Developing the Next Generation Of Leaders for Long-Term Success
In a world of rapid technological advancements and evolving workplace dynamics, nurturing the next generation of leaders is crucial for long-term organizational success. As industries become more complex and interconnected, building a strong future-ready leadership pipeline requires a balance between technical skill development, emotional intelligence, and adaptability. In this article, we’ll explore practical, easy-to-action strategies that organizations can adopt to empower next-generation leaders and ensure they are well-equipped for the challenges ahead.
Implement Iterative Technical Skill Development
The pace of technological diffusion is accelerating, meaning technical skills need continuous upgrading. To prepare next-generation leaders for a rapidly changing landscape, it is vital to implement development strategies that evolve over time. Developing new technical skills can be challenging and requires an understanding of how to help people adapt to doing things in new ways. Developing a learning culture is critical and should advocate a learning mindset as well as focusing on developing skillset:
- Encourage Continuous Learning: Provide access to learning platforms and resources with reward and incentive for individuals taking ownership of their own learning and socialising this learning. Encourage participation in regular technical training sessions or certification programmes.
- Create Learning Pathways: Design individualized career development plans that include technical skill-building milestones that can be reviewed and updated regularly.
- Mentorship Programmes: Pair emerging leaders with technical experts or senior leaders for mentorship, focusing on knowledge transfer in relevant technical areas.
By making technical learning iterative, organizations enable leaders to stay ahead of industry trends while improving their problem-solving capabilities.
Foster Adaptive Leadership Skills
In an unpredictable and fast-paced business environment, next-generation leaders must master adaptive leadership. This involves being flexible, learning from challenges, and making decisions with incomplete information. Adaptive leaders can thrive in uncertain situations, steer teams through change, and foster innovation.
How can you support this:
- Simulate Real-World Challenges: When designing development programmes, build in role-playing exercises (real-play) or simulations (e.g., crisis management drills) that put emerging leaders in high-pressure, real-world scenarios where they must respond quickly. In doing this it is important to create a learning environment where participants can ‘fail safely’ and receive constructive, developmental feedback.
- Encourage Cross-Disciplinary Collaboration: Promote project-based learning that involves working with teams from different departments to develop a broader understanding of how different parts of the business function.
- Develop a Growth Mindset: Incorporate regular feedback loops and emphasize learning from failure. When emerging leaders view setbacks as opportunities to grow, they become more resilient.
Adaptive leadership helps next-generation leaders handle the volatility of modern business environments, enhancing their capacity for decision-making under pressure.
Bridge the Generational Knowledge Gap
Intergenerational collaboration is crucial to passing down institutional and organizational knowledge while fostering innovation. The knowledge gap between senior leaders and the younger workforce can hinder growth if not addressed effectively. Bridging this gap requires creating systems that encourage the exchange of expertise and values between generations.
- Create Reverse Mentoring Programs: In addition to traditional mentorship, reverse mentoring allows younger employees to mentor senior staff on emerging technologies or trends, fostering mutual learning and respect.
- Host Intergenerational Workshops: Regularly bring together employees from different generations for workshops that explore collaborative problem-solving, technological integration, and innovation.
- Build Collaborative Communities: Create forums (online or in-person) where employees can ask questions and share expertise openly. Cross-generational collaboration can be fostered through knowledge-sharing platforms, lunch-and-learns, or innovation sprints.
By facilitating mutual learning, organizations can close the knowledge gap while leveraging the strengths of each generation.
Cultivate Self-Awareness and Emotional Intelligence
Self-awareness and emotional intelligence (EQ) are critical leadership skills that help future leaders manage teams effectively, navigate conflict, and maintain strong interpersonal relationships. Organizations must ensure emerging leaders develop a high level of emotional literacy and empathy.
- Developing Emotional Intelligence: Offer training on active listening, empathy, emotional regulation, and social awareness to help future leaders understand their emotions and the emotions of others.
- Personality Assessments: Use tools like the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), DiSC profiles, or 360-degree feedback mechanisms (e.g. EQI, Leadership Circle) to help emerging leaders reflect on their strengths and weaknesses, promoting self-awareness. These can then form the basis of discussion around personalized development planning.
- Promote Mindfulness and Stress Management: Provide ongoing (not a one-hit fix) mindfulness training, support and resources on stress management to enhance leaders’ emotional resilience and mental well-being.
Cultivating emotional intelligence not only improves leadership capacity but also enhances collaboration, innovation, and team dynamics.
Promote a Culture of Innovation and Agility
Organizations that foster innovation and agility create environments where next-generation leaders can experiment with new ideas, adapt to market changes, and lead teams through uncertainty. Encouraging a culture where innovation is supported by an agile mindset will ensure long-term success:
- Facilitate Risk-Taking: Support innovation by creating a safe space for risk-taking with clear boundaries, where failures are seen as part of the learning process. Leaders should feel empowered to experiment with new approaches without fear of punitive consequences.
- Agile Methodologies: Integrate agile project management methodologies, such as Scrum or Kanban, to help teams remain flexible and responsive to changing priorities.
- Celebrate Innovation: Recognize and reward employees who bring creative ideas to the table, whether through hackathons, innovation challenges, or regular brainstorming sessions.
A culture of innovation and agility ensures that emerging leaders are not just reacting to change but driving it.
Encourage Strategic Thinking and Foresight
Beyond technical skills and adaptability, emerging leaders must learn to think strategically and anticipate future trends. Organizations must provide resources and platforms that promote forward-thinking and strategic insight:
- Future Scenario Planning: Use scenario planning exercises to help leaders explore different future possibilities and consider the strategic decisions they would make under various circumstances. We love this scenario planning template – a good start to structuring discussions; you can download it from here.
- Expose Future or Aspiring Leaders to Strategic Projects: Assign emerging leaders to cross-functional strategic initiatives that require a broader understanding of market dynamics and business growth strategies.
- Networking and External Exposure: Encourage participation in industry conferences, professional associations, or think tanks where leaders can gain insights into emerging trends, global markets, and innovation strategies.
Empowering next-generation leaders requires a multi-dimensional approach that goes beyond technical expertise. By fostering adaptability, bridging generational knowledge gaps, promoting emotional intelligence, and cultivating a culture of innovation, organizations can create leaders who are equipped to navigate the complex and rapidly evolving business landscape. These practical, easy-to-action strategies will not only prepare emerging leaders for immediate challenges but also ensure they are ready to drive long-term success in a constantly changing world.
Developing the Next Generation Of Leaders for Long-Term Success
In a world of rapid technological advancements and evolving workplace dynamics, nurturing the next generation of leaders is crucial for long-term organisational success. As industries become more complex and interconnected, building a strong future-ready leadership pipeline requires a balance between technical skill development, emotional intelligence, and adaptability. In this article, we’ll explore practical, easy-to-action strategies that organisations can adopt to empower next-generation leaders and ensure they are well-equipped for the challenges ahead.
Implement Iterative Technical Skill Development
The pace of technological diffusion is accelerating, meaning technical skills need continuous upgrading. To prepare next-generation leaders for a rapidly changing landscape, it is vital to implement development strategies that evolve over time. Developing new technical skills can be challenging and requires an understanding of how to help people adapt to doing things in new ways. Developing a learning culture is critical and should advocate a learning mindset as well as focusing on developing skillset:
- Encourage Continuous Learning: Provide access to learning platforms and resources with reward and incentive for individuals taking ownership of their own learning and socialising this learning. Encourage participation in regular technical training sessions or certification programmes.
- Create Learning Pathways: Design individualised career development plans that include technical skill-building milestones that can be reviewed and updated regularly.
- Mentorship Programmes: Pair emerging leaders with technical experts or senior leaders for mentorship, focusing on knowledge transfer in relevant technical areas.
By making technical learning iterative, organisations enable leaders to stay ahead of industry trends while improving their problem-solving capabilities.
Foster Adaptive Leadership Skills
In an unpredictable and fast-paced business environment, next-generation leaders must master adaptive leadership. This involves being flexible, learning from challenges, and making decisions with incomplete information. Adaptive leaders can thrive in uncertain situations, steer teams through change, and foster innovation.
How can you support this:
- Simulate Real-World Challenges: When designing development programmes, build in role-playing exercises (real-play) or simulations (e.g., crisis management drills) that put emerging leaders in high-pressure, real-world scenarios where they must respond quickly. In doing this it is important to create a learning environment where participants can ‘fail safely’ and receive constructive, developmental feedback.
- Encourage Cross-Disciplinary Collaboration: Promote project-based learning that involves working with teams from different departments to develop a broader understanding of how different parts of the business function.
- Develop a Growth Mindset: Incorporate regular feedback loops and emphasise learning from failure. When emerging leaders view setbacks as opportunities to grow, they become more resilient.
Adaptive leadership helps next-generation leaders handle the volatility of modern business environments, enhancing their capacity for decision-making under pressure.
Bridge the Generational Knowledge Gap
Intergenerational collaboration is crucial to passing down institutional and organisational knowledge while fostering innovation. The knowledge gap between senior leaders and the younger workforce can hinder growth if not addressed effectively. Bridging this gap requires creating systems that encourage the exchange of expertise and values between generations.
- Create Reverse Mentoring Programs: In addition to traditional mentorship, reverse mentoring allows younger employees to mentor senior staff on emerging technologies or trends, fostering mutual learning and respect.
- Host Intergenerational Workshops: Regularly bring together employees from different generations for workshops that explore collaborative problem-solving, technological integration, and innovation.
- Build Collaborative Communities: Create forums (online or in-person) where employees can ask questions and share expertise openly. Cross-generational collaboration can be fostered through knowledge-sharing platforms, lunch-and-learns, or innovation sprints.
By facilitating mutual learning, organisations can close the knowledge gap while leveraging the strengths of each generation.
Cultivate Self-Awareness and Emotional Intelligence
Self-awareness and emotional intelligence (EQ) are critical leadership skills that help future leaders manage teams effectively, navigate conflict, and maintain strong interpersonal relationships. Organisations must ensure emerging leaders develop a high level of emotional literacy and empathy.
- Developing Emotional Intelligence: Offer training on active listening, empathy, emotional regulation, and social awareness to help future leaders understand their emotions and the emotions of others.
- Personality Assessments: Use tools like the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), DiSC profiles, or 360-degree feedback mechanisms (e.g. EQI, Leadership Circle) to help emerging leaders reflect on their strengths and weaknesses, promoting self-awareness. These can then form the basis of discussion around personalised development planning.
- Promote Mindfulness and Stress Management: Provide ongoing (not a one-hit fix) mindfulness training, support and resources on stress management to enhance leaders’ emotional resilience and mental well-being.
Cultivating emotional intelligence not only improves leadership capacity but also enhances collaboration, innovation, and team dynamics.
Promote a Culture of Innovation and Agility
Organisations that foster innovation and agility create environments where next-generation leaders can experiment with new ideas, adapt to market changes, and lead teams through uncertainty. Encouraging a culture where innovation is supported by an agile mindset will ensure long-term success:
- Facilitate Risk-Taking: Support innovation by creating a safe space for risk-taking with clear boundaries, where failures are seen as part of the learning process. Leaders should feel empowered to experiment with new approaches without fear of punitive consequences.
- Agile Methodologies: Integrate agile project management methodologies, such as Scrum or Kanban, to help teams remain flexible and responsive to changing priorities.
