Simple mistakes that anyone can make, with

potentially catastrophic consequences

How To Avoid 5 Deadly

Leadership Mistakes

Enrique P. Fiallo

Life CoachYOUR LOGO

Contents

Title of the book2

3

4

6

8

9

10

11

Introduction

Mistake 1 – Pride and Arrogance

Mistake 2 – Negative Influences

Mistake 3 – Lacking Integrity

Mistake 4 – Majoring in Minor Things

Mistake 5 – Neglect

Epilogue

3How To Avoid 5 Deadly

Leadership Mistakes

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4How To Avoid 5 Deadly

Leadership Mistakes

Pride and Arrogance

“The Proud will be humbled. Let not the wise boast of their wisdom or

the strong boast of their strength or the rich boast of their riches.”

– Jeremiah 9:23

PRESCRIPTION

1. Remember Your Roots

We all came into the world buck naked.

We all depended on someone to give

us life, and to sustain it. Some of us

came from really humble beginnings.

In your mind, come back to that

organic period of humility and let it

wash over you to center and bring you

back to reality.

2. Don’t Think Yourself Invincible Or Infallible

We all make mistakes. Acknowledge them, face them, learn from them, and move on.

Don’t justify and rationalize mistakes into acceptable behavior.

3. Become More Black And White In Your Thinking

Think about what are right and wrong behaviors in black and white terms. Once you start to see the

world in shades of gray, you think you can hop in and out of the gray areas of life at will and cannot get

into trouble.

Pride creeps in and convinces you of this.

4. Don’t Place Yourself Above Anything Or Anyone

Everyone has value. Red is not better than blue or purple. In fact, purple is the combination of red and

blue. They are all colors with a valuable place in this world.

Mistake 1

Pride and arrogance relates to having an extremely high, and usually unwarranted opinion of oneself, to

the point where it becomes an impediment to good behaviors and outcomes.

It was my desire and inclination to demonstrate my intelligence and wisdom, my skills and experience, my

economic power and the material things I acquired that did me in.

Pride was the first, and by far the biggest mistake I ever made.

5How To Avoid 5 Deadly

Leadership Mistakes

Mistake 1 (cont.)

Pride and Arrogance

5. Look In The Mirror Regularly

Literally, a real mirror. Do it figuratively as well. Introspect. Nightly,

weekly, quarterly, and annually. What is going right. What is not so right.

Take inventory. Take that inventory and use it to continuously improve.

6. Don’t TRY For Humility

Humble is not something you DO. It is something you BECOME and

ARE.

Humility is a by product of a life well lived. Once you say you are

HUMBLE, guess what? You are not.

6How To Avoid 5 Deadly

Leadership Mistakes

Negative Influences

“Bad advice will blind you, good advice will instruct you, excellent advice will

enlighten you, and transcendent advice will elevate you.” ― Matshona Dhliwayo

5 Steps to Finding Positive Influences and Discerning Voices of Value

1. Vet the Candidate Voices of value - look at their profiles, resumes, bios, what others say about them, the

comments they get, and ask others for their input

2. Monitor what they say and write for a reasonable period of time to ensure consistency, integrity, ethical

constancy, and concordance with your values

3. Drop anyone from your list of potential voices that appear at all questionable

4. Enter into mentoring relationships or following cautiously and gradually and do not blindly, merely follow advice

5. Continuously monitor and evaluate what your voices say and do

Mistake 2

PRESCRIPTIONTune in to the voices of value and tune the others

out. I had plenty of people surrounding me all

eager to give advice.

My challenge was in sifting through the ones

worth listening to and ignoring the bad advice.

How can you tell the difference?

Listen to different perspectives from divergent

sets of people, and then pay attention to the still

small voice inside of you.

The longer you listen, the better listener and

discerner you will become.

A negative influence misdirects you from an otherwise good and righteous path through actions, words (advice),

or both. There is no lack of advice in this world.

If you want or need advice you can always find someone willing to give it.

Even when you don’t want it, someone will be very willing and eager to jump in and tell you what they think.

The Second Deadly Mistake I made was allowing myself to be influenced by the type of people that no one

would or should want next to them.

