The Many Faces of Leadership – Part II

I have asked thousands of participants in my leadership workshops to define the activities of effective leaders. Here is the second in a series of articles elaborating on some of the more common answers I get when asking my clients about the role of leaders in their organizations.

Leaders Know How to Convince Others to Follow Their Lead

Former Chrysler Chairman Lee Iacocca once noted that “you can have brilliant ideas, but if you can’t get them across, your ideas won’t get you anywhere”. Leaders know how to “sell” their ideas effectively to their boss, their colleagues and their customers. Leaders effectively “close the deal” by doing their homework, listening, adjusting for the communication preferences of others, presenting with passion and following up “after the sale”. Most of all, leaders appreciate that objections often signal that the audience simply is interested in continuing the conversation and may need more information to overcome their initial resistance.

Leaders Remove Organizational Barriers to Risk Taking

Leaders encourage risk taking by embracing failure as an essential step in the learning process. While many organizations profess an interest in experimentation and ongoing innovation, it is far more instructive to observe what happens when someone actually tries something new and fails. Leaders promote risk taking in their organizations by not punishing failure when it invariably occurs. Instead, they focus on lessons learned and celebrate the bold and focused behaviors of their people.

Leaders Manage Their Self-Sabotaging “Inner Voices” That Get in the Way of Action

Even when leaders become clear about where they want to take their teams, self-doubt and a lack of confidence can block the action necessary to achieve results. By acknowledging that criticisms – both external and internal – always will be present, leaders better prepare themselves for properly weighing the importance of these various voices, gremlins or saboteurs. Leaders develop an ability to mitigate the effect, and lower the volume, of their inner voices so they can remain focused on the future despite the noise all around them.

Leaders Delegate

Leaders appreciate that they cannot do everything themselves. They have become successful by learning to leverage the talents of those around them. Their impact on their organizations has grown in direct proportion to their ability to trust others to do important work. Leaders look beyond grunt work when they delegate and instead hand over meaningful assignments that stretch their people and provide them with a sense of accomplishment and contribution. Leaders look to continuously expand the bench strength of their organizations by lengthening the list of people they can go to to get work done.

Leaders Take Time to Rejuvenate and Recharge

Leaders learn that driving sustainable success and long-term impact requires vibrancy and health. In their quest to avoid overload, overwhelm and even illness, leaders find ways to boost their vitality on a regular basis. One of the best ways to inject more vitality into the lives of leaders is to create more oscillation or planned variation between work and play. Leaders plan ahead by designing specific days on their calendar for rejuvenation and get comfortable making time for taking better care of themselves.