The Key to Successful Leadership
By Todd T. De Voe
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The key to successful leadership today is influence, not authority. ~ Ken Blanchard
Becoming a leader takes hard work, courage, and taking risks. Leadership is about finding solutions to problems and making things better for your team while not falling apart yourself. Being a leader means being a role model for and doing things to help the community, your organization, or even the world.
Leadership is hard. It is not about telling people what to do. The job and duty are to help others do their best by demonstrating specific attitudes, behaviors, and skills that inspire and guide others to follow you. As Simon Sinek said, leaders move from being the person responsible for the job to being accountable for the people responsible for doing the job.
The idea of what a leader is has evolved. Leadership was once viewed as the person who was the expert in the room, and Everyone followed them. Today, people want to follow a leader who builds teams that impact the world or the community they serve.
For example, Elon Musk built the Tesla empire, where the products are used worldwide. Not only has he enhanced the modern electric car, but he has also revolutionized and relaunched worldwide interest in space exploration with SpaceX.
"Talent is extremely important. It's like a sports team, the team that has the best individual player will often win, but then there's a multiplier from how those players work together and the strategy they employ." Elon Musk
Leadership requires courage, confidence, and communication. A good leader is passionate and committed, with a strong positive attitude. President Harry Truman said, "Not all readers lead, but all leaders are readers." I use that quote often when I think of leaders and leadership. Because the more you read, the better you become at communicating ideas, and you open yourself to ideas and engage in listing to others.
Not all Managers Are Leaders
To borrow from Truman, all leaders can manage; however, not all managers lead.
I don't want to spend too much time on this debate. This has to be said; being a leader is different from being a manager. Managers make sure the day-to-day things are being taken care of. Leadership is more about being confident, setting good examples, and being a good listener. Leadership skills are not just for the workplace. Your personal and social life also benefits from having good leadership skills.
Successful leaders create a thriving culture that focuses on meaningful connections and relationships with their people, thereby creating trust among their employees, partners, vendors, and stakeholders.
Leadership is a Relationship
The book of the month is "Leadership is a Relationship." One of the reasons that the EM Weekly Book Editor Marc Baker choose this book is how it projects what leadership ought to be.
What distinguishes a great leader from a good leader is that person's ability to foster deep-rooted and trusting connections with the people they work with.
Finding the right team and building sound and trusting relationships takes effort and intention.
Michael S. Erwin and Willys Devoll's book Leadership is a Relationship argues that leadership is based on relationships with people. Leadership does not appeal to formal authority or coercion; instead, it depends on the leader's ability to motivate and create a shared purpose. When you understand the relationship, you build a bond with your team that inspires commitment to improving each other.
Ways to foster relationships in leadership
Culture of Trust: Leaders share their passion and vision openly and clearly throughout the organization and encourage their employees to work towards that vision.
Effective listening: Listen with compassion to understand others' underlying sentiments, concerns, and interests. This way, you can build a safe environment where everyone on your team can make their voices heard. One of the most successful ways to listen is to create a safe space to ask questions and receive candid answers.
Empathy: Last, and arguably the most important, is empathy. Technical skills may have helped get you into a leadership position; however, your emotional intelligence (EQ) will help you lead. One of the keys to a high EQ is your ability to have empathy. When leaders put themselves in the "shoes" of their employees, trust develops. Vulnerability is helpful because your team sees you as another human being like themselves.
Join us Next Thursday on EM Weekly when we discuss the book Leadership is a Relationship with Marc Baker.
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As leaders we should develop relationships with our subordinates and understand what drive them. This does not mean we should be best of friends with subordinates and shy away from hard decisions, but we should make the effort to understand the “whole employee”, not only just their work performance but also their personal dynamic (interests, family, stresses, joys, ect…). This happens through conversation and willingness to be vulnerable, the only way to get someone to be open with you is for you to be willing to be open and vulnerable with them. Leaders value their greatest resource and put people first, I am reminded of a creed I have lived by for a long time that includes “…My two basic responsibilities will always be uppermost in my mind, the accomplishment of my mission and the welfare of my Soldiers (employees)…” unfortunately some leaders replace the “and” in that line with “then” but that’s not leadership, leadership puts people equal to (or slightly above) mission accomplishment always preserving that precious resource. I truly believe that there are no bad teams just bad leaders, so let’s be accountable to ourselves and our employees (and in turn hold them accountable), continuously forgive and create an environment that emboldens you subordinates where you assume positive intent in actions or deeds. In doing so we can build an environment of trust and loyalty within our organizations with less turnover and greater stability.