- Celebrate Innovation: Recognise and reward employees who bring creative ideas to the table, whether through hackathons, innovation challenges, or regular brainstorming sessions.
A culture of innovation and agility ensures that emerging leaders are not just reacting to change but driving it.
Encourage Strategic Thinking and Foresight
Beyond technical skills and adaptability, emerging leaders must learn to think strategically and anticipate future trends. Organisations must provide resources and platforms that promote forward-thinking and strategic insight:
- Future Scenario Planning: Use scenario planning exercises to help leaders explore different future possibilities and consider the strategic decisions they would make under various circumstances. We love this scenario planning template – a good start to structuring discussions; you can download it from here.
- Expose Future or Aspiring Leaders to Strategic Projects: Assign emerging leaders to cross-functional strategic initiatives that require a broader understanding of market dynamics and business growth strategies.
- Networking and External Exposure: Encourage participation in industry conferences, professional associations, or think tanks where leaders can gain insights into emerging trends, global markets, and innovation strategies.
Empowering next-generation leaders requires a multi-dimensional approach that goes beyond technical expertise. By fostering adaptability, bridging generational knowledge gaps, promoting emotional intelligence, and cultivating a culture of innovation, organisations can create leaders who are equipped to navigate the complex and rapidly evolving business landscape. These practical, easy-to-action strategies will not only prepare emerging leaders for immediate challenges but also ensure they are ready to drive long-term success in a constantly changing world.
Feedback Models – Why Do We Still Get it Wrong?
In the world of modern leadership, feedback is a critical tool for employee development and team growth. Creating a feedback culture is often spoken about as the ideal for organisations; they dream of a world where teams operate in a psychologically safe space, where communication is constructive, compassionate and collaborative. Teams strive for open, honest conversation, where boundaries are pushed safely and innovatively; where employees strive for continuous improvement based on radical candor, non-judgmental, unbiased communication; where striving for better, drives best performance.
So, why is it still the most common request we receive when designing leadership development programs? Why do we still get it wrong?
Despite the abundance of feedback models, leaders often fail to effectively communicate, leaving teams confused or disillusioned.
We explore why that might be the case, starting with a brief look at some of the most commonly referenced feedback models. We dive into what leaders may be missing when it comes to giving and receiving feedback.
The top 5 Feedback Models
1. SBI (Situation-Behavior-Impact)
This model promotes a process which begins with defining a specific situation, the behavior observed, and the impact it had on others. It aims to be clear and objective but often lacks a focus on actionable steps.
2. AID (Action-Impact-Desired Behaviour/Do)
Similar to SBI, the AID model stresses the impact of an action and what change is needed in the future. It’s helpful for steering behavior in a constructive way but can feel prescriptive.
3. IDEA (Identify-Describe-Encourage-Action)
IDEA adopts a more coach-based approach; including encouragement alongside actionable feedback, which fosters support. Leaders may struggle with balancing honesty and positivity, potentially downplaying necessary criticism.
4. EEC (Example-Effect-Change/Continue)
A model that aims to capture the impetus for change to improve outcomes; recognizing and advocating for positive affirmation in equal measure.
5. STAR/L (Situation-Task-Action-Result/Learning)
A popular feedback model however it can lack focus on improvement and change; hence the addition of the L-Learning.
What’s Missing: Why Leaders Still Get It Wrong
Despite these well-structured models, feedback often misses the mark. Here’s why:
1. Emotional Intelligence and Empathy
Models provide structure, but leadership requires emotional intelligence. Many leaders focus on following the formula of a feedback model without tuning into the emotions of the recipient. Effective feedback requires a genuine understanding of the other person’s feelings and how the feedback will be received. For example, even well-delivered constructive feedback can trigger defensiveness if empathy isn’t shown. Leaders take care to consider ‘intention’ and what you want the ‘receiver’ to take away, while being aware of your own communication styles and how you may need to adapt this to meet the listener.
2. Actionability vs. Reflection
Feedback should always be actionable, yet leaders often forget to offer specific ways for improvement. Many models outline what needs to change but stop short of equipping the recipient with tools or guidance to improve. Help the receiver to consider ways they might change their thinking and behaviors in light of the desired impact. When feedback lacks practical steps, it becomes overwhelming and ineffective.
3. Consistency and Timing/Regularity
Leaders can either wait too long for formal feedback sessions or give feedback at inappropriate times. Feedback needs to be regular and provided close to the behavior it addresses. Delaying feedback for quarterly reviews makes it less effective, as employees may no longer connect the feedback to the specific behavior. On an organization level, inconsistency in terms of quality of feedback, tone and specifics can have a knock on effect in terms of morale and engagement. Train your leaders to give and receive feedback well.
4. Clarity and Directness
One common mistake is a lack of clarity. Feedback must be straightforward, yet many leaders beat around the bush, fearing confrontation. The feedback becomes muddled, leaving employees unsure of what to actually improve.
5. One-Sided Communication
Feedback should be a conversation, not a monologue. While some models encourage dialogue, many leaders still treat feedback as a one-way process. They focus solely on delivering their message without listening to the recipient’s perspective or allowing space for questions.
6. Over-Reliance on the Model
While feedback models provide structure, they are not a substitute for genuine connection. Leaders can get bogged down by adhering strictly to the model, losing the personal touch necessary to make feedback meaningful. Models are guides, not rules, and leaders must adapt their approach based on the individual and the situation.
Conclusion
Despite the plethora of feedback models available, leaders often fail because they overlook the human aspect of feedback. The best models provide structure, but true feedback success lies in emotional intelligence, actionable steps, clear communication, and a focus on dialogue rather than delivering a formulaic response. By incorporating empathy and real-time adjustments into their feedback, leaders can create the kind of culture where feedback, really is the gift it should be.
Feedback Models – Why Do We Still Get it Wrong?
In the world of modern leadership, feedback is a critical tool for employee development and team growth. Creating a feedback culture is often spoken about as the ideal for organisations; they dream of a world where teams operate in a psychologically safe space, where communication is constructive, compassionate and collaborative. Teams strive for open, honest conversation, where boundaries are pushed safely and innovatively; where employees strive for continuous improvement based on radical candour, non-judgmental, unbiased communication; where striving for better, drives best performance.
So, why is it still the most common request we receive when designing leadership development programmes? Why do we still get it wrong?
Despite the abundance of feedback models, leaders often fail to effectively communicate, leaving teams confused or disillusioned.
We explore why that might be the case, starting with a brief look at some of the most commonly referenced feedback models. We dive into what leaders may be missing when it comes to giving and receiving feedback.
The Top 5 Feedback Models
1. SBI (Situation-Behaviour-Impact)
This model promotes a process which begins with defining a specific situation, the behaviour observed, and the impact it had on others. It aims to be clear and objective but often lacks a focus on actionable steps.
2. AID (Action-Impact-Desired Behaviour/Do)
Similar to SBI, the AID model stresses the impact of an action and what change is needed in the future. It’s helpful for steering behaviour in a constructive way but can feel prescriptive.
3. IDEA (Identify-Describe-Encourage-Action)
IDEA adopts a more coach-based approach; including encouragement alongside actionable feedback, which fosters support. Leaders may struggle with balancing honesty and positivity, potentially downplaying necessary criticism.
4. EEC (Example-Effect-Change/Continue)
A model that aims to capture the impetus for change to improve outcomes; recognising and advocating for positive affirmation in equal measure.
5. STAR/L (Situation-Task-Action-Result/Learning)
A popular feedback model however it can lack focus on improvement and change; hence the addition of the L-Learning.
What’s Missing: Why Leaders Still Get It Wrong
Despite these well-structured models, feedback often misses the mark. Here’s why:
1. Emotional Intelligence and Empathy
Models provide structure, but leadership requires emotional intelligence. Many leaders focus on following the formula of a feedback model without tuning into the emotions of the recipient. Effective feedback requires a genuine understanding of the other person’s feelings and how the feedback will be received. For example, even well-delivered constructive feedback can trigger defensiveness if empathy isn’t shown. Leaders take care to consider ‘intention’ and what you want the ‘receiver’ to take away, while being aware of your own communication styles and how they may need to adapt this to meet the listener.
2. Actionability vs. Reflection
Feedback should always be actionable, yet leaders often forget to offer specific ways for improvement. Many models outline what needs to change but stop short of equipping the recipient with tools or guidance to improve. Help the receiver to consider ways they might change their thinking and behaviours in light of the desired impact. When feedback lacks practical steps, it becomes overwhelming and ineffective.
3. Consistency and Timing/Regularity
Leaders can either wait too long for formal feedback sessions or give feedback at inappropriate times. Feedback needs to be regular and provided close to the behaviour it addresses. Delaying feedback for quarterly reviews makes it less effective, as employees may no longer connect the feedback to the specific behaviour. On an organisation level, inconsistency in terms of quality of feedback, tone and specifics can have a knock on effect in terms of morale and engagement. Train your leaders to give and receive feedback well.
4. Clarity and Directness
One common mistake is a lack of clarity. Feedback must be straightforward, yet many leaders beat around the bush, fearing confrontation. The feedback becomes muddled, leaving employees unsure of what to actually improve.
5. One-Sided Communication
Feedback should be a conversation, not a monologue. While some models encourage dialogue, many leaders still treat feedback as a one-way process. They focus solely on delivering their message without listening to the recipient’s perspective or allowing space for questions.
6. Over-Reliance on the Model
While feedback models provide structure, they are not a substitute for genuine connection. Leaders can get bogged down by adhering strictly to the model, losing the personal touch necessary to make feedback meaningful. Models are guides, not rules, and leaders must adapt their approach based on the individual and the situation.
Conclusion
Despite the plethora of feedback models available, leaders often fail because they overlook the human aspect of feedback. The best models provide structure, but true feedback success lies in emotional intelligence, actionable steps, clear communication, and a focus on dialogue rather than delivering a formulaic response. By incorporating empathy and real-time adjustments into their feedback, leaders can create the kind of culture where feedback, really is the gift it should be.
Reflective Practice – a practical guide and how to action
A Practical Guide to Reflective Practice for Leadership Development Using Gibbs’ Reflective Cycle
Reflective practice is your secret weapon when it comes to leadership development. It allows leaders to learn from experiences, adjust thinking and behaviours, and continuously improve their effectiveness.
Gibbs’ Reflective Cycle provides a structured framework for this process, making it one of the most powerful practices to master as a leader.
Graham Gibbs developed his “six-stage reflective model” (1988), which emphasises the process of turning reflections into actionable insights. Each stage encourages deep exploration of what happened, why it happened, and how to improve.
This practical guide will help you work through any situation where you might have experienced less than favourable results, and understand what changes you might want to take to ensure a better outcome. It promotes ownership and taking responsibility for your own behaviours and will help to shine a light on programmed behaviours which may now longer serve you when working with others.
Gibbs’ Reflective Cycle Template
Here is an template for you to use to get started using Gibbs’ Reflective Cycle. For each stage we’ve provided a template for the framework and also an example of how it might work in practice:
Stage 1: Description
In this stage, you describe the facts of the situation or experience that you want to reflect on. The goal is to capture the details without assigning judgment or bias at this stage.
Identify the experience: This could be a leadership challenge, a decision you made, a team conflict, or a project outcome.
Consider the following:
- What exactly happened?
- Who was involved?
- Where and when did it take place?
