Mentors represent knowledge, reflection, insight, and wisdom. They offer understanding, compassion, strategy, and good advice. They engender trust, issue challenges, provide encouragement, and offer positive reinforcement. It is the Extreme Leaders' responsibility to mentor those brilliant mavericks that the rapidly evolving business landscape attracts – those individuals defined as willfully independent and dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge and innovation. They challenge the common practices of business – business they see as ready for change and renewal.
Mavericks continually raise uncomfortable questions that challenge the status quo, inspiring us to go wider and deeper – not to hide from the reality of the ever-evolving global marketplace.
Mavericks consistently inquire into how they can do something radically different. They want to think about the next big idea and make it happen.
Mavericks want to make a difference, discover how to re-create and re-energize their team, division, organization, and their world. They are Extreme Leaders in the making - you want Mavericks, indeed, you NEED them.
I know, I was one (still am to a great extent) and have mentored many...
In his book, Leading The Revolution, Gary Hamel warns, “Most people in industry are blind in the same way. They’re all paying attention to the same things... and not paying attention to the same things”. Mavericks are just the opposite, they understand that strategy and product/service development can no longer be about replication, competing from virtually identical playbooks - they get that innovation and reinvention are an "X" factor to organizational (and individual) success. Extreme Leaders know that mavericks are their best opportunity to continually and successfully reinvent the organization.
A transformational approach to leading mavericks is required. A single maverick can be challenging, a team of mavericks can be downright intimidating - yet exhilarating at the same time. Mavericks are extremely confident by nature and if managed appropriately, are likely to unleash their creativity and insight to the benefit of the entire organization.
Appreciating and recognizing the possibilities mavericks bring to an organization is extremely important. When processes or projects become entangled, turn to skilled mavericks for unorthodox solutions and infectious enthusiasm, and leverage their willingness to involve and commit themselves 110% to ideas and projects. If change is causing chaos and confusion in the organization, a maverick’s visionary foresight will encourage creativity and inspire the whole group to passionately pursue their game-changing future. Always keep in mind what Earl Bakken (founder of Medtronic) said about these unique individuals: “You want to have some mavericks who are out ahead 5 or 6 years. If you don’t have them, you better grow them …”.
It is critically important to establish and maintain an environment where new ideas— often outside of the corporate norm, sometimes radical—can be heard and evaluated. Extreme Leaders find ways to pay specific attention to what their “idea people” are saying and doing – they listen and understand that from the maverick will come the innovation and reinvention of the future. They listen, even when the listening is not particularly pleasant or easy. They understand, as they listen, that talented mavericks do not always communicate in a direct or linear manner. In some cases, the communication is both brilliant and confusing, and it is the role of the Extreme Leader to provide for the essential interpretation and operationalization to leverage the information to the company’s benefit. It is the Extreme Leader’s function to hear the ideas, but more importantly, to encourage and guide them toward successful ends.
Extreme Leaders neither bury brilliant mavericks, nor let them venture too far off on their own – they mentor them in a purposeful and meaningful context. With an enormous amount of imagination and patience, Extreme Leaders accommodate their thinkers on a global basis and give them the support their brilliance deserves. The challenge in leading mavericks is great, but so, too, are the potential rewards.
Who are your mavericks and how are you going to mentor them?
Please engage the discussion and let us know how you mentor your mavericks. Feel free to contact me atSheriLMackey@gmail.com. Visit again soon for new editions of Leadership Across Boundaries & Borders.
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