Wimpy Leaders

You cannot be wimpy out there on the dream-seeking trail. Dare to break through barriers, to find your own path. ~ Les Brown.

I have written about bully leaders previously, but I have not addressed until now, the other end of the spectrum – wimpy bosses. While not as obnoxious as a bully boss, the wimpy leader can be exasperating in different ways.

There are numerous characteristics that define a boss as being on the wimpy side, here are six habits that stand out to me:

1. Procrastination, slow decisions, analysis paralysis

I am reminded of the cartoon character “Wimpy” in the Popeye Cartoon, (I know I am dating myself – and as Groucho used to say, “If you are dating yourself, you aren’t likely to have many children”). Wimpy was famous for the line, “I would gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today.” That characteristic of postponing things is one of the hallmarks of a wimpy boss. Regardless of the issue, there are some bosses who do not want to face making a decision, so they ask for more analysis or more time. Eventually people get the message that there isn’t going to be a firm answer.

2. Not standing up for people in discussions with higher management 

Another trait of a wimpy boss is that the person will not stand up for people who work for him or her. If upper layers of management perceive an individual incorrectly, the wimpy boss is going to be a “yes man” and not challenge the misconception.

3. Waffling depending on which way the wind is blowing - "flip-flopping" 

Wimpy bosses do not hold firm to decisions made on principle. They bend with the breeze coming from on high and waffle when asked to take a stand on issues involving integrity. They are like chameleons and change colors to blend in with the background.

4. No backbone, does not confront people who abuse 

When a person is abusing other employees, the wimpy boss does not step in with strong action to stop the problem. Instead, problems are allowed to fester and well up because the boss has no strength or backbone.

5. Using Authority instead of Power 

To make up for the perception of being weaker, these bosses who have not earned sufficient power make the mistake of trying to influence others by overexerting their authority. But excessive use of authority can cause employees to rebel in much the same way that children rebel against restrictive parents.

6. Encouraging ‘up-delegated’ tasks 

Too nice is being a doormat and letting people walk all over you. To placate whiny employees and squeaky wheels - primarily because you were too weak to fight for and provide the resources in the first place - you do their work for them or place more of a burden on others. Eventually, everybody is doing nothing but complaining.

What can you do if you have a wimpy boss? That is a really good question, because you are not likely to change this person. The weak habits are a form of self preservation, laziness, or just plain being gutless. No amount of coaching is likely to reverse a lifetime of bad habits in this area. It can be very frustrating because it seems there is little you can do short of leaving the organization.

Here are some ideas that can help if applied with care.

1.    Document your requests and needs well. Don't let things slip. 

If you are reporting to a wimpy boss, the best you can do is document your requests carefully and make sure you copy others, such as senior management or HR in on your requests.

2.    Put a "date by" on all requests and check if late. 

Make sure the need for decisions have a date fixed to them and that a large number of people are aware of the delivery date. If needed, send reminders a reasonable time before the due date.

3. Follow up on all discussions and promises.

Hold the boss to promises made. 

4. Reinforce when the boss does show some backbone. 

If you see some signs of strength emerging, reinforce the boss enthusiastically for taking action. It will serve to encourage stronger action in the future.

5. Gently suggest some leadership training if appropriate. 

Lastly, training can help a wimpy boss learn how to handle difficult situations and also make more firm decisions. You may not be in a position to nudge the boss directly to get some training, but there could be indirect ways to let it be known that some additional seasoning would be beneficial. Each organization will have a different political hierarchy that includes not only the wimpy boss but also that person’s peers, manager, HR, and the Development Group. As an underling to a wimpy boss, you need to be careful how and when you point out opportunities for improvement.

Time to look in the mirror to ask yourself: “Where am I being a Wimpy Leader? Where do I need to be The Decider?”

I would love to hear your stories of Wimpy Leaders – please share in the comments below.

What is Self-Awareness?

Socrates said:  “Know Thyself.”

His message was that, unless you are willing to take an honest look at how you have been living your life and the results you have been creating, you are doomed to repeat the same results over and over again, with no prospect of progress or growth.

In psychology, the concept of “Self-Awareness” is defined as a form of intelligence, and an understanding of one’s own knowledge, attitudes, and opinions. Self-awareness is the concept that ONE exists as an individual, separate from other people, with private thoughts. It may also include the understanding that other people are similarly self-aware. Self-awareness, in the simplest terms, is the discovery of one’s own personality. It allows us to discover ourselves; our likes and dislikes, strengths and weaknesses, and our own individuality.

