How “in touch” with the front lines are your leaders?

Our poll today asks: How “in touch” with the front lines are your leaders?

– Very — they understand the front line very well: 13%
– Kind of — they generally know what’s going on with the front line: 36%
– Not very — they are mostly in the dark about the front line: 35%
– Not at all — they have no idea what’s going on with the front line: 16%

Get Out of Your Office. How can you run a business if you don’t know how it’s running? Sitting in your office all the time and managing your organization without ever seeing how things are working on the front line is akin to driving your car by remote control from your laptop. Get out there. You might learn something. It only takes a few hours a year to walk around your operations. Of course you can invest more time than that and leaders who “get it” tend to do so. Put a recurring appointment on your calendar to meet with your front line in their environment. You’ll be much better informed about problems and opportunities before they happen.

Do you agree with these poll results? Let us know in the comments below!

– Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

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These results were originally a SmartPulse poll in SmartBrief on Leadership which tracks feedback from more than 200,000 business leaders. Get smarter on leadership and sign up for the SmartBrief on Leadership e-newsletter.