7How To Avoid 5 Deadly

Leadership Mistakes

Mistake 2 (cont.)

Negative Influences

6 Sources of Value

1. Research Professional, Socially Renowned and Recognized Experts

Look for people in your chosen field, or with skills you want to acquire, that have the breadth and depth,

doing the things you do, or want to do, extraordinarily well. It also matters if they do those things for a living.

After all, one of the hallmarks of doing things right, and of success, is that people keep coming back to a

person. To continue to do business with them, and to obtain their services. These are the voices of value.

2. Look at Peers or Higher Ups in Your Present Company

People performing similar roles or supervising the same or similar areas as you, or things you aspire to.

Look for people with more time on the job and more experience, especially if they’ve worked at other places.

Above all, look for people others look up to and hold in high regard. Those are voices of value.

3. Join Groups With Similar Affinities

These would be groups that share your common interests. For example, if you are a Human Resources

professional, a group of other HR Professionals. If you are in Finance, a group of CFOs, or Professional

Accountants or Economists. If you are a Technologist, a Tech related group. You get the idea.

Once you become a member, watch, listen, observe what people have to say, and how it is received. Who

do people listen to and engage with the most? Who do they gravitate to? Who commands the audience and

has earned respect? These are the voices of value.

4. Attend Conferences or Trade Shows That Feature Sessions and Speakers

A good speaker doesn't have to be world renown or famous. In fact, most if not all of the world renown

speakers, presenters, authors were not at all well known, once upon a time. Attend the sessions. Listen. See

what the audience thinks.

Observe how the presenter behaves, what they say, how they say it. you just might find a voice of value you

can follow in your area of interest. And if the speaker is just starting out, you may be lucky enough to engage

with them early on, before they develop such a huge following, that you are now just part of the mass.

5. Go Back To School

Perhaps you are still attending college. Maybe its been a while since you set foot on campus. Either way,

take a look at your professors. If it's been a while, go back, virtually if you can't physically. What do they

stand for? What are they lecturing on? What are they saying? Writing? Publishing? Does it resonate with

you and your values? Do they have a following? Are they respected? These individuals are potential voices

of value.

6. Take a Fresh Look at Family Members

I recently re-engaged with members of my family that I had not had meaningful conversations with in quite a

while. I discovered some deep thinking, interesting discussions, broad perspectives, and sound advice. You

might just discover a voice of value, or two, or three among your family members.

8How To Avoid 5 Deadly

Leadership Mistakes

Lacking Integrity“Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one.”

― Marcus Aurelius

Mistake 3

PRESCRIPTION

1. Establish a set of sound ethics policies.

2. Integrate them into all business processes.

3. Communicate them broadly to all employees.

4. Make clear there is no tolerance for any

deviation from any of them.

5. Live by these policies.

You have to make time to set your “integrity

agenda,” for yourself, and then to make clear how

important Integrity is to you, for others.

I took for granted people would be able to figure

out right from wrong. The problem is, in the middle

of a hectic and pressure filled life, I myself failed to

figure it out.

Don’t assume your Integrity ranking is where it

should be, or that others can plainly see what you

stand for.

Understand who you are from an Integrity

standpoint, and what you stand for.

Make sure what you outwardly display through you

actions, and not just your talk, clearly

communicates the Integrity in you.

Integrity is a human quality of possessing strong moral principles and being honest.

There are many things you can lack and still be successful. You can fall short in many areas of your

character, skills, talents, and experience and still steer clear of danger.

Integrity isn’t one of the things. You either have it, or you don’t.

The Third Deadly Mistake I made was Lacking Integrity.

9How To Avoid 5 Deadly

Leadership Mistakes

Majoring in Minor Things

“Most people fail in life because they major in minor things.”

― Anthony Robbins

Majoring in minor things is defined as paying attention to trivialities and relatively unimportant issues.

The allure of the minor things in life can be difficult to resist.

The trivial, the mundane, the distractions, the shiny object, the squirrel flitting from branch to branch. They

are almost like a drug, reaching out to you, interrupting, engrossing, diverting, interfering, confusing and

preoccupying your thinking and focus.

