I have never been a fan of "reality shows!" My idea of survivor is a woman who has conquered breast cancer and is honored every spring at "Race for the Cure." I have a big brother, but he's never been on television, and has enough reality of his own for two episodes; and as for apprentice, I thought that was a training program for the new generation of workers within a trade.  I certainly don't place judgment on anyone who schedules their evenings around reality shows; it's just something I have never done before. Of course, that was until now. I was left alone one night this summer with nothing to do but watch Undercover Boss. Oops! Guess who's hooked?

Undercover Boss is the new hit "reality series" that follows a corporate executive to the frontlines of their company to see how it operates from a day-to-day perspective.  They get the opportunity to be in the trenches for a week with their employees to see how the work is actually being accomplished. They also get to witness whether or not the company's greater vision is being realized from the bottom up.  It's one thing to have the well-crafted mission statement prominently displayed in the corporate boardroom; it's quite another to see how the message is being communicated to the organization's customers and employees.

The more episodes I watch, the more I realize the premise of this series is much like taking the personal assessment Phil Eastman offers at the end of every chapter in his book, The Character of Leadership: An Ancient Model for a Quantum Age.  These leaders get to experience the effects of their decisions that are made in the comfort of their office back home.  They go with the mindset to learn, assess, and gather information about the companies they lead.  The difference is that the employees are doing the assessing, and the leader is hearing it unfiltered and first-hand.

The first character element from Eastman's character of leadership model I see is Courage. The mere fact the leader wants to leave the safety of corporate and get their hands dirty exhibits a level of Courage that quite possibly they have not had to confront in a while. By the time the episode is over, the boss has to boldly call upon Courage once again to approach the obstacles and challenges they discovered on their field trip. It would be amiss for them as leaders to not take the final corrective actions.

Another character element that begins to emerge in the program is the leader's Love for their people.  Once the leader is undercover and quite literally rubbing elbows with the employees, they get to know them as individuals with hopes and dreams, setbacks and pain. They begin to understand the personal hardships and sacrifice some of their frontline people make daily for the company.

Most of the bosses admit the work is harder than expected, the hours are long, and some of them are ready to quit before the days are even over. In one of the episodes, a leader almost got fired, and in a couple of them, they nearly blew their cover because of what was being done in the name of profit.

The character qualities are not just for the positional leaders that go undercover.  As the CEOs work with the employees on the frontlines, they get to observe the Wisdom of their people in action. The accumulated knowledge and experience of their workers is applied daily in the trenches to effectively help the overall bottom-line of the company.  Justice is another character element the undercover bosses see displayed.  Many workers go out of their way to help others triumph in the daily struggles. The positional leaders get the privilege to learn significant lessons which can ultimately be developed in other areas of the organization.

Perhaps my favorite character element that flows throughout all the episodes is Hope.  For me, Hope would be the genuine motivation for the entire reality series.  When you see the leader interact with their workforce, listen to their commentaries at the end of each day, and then witness the outcome in the boardroom when it's all over, Hope is ever present. The changes the leaders are willing to make, due to the lessons learned, are saturated in Hope.  The leaders determine to make a difference not only for the organization, but on behalf of their employees, which will eventually influence the profitability of the whole company.

To juxtapose the Character of Leadership Model with the lessons learned by these corporate leaders, I can see why Undercover Boss is a hit television program swiftly moving into its second successful season. Whether it's a hotel chain, a restaurant franchise, or a global shipping company, the character qualities of a leader needs to be the reality demonstrated throughout the organization and not just on network television.