Leadership is a very fashionable concept at the moment. There are several posts every day on social media promoting the positive impact of being a good leader at work and in your personal life.
There is also the listing of several character traits that a leader must possess to increase their influence and impact on those around them.
If you are like me, reading these characteristics and benefits of following or being a good leader energizes you and gives you hope that this approach will be favored by organizations today and tomorrow.
Although this gives us energy and hope for the future, several important questions remain unanswered:
- How can I develop my leadership?
- What is the first element I must put in place to position myself as a leader?
- How will this impact my team?
- Who can help me?
The problem comes from the fact that as in many areas of our lives such as exercise, healthy eating and sleep, there is a big difference between knowing the theory and putting in the effort that will be needed to put it into practice.
I am a very good example of this for healthy lifestyle habits: I know the harmful effect of my consumption of soft drinks, unhealthy foods and lack of sleep on my health, but I continue to have an unbalanced diet and go to bed in the early hours of the morning. Why you ask me? Because it’s my comfort zone and I like it.
Comfort zone
For many organizations, the comfort zone is traditional management with a boss who decides and employees who obey. It is a method that worked with past generations, but which risks being difficult to maintain in current conditions and even more with future generations.
The carrot and stick method no longer works even though our parents and retiring workers tell us how much it simplified things. If you are parents like me of children of the 2000s, you know that this methodology does not work for raising our children so why would it work in business with these same workers?
A leadership approach instead of a directive boss therefore seems a good alternative. The question remains: how to become a leader?
There are several excellent books on this subject and they are good tools for developing self-confidence and opening minds to the possibility of positioning yourself as a leader. There are also mentors and trainers, like me, who can help in the development process.
Influence and Personal Development
Important fact: A leader is a person who influences others. He can be a manager, but that’s not necessary. A good starting point is to develop your leadership in a team without exercising defined management responsibilities. You can do lots of testing on what works and what doesn’t apply to your team of collaborators.
The qualities of a leader come from a development of his interpersonal skills much more than his know-how. This means that the theory read in books or taught by a mentor or trainer brings nothing if you do not not live the skills and character traits of the leader.
In my opinion, it all starts with an intention: to serve others and leave your ego at the front door.
Give credit to those who deserve it
It is true that there are several other elements that can allow you to become a good leader such as charisma, empathy, effective communication and global vision.
It is obvious that these are all complementary elements that help the leader in his mission to grow a work team.
However, a leader works with people and people are intelligent enough to detect the intention of the person in front of them. If this person takes all the credit for successes and shifts the blame onto team members when problems arise, all the charisma and empathy in the world won’t be able to correct the person’s intention to use the team. for his personal promotion.
However, if the leader equips his team for success and takes responsibility for failures when necessary, employee engagement will be increased and organizational results improved.
These are two extreme situations and it is true that being a good leader will propel your teams to impressive successes. However, it is important to understand that this will not happen in the blink of an eye. It will take a lot of hard work and determination to achieve the goal.
A good approach is to set numerous milestones in order to celebrate successes and quickly implement quick wins that will create positive momentum to facilitate the implementation of the new way.
Strategy and analysis
Good leaders possess strategic and analytical thinking. They demonstrate flexibility and agility. Their innovation and creativity are major assets, and they often have strong planning and organizational skills. If this is not the case, they surround themselves with people who can complement them in these areas.
Practical Tip for Ethical Leadership Intention
I’m going to leave you with a little trick that I use to judge my intention in a situation or during a conversation: I place myself in the chair of my interlocutor or a person impacted by the decision and I ask myself if the the approach taken would be acceptable to me. If yes, I keep my trajectory. If no, then I change my approach or my goal.
Now that you know what the starting point is to become a good leader! Share your views in the comments.
Need help to take action or simply to clarify the next steps to take? Do not hesitate to contact me . It is with pleasure that I will be able to support you in your new challenges.
Carl-Michaël Tessier
Coach in high-performance team development and tailor-made support
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