Soon to be available in book stores nationwide and online globally, ‘Visionary Leadership: Learning to Lead from the Inside Out’ is teaching executives, entrepreneurs and leaders how to plot their own course as a visionary leader in business. Authored by respected health industry leader and strategist Stephen R. Mason, the book introduces the concept of visionary leadership and outlines how readers can prepare for the journey in their own careers.
Positioned at the crossroads of personal development, business leadership, and organizational operations, this book touches upon the author’s own career path and lays out a set of key principles required to become a visionary leader.
Opening with the challenging question, “Can anyone become a Visionary Leader?”, the question becomes the center point of an intricately constructed framework that is answered with a resounding “Yes!” throughout the subsequent chapters.
Mason was motivated to put pen to paper by the thought that sharing his journey and the insights he has learned along the way might be of service to others.
Part autobiography, part strategic leadership manual; Stephen R. Mason reflects on learnings from a long career in the healthcare industry in his new book, Visionary Leadership.
The Fundamentals of Leadership
Split into two parts; the journey begins with a series of refreshingly personal analogies and anecdotes, organized around a set of guiding principles called The Success Formula. The Success Formula aims to help readers understand the concept of ‘vision’. He does this through three distinct phases from inception to fruition: Create the Vision, Commit to the Vision, and Execute the Vision. With the introduction of each new section, Mason challenges conventionally held perspectives (seeing negative spaces and polarity), introduces the concept and importance of buying-in (engaging the critical mass), and implements a process for managing the project (creating clear standards and best practices).
Throughout the three sections, there is room for individual interpretation as Mason presents time-tested, well-vetted recommendations to help the ambitious make their vision a reality. Interlaced throughout the content are interesting insights and examples from his own career in healthcare to illustrate how any organization—including those in fields not known for their swift adaptation and market repositioning—can learn to innovate and think beyond the status quo.
Prepare for the Journey
Building on the understanding that becoming a visionary leader is possible, the immediate follow-up question to this is then “How?”. Mason guides his readers through a process that focuses on personal development – the skills and traits that should be honed in order to become a truly visionary leader.
He underlines the importance of having this process to be self-motivated, following the idea that visionary leadership comes from within, not from others. It requires unshakable self-awareness because a visionary leader must be willing to wrestle with their own thoughts, emotions, and deeply-held beliefs to find the confidence to stand up in front of an entire organization and say, “Follow me”.
The book is equal parts encouraging and motivating, as it explains concepts in a way that is straightforward in both comprehension and application, without shying away from bigger themes of meaning, purpose, and spirituality.
The Genesis of Visionary Leadership
The book is the accumulation of the knowledge and wisdom that Mason has gained about leadership, and the reasons behind his teams’ many implementation successes. Rather than a ‘how-to’ manual, the book can be viewed as an anthology of anecdotes, principles, and ideas. While the ‘how’ is important in understanding his accomplishments and the path that was taken, leadership is an intensely personal journey. Thus, the teachings make allowance for different approaches and styles, rather than advocating adherence to a strict algorithm. In the words of the author himself, “Mathematics is finite, leadership is not.” Readers will find this book both inspirational and instructional; a roadmap for exploring the path of their own careers.
About the Author
Stephen R. Mason has spent the last forty years working in various roles within health care organizations, stretching as far back as his military experience in the 1960s. For the last twenty-seven years of his career, he has successfully held a number of key leadership positions in two large health care organizations during a challenging, tumultuous time for the industry.