The eminent psychologist, Daniel Goleman defined Self-awareness as “the ability to recognize and understand one’s moods, emotions and drives, as well as their effect on others.” He identified Self-awareness as the number one component in Emotional Intelligence (EI).

Self-Awareness is comprised of three specific capabilities: Self-confidence, Accurate Self-assessment and Emotional Self-awareness. A greater understanding of each of these capabilities will provide a basis for development.

·     Self-confidence allows us to have a positive and realistic perception of ourselves and our abilities. It is characterized by personal attributes such as assertiveness, optimism, enthusiasm, affection, pride, independence, trust, the ability to handle criticism and emotional maturity. A balance in self-confidence, not too much or too little, is important and directly affects one’s opportunity to achieve success in any endeavor. As is true of all strengths, when taken to excess, they become liabilities.

·     Individuals who are capable in Accurate Self-assessment are acutely aware of their abilities and limitations, seek out feedback and learn from their mistakes, and know where they need to improve and when to work with others who have complementary strengths. Accurate Self-assessment was the competence found in virtually every successful “star performer.” That’s because these people are more likely to pay attention to all forms of feedback and make necessary modifications to their behavior in order to achieve their goals.

·     Emotional Self-awareness is the recognition of one’s own feelings and how they affect one’s performance. The better you understand yourself, the better you are able to accept or change who you are. Being in the dark about yourself means that you will continue to get caught up in your own internal struggles and allow outside forces to mold and shape you.

Emotional Intelligence begins with this Self-awareness. People with a high degree of Self-awareness know their weaknesses and are not afraid to talk about them. For example, someone who understands that he works poorly under tight deadlines will work hard to plan his time carefully and will let his colleagues know why. It is very important not to mistake such candor for ‘wimpiness’.

So, this is how Self-awareness is defined:

Develop the understanding and recognize the importance of gaining Self-awareness... an understanding of who and what you "Truly" are and what is truly available to you and your quality of life will transcend the majority in EVERY aspect.

Now, let’s analyze it a little bit more. Self-awareness is about knowing who you are. It is the ability to define yourself in terms of the way you think, the way you feel, your wants, your needs, your values, your personal beliefs, your strengths, your weaknesses, your expectations and your aspirations. In a sense, self-awareness is about understanding just how unique you are, and how your uniqueness adds value to the world, as you continually grow and change. 

Self-awareness is a way for us to explore our individual personalities, value systems, beliefs, natural inclinations, and tendencies.  Because we are all different in the way we react to things, learn, and synthesize information, it’s helpful to occasionally spend time in self-reflection to gain a better insight into ourselves.

Self-awareness remains a critical mystery in philosophy, psychology, biology, and other sciences. Self-awareness is a unique type of consciousness, in that it is not always present.

“Knowing Others is Wisdom, Knowing Yourself is Enlightenment.” - Tao Tzu

Knowing one’s self is the key to unlocking the greatest mystery we encounter in life – who we are and why we are here. Self-awareness is about discovering our innermost being; exploring what makes us tick; how we feel about this all and determining where we let it take us. The more technical definition of Self-awareness is “knowing who you are and understanding why we think, feel and behave the way we do.” Without a higher degree of this set of capabilities we are doomed to wander endlessly in a quagmire of our own emotions with little hope of escape and suffer the results of less than effective relationships.

Self-awareness Theory states that when we focus our attention on ourselves, we evaluate and compare our current behavior to our internal standards and values. We become self-conscious as objective evaluators of ourselves. Various emotional states are intensified by self-awareness, and some people sometimes try to reduce or escape it while some people may seek to increase their self-awareness.

People are more likely to align their behavior with their standards when made self-aware. People will be negatively affected if they don’t live up to their personal standards. Various environmental cues and situations induce awareness of the self, such as mirrors, an audience, or being videotaped or recorded. These cues also increase accuracy of personal memory.

Self-awareness is the awareness of the self as separate from the thoughts that are occurring at any point in time. Without self-awareness the self perceives and believes the thoughts that are occurring to be who the self is. Self-awareness gives one the option or choice to choose thoughts being thought rather than simply thinking the thoughts that are stimulated from the accumulative events leading up to the circumstances of the moment.

Awareness is the first step in the creation process. As you grow in self-awareness you will better understand why you feel what you feel and why you behave as you behave. That understanding then gives you the opportunity and freedom to change those things you’d like to change about yourself and create the life you want. Without knowing who you are, self acceptance and change become impossible.

