Motivation is the name of the game for leadership guru Randy Slechta. As CEO of Leadership Management International (LMI), Slechta has spent most of his life encouraging executives to change their old ingrained ways on corporate governance and embrace new leadership principles that have successfully turned companies around, lifting them from stagnation or loss-making situations to growth and renewed vigour.
More than 100,000 organisations have benefited from his programmes and more have been inspired by his book The 5 Pillars Of Leadership, which lays out a blueprint for leaders in the 21st century. Co-written with Paul Meyer, it has been translated into nine languages.
The book and his numerous leadership courses all boil down to one essential message: How to develop the right attitude.
Back home in the US, the young Slechta studied economics and psychology because he wanted to know "what made people tick".
Leading was in his blood and even before joining LMI he was coaching high school kids in basketball and golf.
Undoubtedly his experience from those early days has helped to formulate what is now one of the most successful programmes under his banner, "The making of a champion for young adults".
Young people are easy to motivate according to Slechta. They have fewer conditions than grown-ups, but you need to understand their various needs - physical, social and spiritual.
Teenagers who have problems at home, for example, are more likely to have social needs and are often starved of acceptance. They have a lot of self-created barriers and low self-esteem, but once you are able to help them overcome those barriers and improve their self-image, they will gain self-respect. With self-esteem comes the potential for an unlimited amount of self-motivation and the ability to set challenging goals for themselves.
This philosophy has also been applied with great success with Slechta's own parenting experiences. Slechta has three daughters now aged 20, 18 and 16. Since they were young, he has made it a priority to help instil in them a sense of personal responsibility.
"It's much too easy to blame others - your parents or your circumstances - if something goes wrong," he said.
Once youngsters know they have to be in control, and accept the consequences, of their own actions, then it's likely they will be more inclined to motivate themselves to succeed, he said.
He also believes you have to help young people find their interests or passions and, when they do, you have to help them excel.
Although he travels a lot for his work - LMI has offices in 70 countries around the world - Slechta makes a point of spending quality time with his children. His eldest is a teacher, the middle child is an aspiring fashion designer, and the youngest an athlete, and during her volleyball matches, more often than not, you can be certain Slechta is in the crowd, cheering her on.
The concept of personal responsibility extends beyond the family to the much wider circle of government as well.
Slechta believes that good leadership at government level means giving citizens the responsibility for their own well-being and helping to provide the means towards that end.
"Too many political leaders are intent on staying in power," he remarked. "To do this, they give people things, until people become dependent on the government instead of taking their future into their own hands. The more people are provided for by the government, the more powerless they become."
According to Slechta, a good government leader should be honest, support and protect the people, and create opportunities that will allow them to thrive and prosper, but not try to solve all their problems for them while they just sit back and wait for hand-outs.
Giving is a form of populism, and might please a group of people for a while, but it doesn't lead to sustainable growth, he said.
A better form of leadership is to change people's attitudes, help them learn how to think, to have a vision and clear goals in life, as well as a sense of commitment to reach those goals. Slechta sees great potential for Thailand.
"Thailand is an extraordinary country with an attitude of service," he said. "It has huge resources in its people, and the opportunities are enormous."
As Thailand moves towards the establishment of the Asean Economic Community, there is an even greater urgency to build a generation of future leaders who will have the vision to lead not just the nation, but the entire region.
If proper leadership training can help a company revive and spur its operations towards success and profitablity, there is no reason why this concept shouldn't be taken to a macro level to help the country develop towards prosperity.
