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I may never come back, and I just want someone to know. This article contains text from a former Shadow Academy course. It is no longer in use, and is preserved here for historical purposes only and should not be used/referenced.
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Course Notes
Introduction
There are two reasons why leadership is important to you and the Dark Brotherhood. The first was expressed eloquently by a Sith High Warrior years ago:
"Your mission above all else as a leader in the Dark Brotherhood is to motivate and inspire goodwill, fun, and companionship. These are the very core assets that keep our organization alive and thriving."
Make no mistake about it. This Sith High Warrior is speaking to you. You are the Dark Brotherhood's leaders, and on your shoulders rests this mission: motivate and inspire goodwill, fun, and companionship amongst our members. The desire to accomplish this mission despite all adversity is called the Dark Brotherhood Ethos and it is the difference that separates the Dark Brotherhood from similar organizations. The Dark Brotherhood Ethos applies to all leaders from the Grand Master down to a Battle Team Commanders.
If that were not enough, there is a second reason you must strive to become the best leader you can be: your subordinates deserve nothing less. When you took the oath and accepted the responsibility of leadership, you entered into a pact with your subordinates and the Dark Brotherhood. Our members have entrusted you with their most precious resource, their time. Every person serving under you has trusted you with their leisure time and it is your duty to make the best of it. Our members are capable of great patience and persistence and tremendous loyalty, as they show every day in Clans and Houses. They show up to meetings, they write reports, and they compete in competitions. It is your job to make the most of their time, and to make their time in the Dark Brotherhood worth their efforts.
The most precious commodities with which the Dark Brotherhood deals is the individual members time. Their efforts and participation are the heart and soul of our organization.
You have been entrusted with a great responsibility. How do you prepare yourself? How do you learn and embrace those values and skills that enable you to meet the challenge of leading in the Dark Brotherhood?
This guide is a tool to help you answer some of these questions, to begin or continue becoming a leader of character and competence, a Dark Brotherhood Leader.
Dark Brotherhood Leadership
- Just as the Sith Sword requires three properties for its formation--carbonite, heat, and pressure--successful leaders require the interaction of three properties--character, knowledge, and application. Like carbonite to the Sith Sword, character is the basic quality of a leader . . . But as carbonite alone does not create a Sith Sword, neither can character alone create a leader. The Sith Sword needs heat. A Leader need's knowledge, study, and preparation . . . The third property, pressure--acting in conjunction with carbonite and heat--forms the diamond. Similarly, one's character, attended by knowledge, blooms through application to produce a leader.*
The Dark Brotherhood's ultimate responsibility is to motivate and inspire goodwill, fun, and companionship amongst its members. To meet this challenge, you must develop character and competence while achieving excellence. This guide is about leadership. It focuses on character, competence, and excellence. It's about accomplishing the Dark Brotherhood's overall mission and taking care of our members. It's about living up to your responsibility as a leader in our organization.
Leadership Defined
Leadership is influencing people--by providing purpose, direction, and motivation --while operating to accomplish the Dark Brotherhood's mission and improving the overall organization.
- Influencing means getting people to do what you want them to do. It is the means or method to achieve the organization's goals. But there is more to influencing than simply passing along orders. The example you set is just as important as the orders you send. And you set an example--good or bad--with every action you take. Through your words and example, you must communicate purpose, direction, and motivation.
- Purpose gives people a reason to do things. This does not mean that as a leader you must explain every decision to the satisfaction of your subordinates. It does mean you must earn their trust: they must know from experience that you care about them and would not ask them to do something--unless there was a good reason, unless that task was essential to the overall mission accomplishment.
- Direction is communicating the way you want things accomplished. You prioritize tasks, assign responsibility for completing them (delegating authority when necessary), and make sure your people understand the goals. In short, you figure out how to encourage your people to accomplish a mission in the time given. Battle Team A will complete the fiction portion of the competition, Battle Team B will compete the flying portion of the competition, and non battle team members will compete in the JO portion of the competition. With our combined focused effort, we should win the competition at hand.