These distractions keep you from your real mission. Prevent you from concentrating on and accomplishing

the truly important things in your life.

The Fourth Deadly Mistake I made was Majoring in Minor Things.

Mistake 4

PRESCRIPTION

Beware of and steer clear of the following:

1. Too many hobbies. Not particularly good at any of them.

2. Avoiding people and important meetings.

3. Subscribing to dozens of magazines, mailing lists.

4. Addiction to and maniacally working an overflowing mailbox.

5. Climbing down Internet rabbit holes, expanding searches,

going deeper and deeper as the path twists and turns.

6. Having dozens of pages open in your browser at one time.

7. An insanely long To Do list full of trivial items - and a false

sense of accomplishments from completing many each day.

8. Procrastination.

9. A cluttered desk with half started tasks and assignments.

10. A series of home projects in progress, all gathering dust.

11. Excessive TV watching, especially news programs.

12. Multitasking.

10How To Avoid 5 Deadly

Leadership Mistakes

Neglect“Neglect is a major reason for some of the most painful experiences

we suffer in life.” ― Sunday Adelaja

Neglect is the reckless abandon of things that should be done. Areas of your life that need attention.

Neglect is like a Ninja. It creeps up on you slowly. Unheard. Unseen.

Except unlike a Ninja, it works slowly without you feeling. A Ninja strikes quickly severing a head with his Ninjato.

Neglect cuts slowly, over time. Death from a thousand paper cuts. You bleed out all the same.

You don’t see it coming. It feeds on itself and spreads.

One day, you fail to do something trivial. It becomes easier not to do the next day.

Weeks go by. Then years.

And neglect, my Fifth Deadliest Mistake, caused serious damage without my realizing it.

Mistake 5

PRESCRIPTION

7 Life Areas - Fertile Ground for Neglect to Thrive:

1. Family and Relationships — Carve out time each

day for Family and loved ones. Note all the

birthdays, make a call, drop a line. Buy flowers. Find

small toys. Pay attention to details and give out

compliments.

2. Skills — Start reading. Anything at first. Take a

Course. On line or in class. here are thousands of

them. Udemy and Coursera are two examples. Aim

to learn 1 new thing a month.

3. Career and Future — Invest quality time to think

about what you are doing today, what it should look

like next year, and in 5 years. It doesn’t have to be

elaborate. If you need help thinking and planning,

get some.

4. Current Job — Get your head on straight about

what you do for a living. If you can, resolve to show

up “in uniform” ready to play every day. If you hate

you job, change it, or get out.

5. Physical Health — Do something physical several

times a week. Walk. Bike. Swim. It does not have to

be intense weight training or marathon’ing. Go see

the doctor, and have regular checkups. Listen to

your body.

6. Spirituality — Reconnect with your spirituality, your

own Higher Power. Meditate. Show Gratitude.

Research shows grateful people are happier.

7. Finances — Resolve to whittle away at your debt.

Resist buying things you don’t absolutely need.

Enjoy life. Avoid conspicuous consumption.

If there are things that you can do, and should do, then

do them. Don’t neglect them.

11How To Avoid 5 Deadly

Leadership Mistakes

These are the 5 Deadly Leadership

Mistakes.

They really happened. No editorial license. No exaggeration.

The sole purpose of my story is to share these reasons why and how I

went from the pinnacle of my professional career, the very top of what

many professionals desire to achieve, to crashing and burning…

…spending almost 3 years of my life in a Federal Correctional

Institute.

I had the opportunity to avoid this. I didn’t see any of it coming.

I chose to ignore the warning signs. They were there. Good people

tried to help me.

I didn’t listen. I didn’t heed good advice.

My hope is that the 5 Mistakes will help someone else avoid the same

fate.

My fervent desire is that you won’t repeat my mistakes. That

you WILL listen, and take the advice I so recklessly ignored.

My writings are on Medium at: Medium - EnriqueFiallo

My website is at www.fiallo.com – visit to learn about and schedule a

free 45 minute Coaching Consultation

“Beware of What You Become In Pursuit Of What You