People often ask why I named this company Loving Leaders. After all, it is an odd name for a company serving executives and entrepreneurs, right?
The truth is, I was tired of seeing the greed, the stress, the intimidation, the manipulation and the value extraction of the current leadership paradigm. I knew we needed an entirely new leadership paradigm – one based on creating sustainable businesses with:
- leaders who love what they do
- leaders who want to create environments where their employees love what they do
- employees who love to come to work and do a great job
- customers who feel – yes – loved, taken care of, and appreciated fully.
That’s what I’m all about. I’m interested in helping people create sustainable businesses that intermingle with their sustainable lives.
What I had been seeing in the business world seemed to be working toward, or at least ending up, with the exact opposite. Greed, stress, intimidation, manipulation, and using people up until they burn out simply destroy sustainability.
My belief is that a business can only be sustainable when the leaders and the team members truly love what they do, feel supported by the work they do and the company they do it with, believe they are contributing to something greater than or more important than just the work itself, and when the customers or clients can actually feel this through their interactions with the company.
My particular specialty is in helping people tailor their business so they can love it. That’s a fundamental piece when creating sustainability.
I work with people to establish all sorts of metrics to gauge how their business is doing. A specific one I use in my own is “personal fulfillment”. I measure fulfillment levels of myself and my team because each person’s level of fulfillment affects the business. It affects how we feel about the work we do, our energy and commitment we bring to the table when we’re actually doing the work or interacting with clients and potential clients, and quite frankly, it affects how creative and resourceful we are when coming up with new solutions.
Fulfillment is defined as “reaching our potential individually.”
When I told my mom I decided to name my business Loving Leaders, LLC, her response was “That doesn’t sound very business-like to me.” And I said, “Exactly. That’s the problem.” (Meaning: That’s the problem with business.)
We’ve associated anger and greed and stress and difficulty with business, rather than love, creativity, responsiveness, generosity, fulfillment and wealth. Leaders are rewarded for working long hours, working much harder than they need to, and getting as much out of their employees as they can before the employee decides to seek employment elsewhere.
Rarely are leaders in traditional business rewarded for love, creativity, responsiveness, generosity, fulfillment and wealth. Maybe they get acknowledged for some of these things, some of the time, but as a business paradigm, it’s a fairly lonely one.
Recently a client I have worked with continuously for 11 years said “I really respect your commitment to me. I never thought I would meet anyone who cared about my business as much as I did. Thank you!”
That’s the kind of business leader I want to be. I hope I exhibit this level of commitment with every person I work with and inspire them to do the same. That’s why Loving Leaders exists.
Love is about giving people, our businesses, and important things in our lives the attention, devotion, commitment, and sometimes the kick in the ass, they need.
Love is about respecting something fully. It means wanting the best for it. It also means not letting it off the hook.
Loving Leaders – It’s who we are. It’s what we do. It’s who we help others become. Do you love your business like I do?