Maybe It’s You?

I have almost 11,000 people on my newsletter list. My guess is 80% of them are either in the automobile business or a related field. The other 20% come from all types of businesses.

A few weeks ago I wrote an article with 30 bullet points about stinky leadership and the fix for each bullet point. Actually, there were 29 of them. Number 30 was reserved for the readers to hit reply and give me one of their favorite stinky things that leadership does.

The number of replies was staggering. Even more staggering was the common theme among them. Wanna guess what it was?

The number one issue for most people is that the Dealer, GM or GSM talks the talk, but doesn’t walk the walk.

They demand people be on time and they are late.

They demand people work bell to bell and they leave early.

They require people to be responsive to customer complaints and they drag the feet when it’s put in their lap.

They say treat people like family and they treat people like poop.

The theme of asking others to do things that top leadership doesn’t or won’t do went on and on.

My view on leadership is that it just isn’t that hard to be a good leader. Most of it is common sense. As we all know though, common sense isn’t so common.

Maybe it’s time to look in the mirror. Maybe it’s you. That’s all I’m gonna say. Tommy Gibbs