- What was the outcome?
Leadership Example:
During a team meeting, a conflict arose between two team members about the direction of a project. As the leader, I tried to mediate, but the conversation escalated. The meeting ended without resolution, and team morale seemed low.
Stage 2: Feelings
Reflect on your internal experience, your emotional responses to the situation. Understanding your feelings is crucial because emotions often influence how leaders react and make decisions.
Reflect on your feelings during the event:
- How did you feel before, during, and after the situation?
- What were you thinking as events played out?
- How did you think others were feeling? What did you notice that might provide clues?
Be honest: It’s okay to acknowledge feelings of frustration, anxiety, confidence, or satisfaction, as these inform your behaviour. You can also begin to understand why these feelings might have been activated.
Leadership Example:
At the time, I felt frustrated and a bit powerless. I was also concerned about how the rest of the team perceived my handling of the situation. I wondered if they felt I lacked authority or the ability to resolve conflicts effectively.
Stage 3: Evaluation
Reflect on what went well and what didn’t. It’s important to take a balanced approach and acknowledge both the positive and negative aspects of the situation.
Identify successes:
- What did you handle well as a leader?
- How did the team respond to positive aspects of your leadership?
Acknowledge mistakes:
- What didn’t go according to plan?
- Where were the key challenges or failures in your leadership approach?
Leadership Example:
On the positive side, I maintained my composure and ensured everyone had a chance to voice their opinions. However, I struggled to guide the conversation towards resolution. The conflict lingered, which affected team dynamics.
Stage 4: Analysis
Now you can analyse why things happened the way they did. Look for underlying causes, patterns, and dynamics that influenced the outcome.
Analyse causes:
- What were the root causes of the problems or successes?
- How did your actions influence the situation?
- Did your leadership style or behaviours help or hinder the process?
Leverage frameworks:
- Use leadership models, theories, or past experiences to deepen your analysis.
Leadership Example:
The conflict escalated because I focused too much on being neutral rather than assertively steering the conversation towards a solution. My democratic leadership style worked in the past, but in this scenario, a more directive approach may have been necessary.
Stage 5: Conclusion
At this stage, take time to reflect on what you learned from the experience and consider how you might approach a similar situation differently in the future. It may sometimes help to explore these questions with a coach.
Lessons learnt:
- What should you continue doing based on this experience?
- What could you change or improve?
Explore alternative approaches:
- How could you have approached the situation more effectively?
Leadership Example:
In hindsight, I should have intervened earlier and more decisively. I could have proposed a compromise or set clear expectations for resolving the conflict. I also realized that I need to improve my skills in conflict resolution.
Stage 6: Action Plan
This final stage is about turning reflection into action. It’s about creating a plan for how you will apply your insights to future leadership challenges.
Develop a strategy:
- What steps will you take to improve your leadership in similar situations?
Set goals:
- Identify key leadership skills you want to develop, such as communication, conflict resolution, or assertiveness.
Leadership Example:
Next time, I will adopt a more structured approach to conflict resolution, setting clear guidelines for discussions and stepping in earlier to mediate. I’ll also seek out training on managing difficult conversations to strengthen my skills in this area.
Gibbs Reflective Cycle Example
Here’s an example of how to integrate Gibbs’ model into your daily leadership practice:
- Set time for reflection: Regularly set aside time—whether daily, weekly, or after major events—for structured reflection using Gibbs’ cycle.
- Record your reflections in a journal: Writing down your reflections at each stage helps clarify your thinking and track your leadership growth over time.
- Solicit feedback: Ask for feedback from peers or mentors to gain different perspectives on your leadership. This can inform your reflection and action planning.
- Review and refine: Periodically review past reflections to identify recurring patterns or persistent challenges in your leadership. This will help you adjust and continuously improve.
- Practice self-awareness: Stay mindful of your emotions and thought patterns as you lead. This self-awareness is essential for meaningful reflection.
Benefits of a Reflective Model in Leadership Development
Enhanced Self-Awareness: By systematically reflecting on your actions, feelings, and outcomes, you develop a deeper understanding of your leadership strengths and areas for improvement.
Continuous Learning: The cycle encourages a mindset of lifelong learning, helping you evolve as a leader through every experience.
Improved Decision-Making: Reflecting on past decisions enables you to approach future situations with more clarity, confidence, and better judgment.
Increased Emotional Intelligence: By recognizing and analysing your emotions and those of others, you become more adept at managing interpersonal relationships and team dynamics.
Adaptive Leadership: The cycle helps you fine-tune your leadership style, making it more flexible and responsive to different challenges and contexts.
Reflecting on your own performance and outcomes is a critical part of improving leadership effectiveness; unlocking the power of reflection to cultivate resilience, insight, and adaptive leadership.
If you’d like to subscribe to receive regular practical coaching tips you can sign up to our Constant Coach series.
Reflective Practice With Gibbs’ Reflective Cycle
A Practical Guide to Reflective Practice for Leadership Development Using Gibbs’ Reflective Cycle
Reflective practice is your secret weapon when it comes to leadership development. It allows leaders to learn from experiences, adjust thinking and behaviours, and continuously improve their effectiveness.
Gibbs’ Reflective Cycle provides a structured framework for this process, making it one of the most powerful practices to master as a leader.
Graham Gibbs developed his “six-stage reflective model” (1988), which emphasises the process of turning reflections into actionable insights. Each stage encourages deep exploration of what happened, why it happened, and how to improve.
This practical guide will help you work through any situation where you might have experienced less than favourable results, and understand what changes you might want to take to ensure a better outcome. It promotes ownership and taking responsibility for your own behaviours and will help to shine a light on programmed behaviours which may now longer serve you when working with others.
Gibbs’ Reflective Cycle Template
Here is an template for you to use to get started using Gibbs’ Reflective Cycle. For each stage we’ve provided a template for the framework and also an example of how it might work in practice:
Stage 1: Description
In this stage, you describe the facts of the situation or experience that you want to reflect on. The goal is to capture the details without assigning judgment or bias at this stage.
Identify the experience: This could be a leadership challenge, a decision you made, a team conflict, or a project outcome.
Consider the following:
- What exactly happened?
- Who was involved?
- Where and when did it take place?
- What was the outcome?
Leadership Example:
During a team meeting, a conflict arose between two team members about the direction of a project. As the leader, I tried to mediate, but the conversation escalated. The meeting ended without resolution, and team morale seemed low.
Stage 2: Feelings
Reflect on your internal experience, your emotional responses to the situation. Understanding your feelings is crucial because emotions often influence how leaders react and make decisions.
Reflect on your feelings during the event:
- How did you feel before, during, and after the situation?
- What were you thinking as events played out?
- How did you think others were feeling? What did you notice that might provide clues?
Be honest: It’s okay to acknowledge feelings of frustration, anxiety, confidence, or satisfaction, as these inform your behaviour. You can also begin to understand why these feelings might have been activated.
Leadership Example:
At the time, I felt frustrated and a bit powerless. I was also concerned about how the rest of the team perceived my handling of the situation. I wondered if they felt I lacked authority or the ability to resolve conflicts effectively.
Stage 3: Evaluation
Reflect on what went well and what didn’t. It’s important to take a balanced approach and acknowledge both the positive and negative aspects of the situation.
Identify successes:
- What did you handle well as a leader?
- How did the team respond to positive aspects of your leadership?
Acknowledge mistakes:
- What didn’t go according to plan?
- Where were the key challenges or failures in your leadership approach?
Leadership Example:
On the positive side, I maintained my composure and ensured everyone had a chance to voice their opinions. However, I struggled to guide the conversation towards resolution. The conflict lingered, which affected team dynamics.
Stage 4: Analysis
Now you can analyse why things happened the way they did. Look for underlying causes, patterns, and dynamics that influenced the outcome.
Analyse causes:
- What were the root causes of the problems or successes?
- How did your actions influence the situation?
- Did your leadership style or behaviours help or hinder the process?
Leverage frameworks:
- Use leadership models, theories, or past experiences to deepen your analysis.
Leadership Example:
The conflict escalated because I focused too much on being neutral rather than assertively steering the conversation towards a solution. My democratic leadership style worked in the past, but in this scenario, a more directive approach may have been necessary.
Stage 5: Conclusion
At this stage, take time to reflect on what you learned from the experience and consider how you might approach a similar situation differently in the future. It may sometimes help to explore these questions with a coach.
Lessons learnt:
- What should you continue doing based on this experience?
- What could you change or improve?
Explore alternative approaches:
- How could you have approached the situation more effectively?
Leadership Example:
In hindsight, I should have intervened earlier and more decisively. I could have proposed a compromise or set clear expectations for resolving the conflict. I also realized that I need to improve my skills in conflict resolution.
Stage 6: Action Plan
This final stage is about turning reflection into action. It’s about creating a plan for how you will apply your insights to future leadership challenges.
Develop a strategy:
- What steps will you take to improve your leadership in similar situations?
Set goals:
- Identify key leadership skills you want to develop, such as communication, conflict resolution, or assertiveness.
Leadership Example:
Next time, I will adopt a more structured approach to conflict resolution, setting clear guidelines for discussions and stepping in earlier to mediate. I’ll also seek out training on managing difficult conversations to strengthen my skills in this area.
Gibbs Reflective Cycle Example
Here’s an example of how to integrate Gibbs’ model into your daily leadership practice:
- Set time for reflection: Regularly set aside time—whether daily, weekly, or after major events—for structured reflection using Gibbs’ cycle.
- Record your reflections in a journal: Writing down your reflections at each stage helps clarify your thinking and track your leadership growth over time.
- Solicit feedback: Ask for feedback from peers or mentors to gain different perspectives on your leadership. This can inform your reflection and action planning.
- Review and refine: Periodically review past reflections to identify recurring patterns or persistent challenges in your leadership. This will help you adjust and continuously improve.
- Practice self-awareness: Stay mindful of your emotions and thought patterns as you lead. This self-awareness is essential for meaningful reflection.
Benefits of a Reflective Model in Leadership Development
Enhanced Self-Awareness: By systematically reflecting on your actions, feelings, and outcomes, you develop a deeper understanding of your leadership strengths and areas for improvement.
Continuous Learning: The cycle encourages a mindset of lifelong learning, helping you evolve as a leader through every experience.
Improved Decision-Making: Reflecting on past decisions enables you to approach future situations with more clarity, confidence, and better judgment.
Increased Emotional Intelligence: By recognizing and analysing your emotions and those of others, you become more adept at managing interpersonal relationships and team dynamics.
Adaptive Leadership: The cycle helps you fine-tune your leadership style, making it more flexible and responsive to different challenges and contexts.
Reflecting on your own performance and outcomes is a critical part of improving leadership effectiveness; unlocking the power of reflection to cultivate resilience, insight, and adaptive leadership.
If you’d like to subscribe to receive regular practical coaching tips you can sign up to our Constant Coach series.
7 Leadership Negotiation Skills to Make the Breakthrough
Why negotiation skills are important
As a leader, you will need to hone leadership negotiation skills to cope with a multitude of situations. Effective negotiation skills are essential for successful communication and collaboration in these scenarios. Negotiation is an essential skill for resolving conflicts and achieving mutually beneficial outcomes.
