The Importance of a Good Bus Driver

Warning: The following may sting a little…

We hear many times a day the recent favorite expression: “Have to get the right people on the bus and make sure they are in the right seats.”

This is a thoughtful way of considering your team, their talents and potential, and the overall effectiveness of the people “on the bus”.  Many owners and managers strive to improve the talents and “seating” configurations to try to get the occupants to perform better.  They look outside the bus to see if they can change riders.  These are all important efforts for leaders trying to improve their organization.  Might I suggest that the equally or even greater concern might be the bus driver?

The bus driver is absolutely critical to the direction the team is traveling.  Their speed and effectiveness.  Attracting talent, keeping talent and managing talent (assigning seats) is a must to make sure the riders are successful.  If the riders don’t like the direction, most don’t get off the bus, they simply stay unhappy about the ride. However, can you risk losing talent even if unhappy?

Today, finding talent and even “ok” riders is hard.  The ability to improve the staff by hiring new staff is not easy.  The precious riders that ARE on the bus need to be coached, trained, held accountable and encouraged maybe even more now than ever!

An organization’s leader(s) must be introspective and honest about how they navigate and steer the group.  They are the most in control of direction, strategy and in how the rest of the group perceives the ride.  It starts with the leader(s) and ends with the leader(s).

If you are a leader and don’t like the direction you are going or the speed, it’s likely the riders only own a little of that.

See, that didn’t hurt so bad did it?