What does it take to lead an organization during challenging times?
Julio Melara, the keynote speaker at BizTimes Media’s Elevate Your Leadership program on May 13, says it requires being flexible, resilient and optimistic and then instilling those ideas into the culture of your organization.
Melara is president and chief executive officer of Baton Rouge, Louisiana-based Melara Enterprises, a multimedia company that include news coverage, video production, strategic content and marketing solutions, and professional development. He is also the author of multiple books including Do You Have The Time For Success?, It Only Takes Everything You’ve Got!, Keys To Performance, and Mental Snacks – Nourishment for your mind and fuel for your life!
The Elevate keynote is part of BizExpo and takes place at 9:30 a.m. on May 13 at the Brookfield Conference Center. Learn more and register here.
Ahead of the keynote, BizTimes spoke with Melara about his presentation, leadership and how he maintains an optimistic outlook.
BizTimes: In general terms, what should attendees expect hear about during your presentation?
Julio Melara: “Well, I think that we’re living in very challenging times. The rate of and the speed of change is happening so fast that people need perspective, and so the bulk of my presentation is going to be giving them a perspective in terms of where we’ve been. Life and business have a cadence, and so my goal is to help them remember to be resilient in these times. Which means that ‘hey, no matter what setbacks, no matter what changes, no matter what difficulties, we all have to adapt.’ And so we’re going to be talking about some of the things that we can do to adapt. We’re going to be talking about some of the qualities of resilient leaders that have navigated unchartered waters. We all certainly know that right now a lot of things are changing and a lot of things are up in the air. I’ve learned over time that human beings prefer consistency over accuracy many times, and right now nothing’s consistent in terms of the economy, and so we have to be on our A game as leaders.”
What are some of the necessary qualities or ingredients for that resilient leadership?
“One is adaptability, right? I mean, you got to be flexible. You got to be open to change right now, and you got to be able to pivot strategies because again, things are changing so fast, the economy’s changing, technology is changing, consumer behavior is changing, and so adaptability, I think is one of the key qualities that you have to be if you’re going to be an effective leader.
“Another one, the number one key ingredient to, and this is based on science, to being resilient, is optimism. Nobody wants to follow a negative leader with a doom and gloom attitude, right? So you got to keep it all in perspective. … We’re not positive as leaders, positive in today’s world, because we’re Pollyanna positive, but because life is hard, because business is challenging. History is there so that we would learn from it, and so you understand that what goes up goes down, what goes down, goes up. This is the reason we’ve got to build our organizations for long-term sustainability. One of the big tragedies we have today, contemporary living is the fast, quick fix, overnight thinking. We’ve got to program our businesses to think of long-term, our culture, our organizations, and view the challenges and the opportunities as growth opportunities. And so I think that’s going to be extremely important as we move forward.
“Another one that comes to mind is that you got to build a resilient culture in your organization, and I think burying your head in the sand is not a good strategy. You got to be able to discuss strategies for cultivating the culture and empowering your teams to overcome obstacles and the challenges that we all face.”
How do you go about sustaining optimism, especially being in the media world, which is a challenging space?
“I think it’s a mindset. The mindset’s got to be one of growth, right? Versus fixed, which I am going to be talking about. It’s got to be one of abundance versus lack. One of positive versus negative. Mindset really is the way we see the world, and if we understand and we embrace, most people resist change, everybody agrees that growing is a good thing and everybody wants to grow, except that it demands change. For me, what’s helped me over the last four decades of being in this business has been my mindset. Every generation has obstacles to overcome, and again, what the science shows is that if you’re optimistic and you’re positive, it helps your creativity, it helps you innovate as opposed to being negative and thinking, lack and having a fixed mindset, well, that impedes. It does just the opposite. It impedes your ability to innovate and to problem solve and to be creative.
“We’re living in a day and age where that’s a tremendous asset. To me, I believe it’s a competitive edge in today’s world to have an optimistic and a positive mindset, a growth mindset, an abundance mindset. And the truth of it is, I travel all over the world, the U.S., with all of its challenges, there’s still so much abundance opportunity here, but you got to have the right lenses, you got to have the right perspective, and that’s what I’m going to drill into a little bit.”