Whether you are mediating in a difficult breakdown in communication, working on a complicated client deal, or negotiating a new pay deal or change in working conditions, the likelihood is that there will be some compromise needed to reach an agreeable solution. Mastering negotiation skills benefits both personal and professional interactions by improving communication, collaboration, and conflict resolution.
Understanding Negotiation
Negotiation is a complex process that involves two or more parties working together to reach a mutually beneficial agreement. It is a vital skill that can be used in various situations, including business, personal relationships, and conflict resolution. Understanding negotiation is essential for effective communication, building trust, and achieving successful outcomes.
A skilled negotiator must have a thorough understanding of the needs, concerns, and goals of all parties involved. This requires active listening, empathy, and effective communication to build rapport and trust. By analyzing the situation, identifying potential obstacles, and developing a strategy to overcome them, a skilled negotiator can navigate the negotiation table with confidence and precision.
Preparing for Negotiation
Preparing for negotiation is crucial for achieving successful outcomes. It involves thorough preparation, research, and planning to understand the needs and concerns of all parties involved. A skilled negotiator must be able to:
- Identify their goals and objectives
- Research the other party’s needs and concerns
- Develop a strategy for negotiation
- Anticipate potential obstacles and develop a plan to overcome them
- Prepare for different scenarios and outcomes
Effective preparation involves gathering information, analyzing data, and developing a clear understanding of the negotiation process. It also involves identifying potential risks and opportunities and developing a plan to mitigate them. Thorough preparation ensures that you are well-equipped to handle any situation that may arise at the bargaining table.
Here are 7 leadership negotiation skills to improve outcomes:
1. Achieve the win/win
An agreement that ends with an enforced deal will break down. Real breakthrough is achieved when both sides can claim victory, and your needs and those of the other party are both satisfied through a negotiated agreement. The real outcome is the creation of a positive environment to move forward together. Successful negotiations are achieved through trust and respect, fostering better outcomes for all parties involved
2. Never be the first to make an offer
Opening first always gives the other party the upper hand in negotiations. Let them make the first offer: this way you’ll have a better feel for the limits under which you’ll be negotiating. If a better than expected offer is made, you may be able to negotiate even better.
3. Be emotionally adept and practice active listening
Emotional intelligence is perhaps the critical key to attaining excellent leadership negotiation skills. An emotional intelligence assessment will tell you where you are currently on the EI scale. It will give you the knowledge needed to develop a number of skills associated with negotiation, including:
- Self-awareness
- Self-regulation
- Social awareness
- Relationship management
Improve your emotional intelligence and you’ll improve your leadership negotiation skills.
4. Ask for more than you expect to receive
If you ask for more than you expect to receive, you may be pleasantly surprized by the response. Setting the bar high allows greater wiggle room to negotiate down. In addition, it is unlikely that the other party will walk away from negotiations at this point, so starting high has very little cost.
5. Communicate flexibly
The most successful negotiators are those who communicate well. Understand the person with whom you’re negotiating, and how to assess their likely reactions and your communication skills will improve. Lack of communicative ability will hold you back, while well-rounded interpersonal skills will propel your leadership career.
6. Once the deal is closed, stop negotiating!
As you progress in negotiations, you’ll hit several mini-closes. This might be the conclusion of a point you want to make, a story you wish to tell, or fine details you want to discuss further. Once you have said what you need to, stop talking. Let the other person have their say and put their point across. Not only will you better understand the counterargument or need, you’ll also gain respect for listening well.
7. Always make it personal
Connect with your people and create working relationships that help to progress the organisation and the individual. Learn what makes your people tick, and take a genuine interest in their wellbeing: you’ll find that in any negotiation, having a set of shared values and common goals will enhance the potential for a positive outcome.
Contact Primeast today to discuss our Management Development Series, including our Energy Leadership Program that helps develop high performing managers into inspirational leaders that understand the importance of leadership negotiation skills.
The Negotiation Process
The negotiation process involves several stages, including:
- Preparation: Gathering information, researching the other party’s needs and concerns, and developing a strategy for negotiation.
- Opening: Establishing a rapport, building trust, and setting the tone for the negotiation.
- Discussion: Exchanging information, identifying potential obstacles, and developing a plan to overcome them.
- Bargaining: Negotiating the terms of the agreement, including price, delivery, and other conditions.
- Closing: Finalising the agreement, ensuring that all parties are satisfied, and documenting the terms of the agreement.
A skilled negotiator must be able to navigate each stage of the negotiation process effectively, using active listening, empathy, and effective communication to build trust and achieve successful outcomes. Understanding each stage and the skills required will help you become more adept at the negotiation table.
Conclusion
Negotiation is a complex process that requires thorough preparation, research, and planning. It involves active listening, empathy, and effective communication to build rapport and trust. A skilled negotiator must be able to analyze the situation, identify potential obstacles, and develop a strategy to overcome them.
By understanding the negotiation process, preparing effectively, and using essential negotiation skills, individuals can achieve successful outcomes and build strong relationships. Negotiation skills are essential for effective communication, building trust, and achieving successful outcomes in various situations, including business, personal relationships, and conflict resolution.
7 Leadership Negotiation Skills to Make the Breakthrough
Why negotiation skills are important
As a leader, you will need to hone leadership negotiation skills to cope with a multitude of situations. Effective negotiation skills are essential for successful communication and collaboration in these scenarios. Negotiation is an essential skill for resolving conflicts and achieving mutually beneficial outcomes.
Whether you are mediating in a difficult breakdown in communication, working on a complicated client deal, or negotiating a new pay deal or change in working conditions, the likelihood is that there will be some compromise needed to reach an agreeable solution. Mastering negotiation skills benefits both personal and professional interactions by improving communication, collaboration, and conflict resolution.
Understanding Negotiation
Negotiation is a complex process that involves two or more parties working together to reach a mutually beneficial agreement. It is a vital skill that can be used in various situations, including business, personal relationships, and conflict resolution. Understanding negotiation is essential for effective communication, building trust, and achieving successful outcomes.
A skilled negotiator must have a thorough understanding of the needs, concerns, and goals of all parties involved. This requires active listening, empathy, and effective communication to build rapport and trust. By analysing the situation, identifying potential obstacles, and developing a strategy to overcome them, a skilled negotiator can navigate the negotiation table with confidence and precision.
Preparing for Negotiation
Preparing for negotiation is crucial for achieving successful outcomes. It involves thorough preparation, research, and planning to understand the needs and concerns of all parties involved. A skilled negotiator must be able to:
- Identify their goals and objectives
- Research the other party’s needs and concerns
- Develop a strategy for negotiation
- Anticipate potential obstacles and develop a plan to overcome them
- Prepare for different scenarios and outcomes
Effective preparation involves gathering information, analysing data, and developing a clear understanding of the negotiation process. It also involves identifying potential risks and opportunities and developing a plan to mitigate them. Thorough preparation ensures that you are well-equipped to handle any situation that may arise at the bargaining table.
Here are 7 leadership negotiation skills to improve outcomes:
1. Achieve the win/win
An agreement that ends with an enforced deal will break down. Real breakthrough is achieved when both sides can claim victory, and your needs and those of the other party are both satisfied through a negotiated agreement. The real outcome is the creation of a positive environment to move forward together. Successful negotiations are achieved through trust and respect, fostering better outcomes for all parties involved
2. Never be the first to make an offer
Opening first always gives the other party the upper hand in negotiations. Let them make the first offer: this way you’ll have a better feel for the limits under which you’ll be negotiating. If a better than expected offer is made, you may be able to negotiate even better.
3. Be emotionally adept and practice active listening
Emotional intelligence is perhaps the critical key to attaining excellent leadership negotiation skills. An emotional intelligence assessment will tell you where you are currently on the EI scale. It will give you the knowledge needed to develop a number of skills associated with negotiation, including:
- Self-awareness
- Self-regulation
- Social awareness
- Relationship management
Improve your emotional intelligence and you’ll improve your leadership negotiation skills.
4. Ask for more than you expect to receive
If you ask for more than you expect to receive, you may be pleasantly surprised by the response. Setting the bar high allows greater wiggle room to negotiate down. In addition, it is unlikely that the other party will walk away from negotiations at this point, so starting high has very little cost.
5. Communicate flexibly
The most successful negotiators are those who communicate well. Understand the person with whom you’re negotiating, and how to assess their likely reactions and your communication skills will improve. Lack of communicative ability will hold you back, while well-rounded interpersonal skills will propel your leadership career.
6. Once the deal is closed, stop negotiating!
As you progress in negotiations, you’ll hit several mini-closes. This might be the conclusion of a point you want to make, a story you wish to tell, or fine details you want to discuss further. Once you have said what you need to, stop talking. Let the other person have their say and put their point across. Not only will you better understand the counterargument or need, you’ll also gain respect for listening well.
7. Always make it personal
Connect with your people and create working relationships that help to progress the organisation and the individual. Learn what makes your people tick, and take a genuine interest in their wellbeing: you’ll find that in any negotiation, having a set of shared values and common goals will enhance the potential for a positive outcome.
Contact Primeast today to discuss our Management Development Series, including our Energy Leadership Program that helps develop high performing managers into inspirational leaders that understand the importance of leadership negotiation skills.
The Negotiation Process
The negotiation process involves several stages, including:
- Preparation: Gathering information, researching the other party’s needs and concerns, and developing a strategy for negotiation.
- Opening: Establishing a rapport, building trust, and setting the tone for the negotiation.
- Discussion: Exchanging information, identifying potential obstacles, and developing a plan to overcome them.
- Bargaining: Negotiating the terms of the agreement, including price, delivery, and other conditions.
- Closing: Finalising the agreement, ensuring that all parties are satisfied, and documenting the terms of the agreement.
A skilled negotiator must be able to navigate each stage of the negotiation process effectively, using active listening, empathy, and effective communication to build trust and achieve successful outcomes. Understanding each stage and the skills required will help you become more adept at the negotiation table.
Conclusion
Negotiation is a complex process that requires thorough preparation, research, and planning. It involves active listening, empathy, and effective communication to build rapport and trust. A skilled negotiator must be able to analyse the situation, identify potential obstacles, and develop a strategy to overcome them.
By understanding the negotiation process, preparing effectively, and using essential negotiation skills, individuals can achieve successful outcomes and build strong relationships. Negotiation skills are essential for effective communication, building trust, and achieving successful outcomes in various situations, including business, personal relationships, and conflict resolution.
How to Manage a Multigenerational Workforce
Is Your Workplace Environment Conducive to Collaboration Amid Generational Differences?
As younger employees join your workforce and older employees remain employed for longer, your organisation is likely to become a multigenerational workforce. This diversity of age demographics presents leaders with many challenges that must be overcome. In this article, we examine seven of these challenges.
Understanding Generational Differences
Understanding generational differences is crucial for effective management in today’s multi-generational workforce. Each generation brings unique attributes, values, and experiences that shape their perspectives and behaviours. By recognising and embracing these differences, organisations can foster a more inclusive and productive work environment.
Generational differences can be attributed to various factors, including historical events, technological advancements, and cultural shifts. For instance, Baby Boomers grew up during a time of economic prosperity and social change, while Generation Z is characterised by their digital nativity and diverse backgrounds. Understanding these differences can help managers tailor their leadership styles, communication approaches, and professional development opportunities to meet the needs of each generation.
Moreover, recognising generational differences can help bridge the generational gap and promote knowledge sharing between older and younger employees. By leveraging the strengths of each generation, organisations can create a more collaborative and innovative work environment. For example, younger employees can bring fresh ideas and technological expertise, while older employees can offer valuable experience and mentorship.
