The 21 Indispensible Qualities of a Leader | Initiative: You won’t leave home without it

10.       Initiative: You won’t leave home without it

Kemmons Wilson was disappointed by the state of the motels when he was on vacation.  He then took the initiative and started the Holiday Inn chain of hotels.  Up to 1979, when Wilson stood down from the company’s leadership, the Holiday Inn grew at a rate of one hotel opening every seventy-two hours in the world.  Maxwell counted “at least four qualities that leaders have that enabled them to make things happen”: they know what they want, they push themselves to act, they take more risks and they make more mistakes.  The story of Lester Wundermann, who stayed on at his job for a month without pay after being fired from it, closed the chapter.

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Webster’s definition

energy or aptitude displayed in initiation of action

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My thoughts

I’ve never stayed in an Holiday Inn before, now that it is part of the Intercontinental Hotel Group room prices could be higher compared to Wilson’s time.  Many entrepreneurs have been quoted saying that they started their business because whatever that were already in existence did not live up to their expectations.  Apparently Wilson was of the same mind.  He was also very financially strong to take the initiative to bring his wish to reality.  I am quite in two minds about Maxwell’s view that leaders take more risks and this “enabled them to make things happen”.  I would have preferred if Maxwell had qualified risk-taking in a justifiable manner, given that traders with big risk appetites had caused much grief to their employers.  Still, Maxwell might never have anticipated the ludicrous-ity of some risk-takers back when he wrote this book.