In summary, Self-awareness means becoming aware of yourself -- your limitations, emotionally and physically and your learning challenges. 

Being self aware is knowing:

·     what you want in your life

·     your strengths and weaknesses

·     what motivates you and what makes you happy

·     what you want to change about yourself or about your life

·     your achievements so far

·     how you relate to others

·     you need to improve as a person

·     your most important beliefs and values

·     how you see yourself as a person 

In the next article, I will discuss the importance of achieving the Self-awareness as a pre-cursor to balancing one’s life.

In the meantime, I encourage you to share your Self-awareness story on this blog and I promise to read your experiences.

Inspire Others by Self Improvement

Here is the article that I originally intended to post last Saturday but, changed my tracks. I hope that you will appreciate my point clearly.

More often than not, we think and believe that someone or rather, most people are better than us - when in fact, most people are more scared than us. When all our doubts, fears and insecurities wrap ourselves up, we end up with a wishful idea of “I wish I was somebody else!” 

Isn’t it funny? We look at other people, envy them for looking so outrageously perfect and wish we could trade places with them, while they look at us and think of the same thing. We are insecure of other people who themselves are insecure of us. We suffer from low self-esteem, lack of self-confidence and lose hope in self improvement because we are enveloped in quiet desperation.

Self Esteem – what exactly is it and how does one find it?

Esteem: (definition according to Webster's Dictionary) to value, appraise, estimate, to have great regard for; value highly; favorable opinion, high regard …

When people truly esteem themselves, they will take 100% responsibility for their own lives. They let others make decisions for themselves without trying to be in control, and let others be responsible for their actions. Life lived right is a delicate balance, and we all need help maintaining this balance.

Get in touch with your true self which is perfect in every way. Your true self esteem is who it is because it knows it was created perfect by a perfect creator. It is the false self that finds fault in who it is and lacks self esteem. Finding your Authentic or true self is the only adventure you can’t afford to miss in life.

For the record, I never had a client who complained of having too much self esteem, and who therefore asked for a reduction. Most people, in moments of profound honesty, will admit to a lack of self esteem. They would like to feel better about themselves - more confident and capable - in short, to love themselves more.

Some time ago, an extremely famous chat show host was heard to say: "Low self esteem is the root of all the problems in the world”...

One key to self improvement is to LISTEN and TALK to a trusted friend. Find someone who you find comfort in opening up with even the most gentle topics you want to discuss. Ask questions like “do you think I am ill-mannered?”, “Do I always sound so argumentative?”, “Do I talk too loud?”, “Does my breath smell?”, “Do I ever bore you when were together?”  In this way, the other person will obviously know that you are interested in the process of self improvement. Lend her your ears for comments and criticisms and don’t give her answers like “Don’t exaggerate! That’s just the way I am!”  Open up your mind and heart as well. And in return, you may want to help your friend with constructive criticism that will also help her improve herself.

One of Whitney Houston’s songs says “Learning to love your self is the greatest love of all.” True enough. In order to love others, you must love yourself too. Remember, you cannot give what you do not have.

Before telling other people some ways on how to improve themselves, let them see that you yourself is a representation and a product of self improvement. Self improvement makes us better people, we then inspire other people, and then the rest of the world will follow.

Stop thinking of yourselves as second-rate beings. Forget the repetitive thought of “If only I was richer… if only I was thinner” and so on.  Accepting your true self is the first step to self improvement. We need to stop comparing ourselves to others only to find out at the end that we’ve got 10 more reasons to envy them.

We all have our insecurities. Nobody is perfect. We always wish we had better things, better features, better body parts, etc. But life doesn’t need to be perfect for people to be happy about themselves. Self improvement and loving yourself is not a matter of shouting to the whole world that you are perfect and you are the best. It’s the virtue of acceptance and contentment. When we begin to improve ourselves, we then begin to feel contented and happy.

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Surya M Ganduri, PhD. PMP. is the founder and president of eMBC, Inc., an international firm specializing in strategic and executive leadership development processes that Help People Succeed in an Evolving World. His company is dedicated to helping organizations and individuals manage strategic change, innovation, cultural transition, and goal achievement. Surya has over 26 years of business experience in management consulting, leadership development, executive coaching, process improvements, organizational development and youth leadership. Contact Surya at s6ganduri@eMBCinc.com. For more information, visit www.eMBCinc.com or contact eMBC, Inc., directly at (630) 445-1321.