Benefits of a multi-generational Workforce
A multi-generational workforce offers numerous benefits to organisations, including increased productivity, improved decision-making, and enhanced innovation. By embracing generational diversity, organisations can tap into the unique strengths and perspectives of each generation, leading to better problem-solving and a more competitive edge.
Moreover, a multi-generational workforce can help organisations attract and retain top talent, as employees of all ages are drawn to inclusive and diverse work environments. By offering flexible work arrangements, professional development opportunities, and a culture of respect and empathy, organisations can create a workplace that appeals to multiple generations.
Additionally, a multi-generational workforce can help organisations better understand and serve their diverse customer base. By having employees from different generations and backgrounds, organisations can gain valuable insights into the needs and preferences of their customers, leading to improved customer satisfaction and loyalty.
1. Age
There are many personal challenges associated with age, and these manifest in the workplace. Younger employees may desire more flexibility and the opportunity to work from home. Older employees may have more exacting wellness needs. Leaders should create the flexible workplace environment that addresses the needs of all employees, promoting a healthy work life balance.
2. Values
Our values are determined by many factors, including upbringing and experiences. Older generations have lived through the Cold War and economic strife. They were raised by parents who suffered war during World War II. They took part in civil rights movements. Younger generations have been at the forefront of technological advance, and are living with a future shaped by climate change.
Baby boomers expect millennials to have the same commitment to hard work and long hours. Millennials expect more flexibility and shorter hours in the office with greater autonomy. Leaders must manage these conflicting values, respecting all workers and helping each to understand and accept the different ways in which full contributions are made.
3. Workplace Relationship Issues
Older employees, particularly those from the Silent Generation, tend to be more conservative in their approach to workplace relationships. They have been conditioned that work is work, and personal issues should be left at the door. However, today mental health and wellbeing is considered of great importance. Employees are encouraged to discuss a wider range of issues, and organisations accept the overlap between personal and professional lives more readily. This can create friction between employees, as some wish to discuss subjects that others consider to be taboo.
Organisations are combatting this challenge by providing ‘safe spaces’’ where controversial subjects may be discussed openly, and equipping managers with the skills to carefront rather than confront conflict between work colleagues.
4. Feedback
The need for feedback differs between generations. Younger employees tend to thrive on constant feedback, whereas older workers require less. For older employees, feedback should be given when necessary, not when desired.
How does a leader know how often to give feedback? Ask each employee, and set a schedule for them. Remember, though, that continuous communication leads to healthier relationships, and less confusion when honest truths are finally revealed.
5. Preferred Communication Styles Across Generations
The communication preferences of different generations in the workplace stretch from the millennials’ use of social media and digital communication channels, to the baby boomers’ desire for face-to-face conversation or email.
An organisation must establish how best to communicate, and set a strategy that embraces all preferences. For example, a team meeting may be followed up by a video summary posted to employees’ email inboxes or on the company’s intranet.
6. Dress Code
Older workers, who witnessed the rise of personal computers, are used to the formality of workwear. It helps them draw a line between their professional self and their personal self. Younger workers are more likely to wish to wear the same clothes in the office as they would outside. While many organisations have relaxed their dress code, many have not. This can cause conflict between employees and management.
While there is no single correct answer to dress code – often it is part of the DNA of an organisation – it is important that, while a workplace may not have a uniform, workplace dress code is uniform and observed consistently by all.
7. Perceptions of Work Ethics
Older generations often accuse younger workers of having poor work ethics. However, perception of work ethic varies between generations.
Older employees are more likely to remain at work until their work is complete before leaving for home. They see younger employees leaving before their work is complete and believe that this is indicative of a poor work ethic. However, these younger employees – often more digitally adept – may be working remotely from home, where they feel more relaxed and productive.
Organisations may combat these perceptions by managing by performance and introducing workplace project management systems to routine. Taking this action often helps people to work more collaboratively and understand that being office based is not always necessary to be productive.
Accommodating Diverse Working Styles and Needs
Accommodating diverse working styles and needs is essential for creating an inclusive and productive work environment. Organisations can offer flexible work arrangements, such as telecommuting, flexible hours, and compressed workweeks, to accommodate the needs of employees with caregiving responsibilities, health issues, or other personal circumstances.
Moreover, organisations can provide a range of benefits and perks, such as wellness programs, employee assistance programs, and professional development opportunities, to support the well-being and career advancement of employees. By recognising and accommodating the diverse needs and preferences of employees, organisations can create a workplace that is inclusive, supportive, and empowering.
Furthermore, organisations can use technology to facilitate communication and collaboration among employees, regardless of their location or work style. By leveraging digital tools and platforms, organisations can create a virtual workspace that is accessible, flexible, and inclusive, allowing employees to work effectively and efficiently from anywhere.
In Summary
In multigenerational workplaces there is a wide diversity of values, preferred communication styles, mental wellbeing issues and preferred methods of working. Differences even stretch to how employees dress for work.
When leaders understand the different characters of each generation, they will more easily discover the strengths of each generation and use these to improve collaboration. To build a cohesive team, managers must create a workplace environment that allows all generations to contribute fully and embrace the qualities of their work colleagues.
Contact us today, and discover how we could help your managers and leaders be more effective in developing multigenerational teams and foster the collaboration that delivers high performance.
7 Ways to Motivate Your Team
Leading via the link between team motivation and engagement
Many studies, surveys, and polls have concluded that employee engagement is key to building a successful business, leading change initiatives, and developing high-performance teams. To motivate your team effectively, it’s essential to foster engagement. In its eighth meta-analysis measuring the effects of employee engagement, Gallup found that:
“Work units in the top quartile in employee engagement outperformed bottom-quartile units by 10% on customer ratings, 22% in profitability, and 21% in productivity. Work units in the top quartile also saw significantly lower turnover (25% in high-turnover organizations, 65% in low-turnover organizations), shrinkage (28%), and absenteeism (37%) and fewer safety incidents (48%), patient safety incidents (41%), and quality defects (41%).”
Given so many positives of employee engagement, it is little wonder that organizations are continually finding ways to increase employee engagement and create a productive work environment.
What is employee engagement?
Employee engagement describes how people are committed to the work they do and the values and mission of the organization for whom they work. They are happy team players who are invested in their colleagues, their team, and their organization, and employees feel motivated to contribute their best.
In other words, they are motivated to turn up, help others, and do the best work they can. However, engagement is not quite the same as motivation, but a complimentary quality – a key ingredient in employee engagement. For example, motivated employees feel that their work is meaningful, while engaged employees are emotionally committed to their work. Good leaders motivate their employees to be engaged.
Setting the Foundation for Success
Setting the foundation for success is crucial for motivating a team. A motivated team is more productive, engaged, and committed to achieving their goals. To set the foundation for success, team leaders should establish clear expectations, provide necessary resources, and foster a positive work environment. This includes setting SMART goals, providing regular feedback, and recognising team achievements. By setting the foundation for success, team leaders can create a motivated team that is equipped to achieve their goals.
How to engage employees with motivational tactics
Many motivational techniques will serve the simultaneous objectives of engaging employees and developing a high-performing team. Here are seven of the techniques used by successful managers and leaders.
1. Share the big picture to give them feel valued
Share your vision with your employees, helping them to see how they fit into the achievement of that vision by providing tasks that help the team progress toward its goals. This will provide the purpose they need to engage with the big picture. Keeping employees up to date with the latest developments and how their roles contribute to the overall vision can further enhance their sense of purpose.
2. Motivate individuals to motivate the team
Each member of a team will have individual aspirations, goals and objectives. It is a manager’s responsibility to learn what makes their employees tick, and how to create the environment where the needs of individuals can be activated to improve the team, ensuring each team member feels valued and motivated.
Listen to ideas, learn from their experiences, and recycle into the team environment, showing how individual success can propel the team to greater teamwork. This personal and individual approach will help to incentivise employees with a clear understanding of the power of collaboration.
3. Give trust
A team leader should give trust to their employees and show that they trust their abilities by handing over responsibility. This responsibility may be given through providing specific tasks that challenge, or by asking an employee to manage a project sub-team, or perhaps requesting that a team member act as chair in a team meeting. There are many opportunities to share responsibilities and give trust each day – these should be used.
4. Motivate with milestones
Lofty goals often remain unaccomplished because they seem so far away, and unachievable. This serves to demotivate and disengage. Focus instead on smaller, challenging but achievable milestones that will help individuals and teams progress. Reward achievement of each milestone, and reinforce how much nearer it takes the team to its final target, thereby boosting team motivation.
5. Reward performance based upon feedback
Value performance and attitude by recording, measuring and rewarding feedback from clients, suppliers, colleagues and other stakeholders. Seek to reward the expected behaviors that help to drive teamwork and promote the organization.
6. Energise the team by exampling expected behaviors for a productive work environment
Employees follow the lead of their managers and the organization’s leaders. An enthusiastic, energetic leader who exudes positivity toward work and the organization’s values and goals is more likely to keep the team motivated and create that energy within his or her team.
7. Communicate openly
Be transparent about company goals and progress. Hide nothing, so that there are no surprises. Allow people the opportunity to voice concerns and ask questions, and provide honest feedback. Always show respect in the communication process, and include team members in the decision-making process, valuing their contribution and helping them to understand their value to the organization. Additionally, organizing team building activities can further enhance open communication and strengthen team bonds.
Fostering a Positive Work Environment
Fostering a positive work environment is essential for motivating a team. A positive work environment encourages team members to feel valued, motivated, and engaged. To foster a positive work environment, team leaders should promote open communication, encourage teamwork, and provide opportunities for growth and development. This includes creating a healthy work environment, providing flexible schedules, and offering work-life balance.
By fostering a positive work environment, team leaders can create a motivated team that is productive and committed to achieving their goals.
Investing in Team Development
Investing in team development is critical for motivating a team. Team members feel motivated when they are learning and growing in their roles. To invest in team development, team leaders should provide opportunities for training, mentorship, and coaching. This includes providing regular feedback, recognising team achievements, and offering opportunities for advancement.
By investing in team development, team leaders can create a motivated team that is equipped to achieve their goals.
Measuring Success and Adjusting Course
Measuring success and adjusting course is essential for motivating a team. Team leaders should regularly track progress, solicit honest feedback, and make adjustments as needed. This includes setting clear goals, providing regular feedback, and recognising team achievements.
By measuring success and adjusting course, team leaders can create a motivated team that is productive and committed to achieving their goals.
Conclusion
Employee engagement and employee motivation work hand in hand to energise teams in the work they do and the goals of the organization. When team leaders, supervisors and managers employ effective motivation strategies, the team should become a more collaborative and cohesive unit, fixed on the achievement of individual and team goals. This level of engagement could transform a team’s results.
Contact us today, and discover how we could help your managers to redefine their own behaviors and embed the leadership techniques to build high-performing teams.
Leadership Immersion – Transforming Learning
Thirty years involvement in leadership development has taught the team at Primeast a lot about the nature of leadership and the development of leaders. In recent years, unsurprisingly, the challenge for most leaders has been leading in an increasingly complex context. With this in mind, many of our clients have found it useful to distinguish between horizontal and vertical leadership development.
