Employees typically seek jobs at companies that offer leadership development. But employers seek candidates that already have some form of leadership skills. This is because management doesn’t want to spend the time or money to train employees to develop their leadership skills.
This creates an opportunity for you – if you learn the secrets to being a great leader and manager. And the opportunity is huge. According to a study by The Conference Board, DDI, and EY, only 14 percent of CEOs have the leadership they need to grow their companies.
Let’s examine a few leadership tips you can use to help you become a better leader in your organization. As you read through, consider what you need to do to display these qualities moving forward.
Understand the Role of a Leader
What it means to be a leader has changed in the past few decades; old management styles that worked in the past no longer apply. Today, you are not in a position of hierarchical power anymore and expected to act as a mentor and coworker.
You need to show the ability to collaborate with those who work for you and empathize with them. This allows you to adapt to tough situations that may come up during a project by pooling skills and working together. Modern leaders also lead by example. This teaches your employees that they can trust you to make good decisions because you truly understand the tasks.
Continual Learning
As the workplace continues to change, you need to evolve with it. This is not only due to the evolution of digital technology but because of changing office cultures in the 21st Century.
Leadership is a learned skill. So, how do you improve your leadership skills over time to keep up with change, as well as stay on top of the work itself? Reflect on your own strengths and weaknesses and identify areas where you need to learn more in order to grow into a better leader.
Inspire and Motivate
As a leader, it is often down to you to either motivate your team or find ways they can motivate one another. Empower your team to celebrate one another's successes and recognize their accomplishments and individual contributions.
If you need to talk to someone about failure, do so with an attitude of empathy and position it as a learning experience. Everyone makes mistakes; it is learning from those mistakes that allows us to grow and become more competent. It is too easy to demotivate people so find ways to use the carrot instead of the stick.
Decision Making
As your company tangles with hard challenges, you often need to make difficult decisions and communicate them to your team. This requires:
- Exemplary communications skills,
- Empathy for the difficulties the decision may cause, and
- A willingness to delegate lengthy tasks.
You also need to deal with the fact that you may make mistakes. Learning from past mistakes and improving your skills in response builds respect. If you continue to make the same errors, it will only grow negative sentiment among your peers.
Discover More Leadership Tips
These are only a few tips to help you improve your leadership skills, but there is much more to learn. We offer individual as well as group training for executives and managers that “sticks” and is put into practice and not forgotten. Our programs help them become better leaders that create an engaged and productive workforce.
Sound interesting? Want to explore further? Have any questions? Get in touch and let’s set up a time to talk. Brian Tracy USA: 877.433.6225 Email Me feedback@focalpointcoaching.com