Self Esteem and Self Improvement

For this week’s blog, I started writing about ‘inspiring others by self improvement’ and half-way thru the article, I made the following statement: “Before telling other people some ways on how to improve themselves, let them see that you yourself is a representation and a product of self improvement.” Then it got me realize that I never said anything about my own story on how I overcame my failures and reached the state where I am now. So, I decided that’s what I’ll do for this week and finish posting the other article for next week.

Here it goes ... my own self improvement process. Not too many years ago, I was going through a dark time in my life. I was broke - financially, personally, socially - even spiritually. In describing it to someone once, I said, "I had the self esteem of a dead skunk." That might have been overstating it a bit but not much!

My life - and my confidence - is much better today, MUCH better.


So what’s changed? Was it outward circumstances? Did my environment change and with it my inner experience? No.


Somehow I knew that any changes would have to be from me. It would be an inner transformation that would eventually alter the outward experience.


Some of the things I did unconsciously. Others were done with deliberation and coaching.

First and foremost, I removed myself from people who had been particularly critical. By distancing myself from this criticism, I was able to gain a better perspective. I was perfectly capable of taking my own inventory and didn't need someone else pointing out my errors and keeping me focused on my shortcomings.

I immersed myself in good books - books of inspiration, books that increased my belief and books that gave me hope. And hope was severely lacking.

I made a conscious effort to focus on my strengths: my talents, my experience and my knowledge. I didn't allow myself to indulge in negative thoughts. When I found myself musing about something less than "uplifting", I would redirect myself to something else. I gave myself no permission to have "pity parties."

Thomas Carlyle wrote, "Our main business is not to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to do what clearly lies at hand." I kept busy. I did what appeared to me as needing doing. I didn't know exactly what I wanted to do or how I was going to do it. The future was uncertain and for the first time in my life I didn't have a plan. Like the AA program, I took one day at a time.

And each day I did what I could to clean up my messes, make things better, keep my focus forward instead of backward and keep the faith.


One of the biggest awareness' I had during these dark times was that I WAS NOT my feelings. I HAD feelings, but they were not me. I also realized that I had cared too much about the opinions of others. I still care; I just don't let it run me like it used to.


Some people believe that if you feel good about yourself, you'll do great things. That may be true, but I also believe that if you do great things, you'll feel good about yourself - and then do even greater things.


Taking these steps consistently over a period of months has enabled me to rebuild my finances, establish a career I'm excited about, develop a loving and nurturing relationship with my family and, most importantly, restore and improve upon my self esteem. I'm grateful for the process. 


Self-esteem is an upward or downward spiral. What you do affects the way you feel. How you feel affects the things you do. The things you do affect what you and others think of you, which in turn, affect how you feel about yourself.


You're either building yourself up or tearing yourself down. There is no status quo when it comes to your self-image.


Let’s recollect some Winnie the Pooh characters … Eeyore has no self esteem, he expects things to go wrong and they usually do. Tigger, on the other hand, bounces through life, always hopeful, always on an adventure, even when his friends try to pull him down; he just sees the bouncy side of things. He exasperates those who need total order, or control. Tigger is truly, just Tigger. He loves his friends just as they are and even the busy but important old Rabbit can’t dampen his spirits. I love Tigger, though I certainly have had my Eeyore moments! If you get a chance, read some of the Pooh books.

See who you identify with and who irritates you … This week try and be aware of the times you feel uncomfortable, depressed, discouraged, irritated, frustrated, out of control, or the flip side, very independent, self sufficient, (don’t need any one else, I will do it myself, no one else can do it right), opinionated, critical, positional … and ask yourself, where am I not valuing myself? 


Start a journal. Keep track, start to be responsible for your life and yourself, find creative intuitive ways to make changes, your inner self knows what it needs. Read a book on self improvement - get this FREE e-Book now, take a class, find a support group, get a Coach!! 

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Surya M Ganduri, PhD. PMP. is the founder and president of eMBC, Inc., an international firm specializing in strategic and executive leadership development processes that Help People Succeed in an Evolving World. His company is dedicated to helping organizations and individuals manage strategic change, innovation, cultural transition, and goal achievement. Surya has over 26 years of business experience in management consulting, leadership development, executive coaching, process improvements, organizational development and youth leadership. Contact Surya at s6ganduri@eMBCinc.com. For more information, visit www.eMBCinc.com or contact eMBC, Inc., directly at (630) 445-1321.