Without attempting to write a dissertation on this, I’d like to offer a simple differentiation between these two crucial elements for anyone who hasn’t come across the terminology and then offer just one approach for vertical development worth considering.
Horizontal development – building the leadership toolkit
I like to think of horizontal leadership development as adding more skills to the leader’s toolkit (conceptually laid out side-by-side on the leader’s workbench). So programs like presentation skills, influencing, engaging staff, empowerment and so on are one-by-one adding to the tools the leader can draw on.
Vertical development
However, studies have shown that leading in complex situations associated with the workplace today, requires more than a strong skill-set. Leaders also need a mature mind-set. Robert Keegan describes this evolution as a progression up ‘psychological levels’ (hence vertical development). At the top end of this scale the leader has to learn how to move from a self-authoring mind-set, where they (as the term suggests) decide what needs to happen and make it so, to a self-transforming mind-set where the purpose of their work is clearly bigger than they are and they understand that to serve it well they must collaborate with others who hold different and often opposing views or who may be culturally different.
Evolving Mindset
There are many ways to help leaders evolve their mind-set and mature in this vertical fashion. We use specialist diagnostics to help leaders understand their current leadership approach and to see where their developmental requirements fall. This is followed with coaching which supports leaders step by step through their development plan. And we also draw on experiential learning in groups and teams where leaders work with skilled facilitators to help them make sense of their learning experience.
Immersion Programmes offer something completely different
One of many types of experiential learning, especially suited to vertical leadership development is an immersion program, so called because we immerse leaders in an experience which is completely different from their ‘normal’ day-to-day existence and which stretches them emotionally and challenges their thinking and beliefs. Immersion programs encourage the participants to see a purpose which is bigger than themselves. These programs can be as creative as the sponsoring organization wishes and we have designed programs taking leaders to the developing world to help solve health problems, work with communities to improve employment prospects, engage with young people on environmental issues to name but a few. In large organizations, immersion programs can also be designed for several cohorts of learners in a series, working on a problem where a real difference can be made over time and the baton passed from one cohort to another.
It is also important to note that immersion programs are not limited to a physical experience. Much is possible with a creative and innovative approach and immersion programs can be just as effectively designed for the digital learning space. Our in-house design team have used learning technologies to create immersive virtual scenarios or simulations which test and challenge the participants’ thinking and provide a valuable opportunity for participants to move away from their comfort zone and enter a safe space where they can practice and reflect on their physiological response to a virtual activity.
Working on immersion programs like these is not a new thing, in fact Primeast has been involved in this type of development for almost thirty years and our team can share stories of some amazing experiences. And many organizations organise such interventions for themselves, which is great. But I would like to conclude with a thought.
The value of external facilitation
People who get to work on immersion experiences will often describe them as ‘life-changing’. I still remember the first of many trips to Malawi and being involved with the Open Arms Infant Home. But to gain maximum learning from such experiences, they have to be well-designed and supported by skilled facilitators who don’t get lost in the task (which is easy to do) but instead know when to ask participants the challenging questions- encouraging them to take a ‘balcony’ perspective on what is going on in the moment rather than remaining on the ‘dancefloor’ for the whole time and failing to gain the deeper learning. These are sometimes posed to the whole group and sometimes to a participant in a quiet space at just the right time. Or to play back an observation with appropriate sensitivity so a leader can reflect on the wisdom (or otherwise) of their actions and try a new and alternative approach. The skill in this must not be undervalued.
The Power of Experiential Leadership Development
2020 saw a dramatic acceleration in the uptake of virtual learning & development. The range of available digital learning platforms and portals exploded; both free to use and subscription based. Some now offer simple broadcast content and others have a SCORM functionality linking to the buyer’s LMS. However, they are mostly aimed at knowledge transfer and knowledge testing. This is great for improving what people know. However, it’s what people actually do at work, day in day out that counts.
Virtual Instructor Led Training also exploded, with thousands of hours of traditional face to face classes being switched to virtual delivery. Again, much of the focus is still on knowledge transfer, generally scaffolded with some discussion and a few activities converted for use in the virtual world. Some have been very successful; others less so.
Over the last few years my learning design colleagues at Primeast have found that the principles of experiential learning that we have honed, in our 30+ years of creating meaningful face to face learning experiences can and have been successfully transferred to the virtual environment. And so far, our clients have been delighted!
What is experiential learning?
In their simplest form, experiential learning sessions involve individuals being exposed to challenging scenarios, each of which has been designed to allow them to practise using what they have learned in a low-risk environment. We believe this is an important consideration as allowing leaders to effectively practise in real-life situations is too risky for all concerned (Bregman, Harvard Business Review, April 2019). Following solid adult development principles, the scenarios themselves also stretch, test and provide insights on a learner’s ability to lead in specific conditions.
The process generally follows these steps:
- Create a simulated scenario depicting a potential issue/situation that replicates dynamics in learners’ day to day work.
- Work through the scenario in real time to see how learners apply what they have learned and how they respond to the situation.
- Use reflective debrief processes, such as 4F and deconstructive dialogue (based on Kegan, 2010) to examine the behaviors that were exhibited and actions or decisions that were taken.
Experienced facilitator/coaches lead discussions where groups of learners reflect in detail on how their underpinning mindsets and their actions (or lack of) affected the outcome and also what could be done for better effect if a similar scenario were to be faced again.
This focus on understanding the importance of mindset and the resulting action/decision-making while under the pressure of time, helps learners understand how they might react in similar real-world circumstances. It also allows them the opportunity to reflect on both their physiological & psychological responses – learning by feeling as well as doing, providing an even more profound learning experience.
This immersive combination of feeling and doing is the essence of experiential development and has been proven to be highly effective in transforming leadership capability.
The benefits of an immersive and experiential approach to learning
One of the areas where this approach has been found to highly effective, regardless of business scale, is that it stimulates challenge of extant mindset or thinking. Often business growth is held back, not by technology or what people do but leaders’ internal operating systems and their modes of thinking, both individual and collective.
Being stewarded through scenarios by an experienced experiential facilitator/coach surfaces those underpinning mindsets that drive the way people act and the decisions they make and can be analyzed at key points during, and at the end of the scenario. The care taken in designing scenarios that replicate workplace challenges means that insights are easily linkable to the real-world and discussions which result in insights which can be enacted more effectively.
Can experiential learning really be done virtually?
Now consider the virtual learning space in which we now spend so much of our time. Recent reports from a range of respected sources like EY & Harvard Business Review have highlighted the narrative around digital fatigue which has grown significantly since the start of the pandemic.
Virtual learning environments which exacerbate this digital fatigue will not be effective, will not be a good investment and will just add to the overall reduction in human effectiveness organizations may experience.
However, we have found that there is little reason why the principles of experiential learning cannot apply to the virtual learning space and change this game around.
Feedback we have received from our learners indicates that fatigue has been mitigated by our focus on their personal and collective experience as learners, alongside teaching them useful concepts. Simple steps such as allowing facilitated reflective debrief discussions in small groups to promote psychological safety creates both engagement and insight for everyone involved.
The ability to design thoughtfully constructed, stimulating digital-enabled virtual experiences which reflect scenarios that are faced in reality is a very specific skill. It requires diagnosis, analysis and a creative and innovative approach which embraces the technological opportunity to leverage sound learning principles. As one of our colleagues noted “the trick is to see it less like designing a class or workshop and more like creating a live TV production”. The best virtual learning feels like a perfectly choreographed performance that immerses, stimulates, engages, challenges and inspires. It must stir the mind, the body and the heart. Like all good learning.
If you’re currently finding yourself working in teams or managing teams remotely and/or virtually, read more about how you can help build trust in remote teams.
Find out more about how we can help you creating truly engaging and experiential learning, both face-to-face or virtually; speak to a member of the team today.
How to Foster Purposeful Leadership
In my twenty-year career in the field of purposeful leadership, I have read, digested and repeated many quotations from leaders past and present. If I had to identify the one that has impacted me most it would be this:
“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom” – Viktor E. Frankl
There is so much depth and wisdom in Frankl’s words, especially when his personal experience is considered. Frankl was an Austrian neurologist and psychiatrist and a Holocaust survivor. He survived Theresienstadt, Auschwitz, Kaufering and Turkheim. He was uppermost in my mind when I personally visited Auschwitz and Birkenau last month (June 2019). He was also uppermost in my mind when I chose to follow the footsteps of several of Primeast colleagues by enrolling to become a practitioner in The Leadership Circle, a powerful diagnostic to help leaders tap into the wisdom identified by Frankl.
The Leadership Circle is a 360 degree instrument to give leaders feedback on the extent they are creative (top half of the circle) or reactive (the bottom half). It is grounded in leadership research from not one but many respected sources. Having gone through the process as a participant, I can speak first-hand on the profound effect it had on me. But that’s another conversation that I’m very happy to have another day with interested parties.
The reason for writing this article is simply to make the connection between Frankl’s wisdom and this modern-day leadership development tool.
To what extent do we really make use of the space between stimulus and response?’ I am aware of the profound difference between being reactive (not using the space) and being creative (using the space).’ I catch myself frequently failing to use the space, reacting to stuff that happens, at work, at home, in restaurants, you name it. I also notice that, when I’m busy, the chances of ‘reacting’ are increased.
Let’s face it, in today’s busy world of work, is anyone not busy? Is there anyone that wouldn’t benefit from understanding their leadership gap (between reactive tendencies and creative capability)?
If you are (or know) that person who could usefully tap into the wisdom of Frankl, aided by the most powerful leadership diagnostic that I’ve discovered in the last twenty years, either let me know or take a look at some of the articles on Primeast’s Insight pages such as this one by my colleague Sarah Cave
Find out more about how Primeast services can support you and your organization to achieve greater success here: Leader and Leadership Development.
What the Tour de France can Teach us About Teamwork
Giant-Shimano rider Marcel Kittel has attributed his opening stage victory in the Tour de France to his team.
“I have to say thank you to my boys,” he said after he crossed the finishing line. “They worked very hard for me. I think the advantage for me today was the team. When you look at the last 5km, we were for sure the strongest team. We could do it how we wanted and that was important for the victory.”
The words of the German are particularly poignant given the controversy surrounding Team Sky in the run up to the tournament, which ended with Bradley Wiggins being left out of the race.
Tensions between Wiggins and Chris Froome have been making headlines ever since 2012 and the words of Kittel only serve to highlight the disparity between the togetherness of the British team and that of the German’s.
If nothing else, the frictions with Team Sky and Kittel’s ride to victory are a lesson in the importance of teamwork and togetherness for the achievement of excellence.
A tale of two teams
When we look at Team Sky and Giant-Shimano we can see clear differences in how they function as teams.
Rewind to before the Grand Depart and Sir Dave Brailsford had given an interview to L’Equipe in which he had said that his next objective was to win the Tour de France with a Frenchman. A comment that would have done little to instil a sense of support in British favorite Chris Froome. This disjointure isn’t without precedent either, with Froome having previously criticized Brailsford for reneging on agreements and not giving him the support he needed.
On the other side there is the coach of Giant-Shimano, Rudi Kemna, whose main headline-making activity thus far this year is selecting the first ever Chinese Tour de France rider. What’s more, when talking to the press he has focused largely on the talent, claiming each member has been chosen to create the best sprint formation around Kittel and Degenkolb.
