August Newsletter Recap
# 1 – Perception is Reality – The most important thing for a leader to know is what those they are trying to lead think about them.
# 2 – Blind Spots – Are there some leadership skills or competencies limiting your effectiveness as a leader?
# 3 – What Should You Do? – Get meaningful feedback and develop a plan to be the Best Boss Ever!
Hello Leaders! This month’s newsletter we’re focusing on mastering the leadership skills that will be essential for the future – without compromising your effectiveness today. Cheers!
Point # 1 – Become More Agile and Purposeful
Strategic perspective is an essential foundation of great leaders. “VUCA” = volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous conditions. Knowing your strategy and tactics is useless unless you can effectively use adaptive leadership to execute in a VUCA world. Your leadership impact will depend on how successfully you steer your team through ongoing challenges and crises.
As the pace of change continues to accelerate (stat), your ability to quickly adapt and be agile is a game changer. However, if you are reactive to everything around you, you will not succeed. Your ability to keep one foot in today and another in tomorrow is more than a balancing act. Great leaders will stay grounded in strategic direction and make agile decisions.
Agility without purpose is like having a good game plan but lacking the energy to execute it. Today, more than ever, the power of purpose separates those who want to be the best. Your team members need to know why your company exists. They must understand how their personal purpose relates to the company’s purpose. Synergy is a superpower, and it comes from uniting purposes. Don’t work your best people to death; give them a big reason to want to make a difference, and they will execute at the highest level possible.
Ask Yourself: “What am I doing today to become more agile with a purpose?”
Point # 2 – Lead Others to Manage Polarities
Solving problems and analyzing issues are critical competencies today. Companies are currently challenged with numerous complex issues and problems. Sometimes, companies try to solve big problems that are mainly unsolvable. What I mean is that they never seem to go away, and companies are constantly fighting them. When you continually implement new programs to solve long-lasting problems, and they don’t go away, they could be polarities. Polarities can only be managed.
A well-managed polarity leverages the inherent tension between the two sides to create balance and benefit from both. Polarity involves two elements that seem mutually exclusive, as if you can only choose one. However, you can have both simultaneously– that’s where the “both/and” terminology comes from. Examples:
· Competing & Collaborating
· Individual & Team
· Consistency & Flexibility
· High Quality & Low Cost
One of the biggest leadership challenges is telling the difference between a polarity and a problem. If you don’t see the challenge as a polarity, you will attempt to solve something that can’t be solved. The goal is to help your team and organization effectively balance and embrace both sides of the polarity. This means leading others who might be strongly attached to one end of the polarity and resistant to considering the other side. Challenging them to work together, let go of the defense of their pole, and create a new solution that incorporates the benefits of the other pole is critical today. It will only become more important in the future.
Ask Yourself: How well do I identify polarities? Do I challenge my team to manage polarities?
Point # 3 – Increase Your EQ+
I am referring to “EQ+” as the ability to dovetail emotional intelligence (self-awareness and management, social awareness, and relationship management) and “CQ,” or curiosity quotient. I know what you are thinking. There is nothing new about emotional intelligence. That may be true. It’s not important to understand EQ; it is important to be really good at EQ.
Many leaders lack an EQ development plan that enables them to create excellent relationships with others (especially those who are different from themselves). Start by dedicating yourself to practicing one simple weekly action that could increase your emotional intelligence. EQ+ is the foundation of your ability to lead others successfully. Check out Emotional Intelligence 2.0 in the Want to Go Deeper section below.
Curiosity quotient refers to your ability to be curious about everything. Intelligence can block our ability to be interested because we know the answer or the solution. When we think we know something, we block out other ideas. Nothing is more detrimental to a leader than faking listening because they already know the answer or have a solution they like. When you are a curious listener, you ask more engaging questions and communicate better. You can help others solve their problems without giving them solutions. Curiosity is a game changer.
Ask Yourself: How curious am I about other’s input and suggestions? Am I a curious listener?
Want to help a leader be better? Pass along their name, and I will help them.
Want to Go Deeper?
1. The Top 5 Leadership Trends That Will Drive Success In 2024 by Brent Gleeson Forbes Jan. 2024
2. Cracking the Curiosity Code – The key to unlocking human potential by Diane Hamilton
3. Emotional Intelligence 2.0 by Travis Bradberry and Jean Greaves