"There can be economy only where there is efficiency." -- Benjamin Disraeli, former British Prime Minister. All leaders wear multiple hats, with their roles as Coach, Overseer, Mentor, and Good Example fairly obvious to anyone willing to look. But another function often goes unnoticed: that of Caretaker. Leaders don't just juggle projects and push people to work harder; they also protect their team from any factor that might jam the gears of productivity. While no analogy can survive over-analysis, you can consider any organizational unit (whether team, department, or division) a kind of garden, where a good leader works to weed out the inefficiencies in the system. This holds true whether those inefficiencies take the form of unproductive employees, bureaucratic red tape, or poorly … [Read more...]