“It is always hard picking a selection for the Tour.” Kemna said. “And especially so this year when we have so many riders all at near enough the same level and capable of bringing a lot to the team. The way we are heading into the Tour is the way that I like to start a race – with a team full of confidence and with clear goals. I am looking forward to going to the Tour and showing the world who Team Giant-Shimano is.”
It is perhaps these clear goals that have given Giant-Shimano the edge. Indeed, at Primeast we have seen that no matter the context – sport or business – all team members need to be aligned to a clear purpose to achieve excellence.
Conversely, the goal of Team Sky has been somewhat marred by conflicting egos, including tensions between Froome and Brailsford, and perhaps ill-advised press statements from those associated with the team.
Disjointure in Team Sky can be traced back to 2012 and while it hasn’t prevented the team from reaching the top of the podium, it hasn’t made for a smooth ride. Two years ago Froome pulled away at stage 11 against orders and in 2013 the team fell apart at stage nine, leaving Froome riding alone and vulnerable.
When we look at Giant-Shimano it’s a different story, not least because the team has two victories under its belt in this competition. Throughout the Tour de France the riders have ridden as a team thus far, being called a ‘masterclass in teamwork’. They have intensified pressure at the same time and worked in such a way as to ensure Kittel can take victory.
Team Sky, on the other hand, put in one of it’s its worst performances, amid Froome’s embroilment in accusations that he had been given preferential treatment through his use of certain medications. It seems instead of all riders being focused on the collective purpose of winning, other considerations – mainly individual – have taken precedence.
There’s no I in team
The Tour de France has certainly made clear that when it comes to creating a successful team, each member has to be valued for their role and has to be working towards the same purpose. There is no room for egos, as these affect engagement and achievement of the goal.
Start putting ‘I’ above ‘we’ and Patrick Lencioni’s five team dysfunctions become apparent.
Absence of trust – This happens when team members are unwilling to be vulnerable and open up about mistakes and weaknesses. Without this honesty, there is no foundation for trust. In Team Sky, Wiggins himself commented on a lack of trust between him and Froome, which has arguably been borne from a mutual inability to admit fault.
Fear of conflict – Conflict is one of the most powerful tools teams have but if people don’t engage in debate or ignore tension – much in the way Brailsford is said to have buried his head in the sand over Froome and Wiggins – a team loses its ability to understand each other and explore resolutions.
Lack of commitment – If a team is not engaged in open, unregulated debate, it becomes difficult to get team members to engage with purpose. This is because they haven’t been involved in the decision-making process. At Primeast we work with teams to ensure leaders involve all members to formation of purpose, values and goals. This way, a generalised team purpose becomes, for every member of the team, ‘our purpose’.
Avoidance of accountability – When people become misaligned from purpose, it becomes hard to hold people to account. This is because they haven’t committed to the plan in the first place.
Inattention to results – As a result of the first four dysfunctions, a team will often fail to achieve its purpose and generate results. This is because individual needs have been placed above the importance of collective goals.
Take aways from the Tour de France
For businesses, the Tour de France has thus far demonstrated the importance of ensuring all team members are aligned to the same purpose and no one person is elevated above the rest.
What’s more, those in charge need to lead from the front and create a culture in which team members feel supported. Whether in sport or business, a lack of togetherness at a team level will make it impossible for a company to deliver results.
Primeast has been working with organizations for over thirty years as learning and development partners. We can support you and your teams to get the compelling purpose, strong team culture, and fully aligned internal processes you need to succeed.
To start a conversation with us today, you can email Simon directly or call Primeast on +44 (0) 1423 531083.
Leading to Prime
I am sometimes asked where our company name comes from – and specifically why the word ‘prime’ features. The story goes back to our early days, when we collaborated with Gerry Faust PhD., a leading California based thought leader and researcher into the concept of ‘The Organisational Lifecycle’.
His work, alongside business partner, Ichak Adizes, identified that an organization didn’t necessarily have a finite life. Their research showed that if the organization operated in such a way as to maintain a state of optimum performance called ‘Prime’, it’s life could be extended almost indefinitely.
There are similarities to what Jim Collins PhD. found in his ‘Built to Last’ and ‘Good to Great’ research; find your evolutionary sweet spot, constantly reinvent and the organization is much more likely to become a long-term creator of value. Our founder, John Campbell, found the quest of helping organizations achieve and sustain Prime so compelling, that it was included in both our reason for being…and our name!
We have maintained that purpose, embracing change as we go to ensure relevance. Enabling, developing and advising leaders on how to get to the space where they can deliver long term value for their customers, their employees and their owners – to Prime.
Prime is the optimum position on an organizational lifecycle, where the organization finally achieves a balance between control and agility.
Prime is not actually a single point on the lifecycle curve but is best represented by an area of the curve that includes both growing and aging conditions. This is because agility and self-control are incompatible, creating healthy tension. Sometimes the Prime organization is more flexible than controllable, sometimes it’s not flexible enough. And given the fact that context is always changing, the area where Prime exists also changes.
Leaders who genuinely ‘Lead to Prime’ recognize that they need to keep their organizations just below the summit of the curve to remain in Prime and not be tempted into the trappings of Stable and the beginning of Premature Aging. As we know so vividly from 2020 nothing remains static. Leading to Prime requires constant attention and energy from both leaders and their people, continually reinventing and developing both the organization and themselves and adapting to change. We are in it for the infinite game.
When Leaders ‘Lead to Prime’ they:
- Ensure the organization is guided by its purpose, it’s reason for being. Working with the leadership team and other key stakeholders they create a clear vision of how to fulfil that purpose so everyone knows what they will do and will not do to make the journey. In short ‘they walk their talk’ and help others to do the same.
- Pursue with passion an enterprise-wide focus on external stakeholders to earn their long-term satisfaction. This results in a high degree of stakeholder loyalty. At the same time, because of the clarity of vision, the organization knows when and how to say ‘no’ to the market. It is disciplined enough to protect itself from engaging in ‘bad business’.
- Drive the institutionalisation of a collaborative, entrepreneurial spirit and creative mindset which consistently produces controlled, profitable innovation.
- Manage the company in a way so it operates in a focused, profitable energized and sustainable manner.
- Think and act systemically, ensuring organizational structures work well. Opposing forces are balanced. There is alignment between vision, strategy, structure, culture, information, resource allocation and rewards. Leaders who are ‘Leading to Prime’ continuously adapt and realign these subsystems to meet the challenges of VUCA environment.
- Make priorities clear so the organization knows what to do and what not to do. That clarity of vision and priorities allows a certain composure and peace of mind when they make tough decisions.
- Champion the balancing act of support and challenge throughout the organization where stretching goals are set and enabled so they can be consistently achieved.
- Recognise that appropriate, effective and reliable infrastructure provides support for the entire organization and resource it to the best of their ability.
- Continually seek opportunities for intra- and inter-organizational integration and cohesion with clients, suppliers, investors, and the community. Decision-making is done in an environment of healthy, constructive conflict. These aid internal cohesion which enables the Prime organization to devote much of its energy externally.
- Strive to create an outstanding place of work where people enjoy spending their lives. Consequently, employee churn or turnover is at a healthy level, as both experience and new thinking are valued. The importance of work/life balance is recognized and instances of burnout are rare.
- Create opportunities for people to align their purpose with that of the organization and liberate their talents to deliver results and personal success
- See change as ‘business as usual’ rather than ‘change management’. As it is the norm, people embrace change and work hard, adapting to shifting markets and technologies, innovating to meet growing stakeholder needs.
- Learn continuously and encourage others to do the same. They recognize it comes in many ways; from formal and informal learning right though to learning by understanding different perspectives when people disagree.
- Act with courageous authenticity as they understand their own values, those of the organization and act in alignment with them.
- Lead an organization that endures, survives and thrives on disruption, enjoying consistent, above average long-term growth in value and worth.
‘Leading to Prime’ is not easy as it requires a shift in mindset as well as behavior. It requires commitment, investment in time, energy and inevitably funding. However, the opportunity is huge, if you are willing and brave enough to make the leap and take a fresh look at how leaders ‘lead to Prime’.
The second part of our name – east, is an abbreviation of our original name from 1986 – Executive And Staff Training.
Our name and how we do things have changed, but our quest has remained constant over the years – we support our clients with the development of their leaders and people so that their organization gets to, and remains in, Prime.
Talk to us about how we can help you and your organization on your journey to being in Prime, email Russell Evans here or call him or our client relationship team on +44 (0)1423 531083.
We invite you to take a few minutes and try out some of our assessment resources which will give you some insights into growth and development opportunities.
The Primeast PrimeFocus™ assessment takes you through the eight elements that must be aligned to deliver prime performance and helps you to understand where you and your organization are on this journey.
Completing the Primeast Leadership Challenge assessment will help you to identify potential leadership development opportunities.
Women in Leadership: Andrea Cartwright, Supergroup
As part of Primeast’s Women in Leadership series, we interviewed Andrea Cartwright, group HR director for Supergroup. Andrea shared with us her journey, the challenges she’s encountered as a female leader, and her tips for those looking to get to the top.
Primeast (P): Explain to us your current role and a bit about your team.
Andrea Cartwright (AC): I’m currently the HR director for Supergroup. We’re probably best known for our apparel brand Superdry. I have a team of HR generalists and a number of specialists in the team ranging from business partners, and learning and development, to resourcing and rewards specialists.
P: You come from a finance background, so tell us about your journey and how you got to where you are now?
AC: It’s probably worth going right back to the beginning. I chose not to go to university. I’d had enough of education, I wanted to work. Whilst studying I worked on the checkouts in a supermarket and I absolutely loved that environment. On the back of that I was successful securing an A-Level training scheme at Fine Fare, which sadly doesn’t exist anymore. So that’s where my career started and I learnt from the shop floor up the basics about food retailing, stock, management, cash management, people management and quite early on in my career started running small operational teams in stores.
At the end of the program I became a store manager and I ran a couple of small stores. I was quite young at this point, 20 or 21. I said at the time I never wanted to go into HR, or personnel as it was then, because there was a dreadful role model in one of the stores that I’d worked in. As luck would have it, I kind of drifted into a HR type role by being invited to become a regional training manager in London. A real challenge for a west country girl, moving to the outskirts of London, visiting lots of stores. I then joined Tesco and I stayed for 13 years. Initially as personnel manager in some of their big stores; I opened a number of stores from scratch. I then went into head office and did more employee relations type roles, I looked after ER for the whole group, which at the time was 160,000 employees from what I remember.
I would have been 28/29 at the time. One of the great things about retailing is it’s about doing a great job, proving yourself, and you can come through the ranks very quickly if you are prepared to work hard and be flexible. I moved house four or five times for Tesco over the years so I could take that next job that came up.
During that time I had two kids. I had my daughter quite young when I was 24. Four and a half years later I had my son and actually for most of my career I’ve been a single parent.
After some time at Tesco I then was approached about a role at Barclays. Having worked in retail for all of my career, the opportunity to do something different was one that couldn’t be turned down. I went into Barclays to be head of their employee relations legal function, so the same role as the one I’d done at Tesco, which was a bizarre experience having come from retail. Retail is a lean, mean operating machine and going to a very wealthy bank that had more money than it could possibly spend was a culture shock really. I was based in the City at this time which was an experience in itself.
