As leaders our goal should be to create sustainable success, not just short term gain or short term profits. Sustainable success is about creating a better brighter future not only for us, but also for those that follow us.
When we are just focused on short term success, then our leadership is more about us rather than the people following us, with short term-ism we are looking to get in and get out quickly, and then looking to move onto bigger and better things.
When we take this approach any success that is achieved will be quickly lost and things will revert back to the way they were, very soon. Obviously we would be able to deny that it was our fault as we are no longer there, and that the reversal didn’t happen on our watch.
But irrespective of this, it’s still our fault.
Sustainable success takes longer to create, we need to focus on changing culture, embedding new processes, and new ways of working.
This takes time, we need to plant the seeds of change, nurture them, allow them to take root, and then to water them until they grow strong.
When we do that, when we take our time and let the roots develop and grow strong, then the probability of a reversal is much lower.
Our goal should always be to achieve sustainable success which will endure longer than our tenure as a leader.
Gordon Tredgold