could lead us to recovery, and leaders at the cutting-edge are fully aware of them. The problem is, that most leaders don't know the methods, or if they do, they don't know how to implement them. Fortunately we now know more of how to close the knowledge-implementation gap than ever before, opening up, yet another, leadership route to recovery.

When the known techniques are applied, they produce astounding results, often contrary to what normally happens. For instance, you might predict that in our time of economic troubles that crime would be increasing, as, cyclically, it always does. Even against that powerful macro-economic driver, recorded crime on the London underground has been reduced to the lowest in recorded history (by Police using advances in leadership techniques). Source: British Transport Police.