- Motivation gives subordinates the will to do everything they can to accomplish the organizations goals. It results in their action on their own initiative when they see that something needs to be done. To motivate your people give them competitions that challenge them. After all, they did not join the Dark Brotherhood to be bored. Get to know your people and their capabilities; that way you can tell just how far to push each one. Hey, I think you would do a great job at the upcoming ACC Competition, your writing skills are extraordinary and you should have great success!
- Improving is the key motivator in every leader's job. Dark Brotherhood leaders strive to improve everything entrusted to them: their subordinate's activity, their web sites, their competition performance, and their productivity. There will always be new tasks, but part of finishing any task is improving the organization
BE, KNOW, DO
BE, KNOW, DO, clearly and concisely states the characteristics of a Dark Brotherhood Leader. Leadership is about taking action, but there is more to being a leader than just what you do. Character and competence, the BE and KNOW, underlie everything a leader does. Developing yourself as a leader includes all three aspects.
- BE: Character describes a person's inner strength. Your character helps you know what is right; more than that, it links that knowledge to action. Character gives you the courage to do what is right regardless of the circumstances or the consequences. You demonstrate character through your behavior. One of your key responsibilities as a Leader is to teach your subordinates the appropriate behavior accepted in the Dark Brotherhood. The old saying that action speaks louder than words has never been more true. Leaders who talk about being a good member but do not live up to these values--send the wrong message. Acting like an idiot on mIRC and then telling your subordinates that there is a code of conduct is a contradiction and decays your value as a leader.
- KNOW: A leader must have a certain level of knowledge to be competent. That knowledge is spread across the full spectrum Dark Brotherhood activities. You must develop interpersonal skills, knowledge of your people and how to work with them. You must have conceptual skills, the ability to understand and apply the doctrine of the Dark Brotherhood. You must learn technical skills, how to use our platforms and forms of activity. As a leader you need to know how to create a competition, award a medal, transfer a member, send a member to the rogues, play XVT, XWA, JA, JO, BF, BF2, ACC, Allegiance, and on and on. Knowing the Dark Brotherhood in and out is essential to your job.
- DO: A leader must use his knowledge and skills to influence and improve the Dark Brotherhood. This is the DO of BE, KNOW, DO.
Taking Care of Members
Taking care of the Dark Brotherhood membership is the core value of leadership in the Brotherhood. In fact the very success of our Club rests upon it. You could say that Improving the Dark Brotherhood and taking care of members are one in the same. But "taking care of members" is one of those slippery phrases, like the word "honor," that many people talk about but few take the time to explain. So what does taking care of members mean?
Taking care of members means creating a fun environment where they can learn and eventually grow into the future leaders of our Club. It means holding members to a high standard and training them to be the next generation of leaders. You take care of members when you treat them fairly, refuse to cut corners, share their triumphs and failures, and set the example for them to follow. Taking care of members encompasses everything from making sure a member is promoted for their hard work to chatting with them on mIRC. It also means providing support for them when real life becomes more important than the Dark Brotherhood. Supporting a member who has to cut down his Dark Brotherhood because of real life means understanding that their priorities are in the right place and you will not punish them for it.
Taking care of members also means demanding that they act in an appropriate manner. It does not mean coddling them or allowing them to break the rules because they are your friends. In fact you do them and the Dark Brotherhood a disservice by allowing members to break the rules and get away with it. Take care of members by setting guidelines and standards of conduct and you will improve the overall attitude of the Brotherhood.
Members will learn a career worth of lessons if you take the time and treat each of them as important parts in the Dark Brotherhood. We owe all members our time and energy. The best plan a leader can execute is to take care of his members because it also transforms into taking care of the Brotherhood.
Putting It Together
Study the Dark Brotherhood Leadership principles; it is the common basis for thinking about leadership. With all the day-to-day tasks you must do, it's easy to get lost in particulars. The Dark Brotherhood Leadership principles are tools that allow you to step back and think about leadership as a whole. These principles apply to all Dark Brotherhood leaders and are there to help us make this great club a better place.