In the end I only worked for Barclays for about a year because I was approached to go back into a generalist HR role for AXA, the life and pensions business. The role was down in Bristol close to my home town of Trowbridge in Wiltshire. It was a good opportunity to do a more autonomous role and be a little bit closer to my parents so they could give me a bit of help running the family. I relocated back to the south-west and worked for AXA where I was Head of HR.
My daughter was then going to be 13 the following year and I had a bit of a ‘oh my god my kids are growing up really fast and I’m never around for them moment’. I left AXA with no job to go to but I had the intention of setting up a consultancy business, which I did. I ran the business for five years while my kids were in their core teens. This was a great experience and gave me the opportunity to work with a really diverse range of business in private, public and the third sector.
I was then approached by Nationwide and it was just an opportunity I couldn’t turn down. It was interesting, they’d had a lot of problems with falling employee engagement levels and wanted somebody to go in and run all of their corporate HR functions, so reward and employer relations, but have an overarching brief in terms of how do you raise the bar on engagement throughout the business.
I really really enjoyed my time at Nationwide. I’d been careful about choosing an employer after working for myself for so long. In truth I never thought I’d work for anybody again but their values aligned with mine. I joined them six weeks after Northern Rock collapsed so it was a pretty momentous time to put it mildly but I felt that business had the right level of integrity and trust and that it would see that period through – which it did of course with flying colors. It was a really tough period to be in financial services.
I worked for Nationwide for almost five years before being approached about becoming Supergroup’s first ever HR Director. I’d have given my right arm to go back and work for a retailer again and it’s a brand that’s just so exciting. I absolutely love my job. Over the past two years I have had the opportunity to apply everything I know about Leadership and HR but in a very pragmatic, modern way. In many ways it’s been a startup role.
There was nothing to unpick really so I’ve been able to take everything I’ve learnt in my HR career and bring it to something new, something fresh and something absolutely right for this business because it’s quite an unusual business. What you’ve got here is a business that’s been built out of nothing over a period of ten years, particularly in the last five years, and you’ve got two founders still very much at the helm of the business. You’ve got a very entrepreneurial led business that is a PLC and you can imagine the challenges of all those things coming together. When I was offered the job, my kids joked at the time that I became the coolest mother on the planet overnight!
P: What have been the main challenges in your career?
AC: I never had huge career aspirations – I’ve always had a philosophy that I’m going to really enjoy what I do and you tend to enjoy things that you’re good at. I suppose the biggest challenge I’ve had is just really juggling work and life. A lot of people have said ‘how have you done that?’, especially being a single parent. Well you just kind of get on with it. You have to be good at planning and organising and I cooked excessively on a Sunday to make sure we had meals for every day of the week because I’m one of these people that would never allow ready meals to cross my threshold at home. I don’t think I’ve ever experienced any challenges specifically because I am a woman; I’ve never not been offered a job because I was a woman or not offered an opportunity specifically because I was a woman.
I have a theory that one of the reasons we don’t have as many women in leadership is because women have more choices than men do. Often we’re not the main breadwinner and we’ve got a partner or a husband who provides the income and we’ve had the privilege to look over the parapet at these big jobs and go why would I want to do that. There are so many sacrifices that you have to make and it’s ok for a woman to make that choice but sadly it’s still difficult for a man to make that choice, even if they really wanted to. I know society is changing but I still think there is a stereotypical view that men should progress and they have to keep their careers on the road and that still isn’t wholly the case for women and that is a privilege really that we should hold onto.
P: If you could do one thing differently what would it be?
AC: I would have been around a bit more for my kids, definitely. I have people in my team at the moment who are expecting babies and they ask how have you done what you’ve done and my personal view is that when they’re little, childcare is easier – it’s expensive – but they need full time care, you know where they are, that’s it. The older they get, the less you know where they are, the less they want someone around looking after them and the challenge is ‘oh there’s a day off school’ or the holidays and that sort of stuff just gets harder and harder the older they get. And also the care that they need when they’re little, of course it’s emotional but it’s mainly the physical stuff. As they get older they just want you around a bit more. They don’t necessarily want to talk to you but they just want you around. I’m quite looking forward to being a granny one day because I can do it all again in a different way.
P: So how did you manage to balance your life with your career?
AC: You have to be organised and actually in some ways that was almost easier on my own because you weren’t relying on anybody else to forget, you had to do it yourself. And I survived because I had a nanny until they went to school and I’ve had some really fantastic au pairs over the years. Much to my neighbours’ amusement they were often lads because lads tended to be able to drive but the girls never could. And it worked really well for me having an au pair because I needed someone who could live in because of the odd night I’d be away.
P: Did you have any flexible working?
AC: No, nothing formal. Clearly I always worked with people that had that sort of give and take so I could go to the odd thing at school. I do remember going to a mothers and daughters pizza evening once and we excused ourselves not very late in the evening as I had to get an early flight the next day and one of the other mothers said “oh, you work!” I thought there’s a whole other world out there that I’ve never had any experience of really.
Early on in my career not long after I’d had my daughter I remember telling my mum I’d got a significant pay rise to which she responded “well you’ll never give up work now will you”. I had to remind my mum that was never in my head. Funny that she had a perception that I would settle down and stop working. However, now she says she’s really envious and proud of what I’ve achieved.
P: What would be your key tip for women aspiring to be leaders?
AC: That’s an easy one and it’s the same for men – be yourself. It’s that authenticity, don’t try to pretend you’re a bloke or you’re something that you’re not. You have to be really credible and really reliable, then everything else sort of falls into place.
P: What are your future aspirations?
AC: I don’t have any great career plans really, they just sort of come along at the right moment. I’ve got a lot of work to do here. We’ll double in size over the next five years, which doesn’t leave me short of things to do. I have an ambition to sail across the Atlantic with my husband at some point, so I’d quite like to stop working for at least a while – I’m not sure I’ll ever stop working but pausing sometime would be nice to do. I kind of take it as it comes. I certainly wouldn’t want to be a CEO or anything. I’m passionate about HR, that’s my thing.
For more inspiration from women in leadership, see the interviews with “Women in Leadership interview, Nancy Mattenberger, VP global consulting services, Infor” and Pauline Yau, Director of Central Government for Microsoft UK’,
Leadership – A Voyage of Discovery?
As a leadership development professional and self-confessed leadership geek, I am always on the lookout for new tools, techniques, books, ideas and perspectives. So you can imagine my excitement when a colleague told me in December 2015 that he had come across a leadership effectiveness diagnostic we hadn’t seen before!
As a leadership team at Primeast, we were keen to know more – not only because we like to offer our clients the very best in theories, tools and diagnostics, but also because as leaders of our own business, we know we need to stretch ourselves and constantly look to grow our own skills and improve our behaviors.
The Leadership Circle is the brainchild of Bob Adams. Bob’s story is like many of us in the learning business – he started off doing one thing, realised it wasn’t for him and then went back to the drawing board to reinvent his career. In Bob’s case, this meant taking a Masters in Organisational Development and then becoming an OD director. He had the pleasure in his early career of working with the leading names in leadership development theory – people like Peter Block, Peter Senge, Robert Fritz, Marv Weisbord, Clay Laugherty, David Whyte, Robert Kegan, and a host of others.
Bob Adams said:
“What I noticed … as I got deeper into the thinking of each of these thought leaders was that the field of leadership and organization development is a random collection of really great stuff. The field is littered with useful theories, frameworks, models and research that is largely unconnected and unintegrated.”
This insight is what led him to create first the Universal Leadership Model and later the Leadership Circle Profile diagnostic tool, which pulls together the best in leadership development thinking into one diagnostic and output tool. Learn more about the Universal Leadership Model here.
How the Leadership Circle Profile Assessment works
The assessment reveals the relationship between patterns of action and the internal assumptions that drive them. It presents a breakthrough 360-degree framework for both individual and collective leadership development that is simple, elegant and comprehensive, thereby helping to create the leadership culture required to achieve improved business performance.
The Profile, as its name suggests, is presented as a circle – or really, three circles within each other. At the centre is identity – who you really are – while the other circles are split horizontally, with the upper halves representing the creative leadership competencies that contribute to a leader’s effectiveness. They measure key leadership behaviors and internal assumptions that lead to high-fulfilment, high-achievement leadership. They are:
- Relating – caring connection, fostering team play, collaboration, mentoring and development, interpersonal intelligence
- Self-Awareness – selfless leadership, balance, composure, personal learning
- Authenticity – integrity, courageous authenticity
- Systems Awarenesscommunity concern, sustainable productivity, systemic thinking
- Achieving – strategic focus, purpose and vision, achievement of results, decisiveness
The lower half of the circle maps self-limiting reactive tendencies and leadership behaviors. The reactive dimensions reflect inner beliefs and assumptions that limit effectiveness, authentic expression and empowering leadership. They are:
- Complying – conservative, eagerness to please, a need to belong, passivity
- Protecting – arrogance, critical mindset, distance
- Controlling – perfectionism, drive, ambition, autocratic mentality
A personal development discovery
Having learned more about the background to this tool, we were excited to try it ourselves. In December 2015, we asked our small team to respond to 360 questionnaires on each member of the leadership team – which was a substantial undertaking for quite a small company. In February 2016, we held a two-day workshop during which we received our feedback.
I think we were all surprised by the directness of the reports we received. It’s fair to say the feedback did not hold anything back, and we quickly learned that these results needed to be accompanied by top-quality coaching by a Leadership Circle-accredited coach, taking the leader through the development points revealed by the profile. I am not ashamed to admit that I had a lot to work on to move towards becoming the leader I want to be.
During 2016-17, I was able to take some time out to really think about the impact my behaviors have on those around me, and understand how to adjust these to better reflect my intentions. I realised that my enthusiasm to get a job done can come across as arrogant and bossy; my desire to do the best possible job for my clients can be interpreted as perfectionism or criticism; my tendency to have an “if you want something done, do it yourself” approach can come across as autocratic. None of these tendencies are my intention, but that’s not the point – the truth is in the eye of the beholder, whatever my intentions are!
By using the profile and coaching, I learned how to reduce my reactive tendencies and increase my creative competencies as a leader. I am happy to say that earlier this year I got to retake the 360, and the results second time around were markedly different; my reactive tendencies have decreased, and while there is still plenty of work to do, my ability to operate from the top half of the circle and to recognize when I “go south” and stop myself has improved greatly. Learn more about Leadership Circle Profiling here/OR take the free personal assessment here.
What does this mean for leadership development?
The biggest plus I can see from this powerful 360 is the way its output gives the receiver a very well-defined development plan. In other words, it is crystal-clear from the report where their development needs are, and the Leadership Circle coach who delivers the report can support the leader to become the best they can be. It’s the first time I have seen a report point to such a clear development journey, and as such it’s something I will be using with my clients as a core tool.
Primeast now has a number of Leadership Circle Profile Certified Practitioners around the globe offering profiling and extended coaching to our clients around the globe with different language capabilities. So, if improving leadership effectiveness for growth is on your agenda, then get in touch and we’ll be happy to help you on your journey of discovery and growth.Email us here.
So if you would like a coach to reflect with, challenge your thinking, help you navigate the way forward managing your business and your team, then contact me directly and we can discuss how we can support you with coaching to help you in delivering results quickly and positively.
You can email Sarah directly or call Primeast on +44 (0) 1423 531083.
Women in Leadership: Pauline Yau, Microsoft
As part of Primeast’s Women in Leadership series, we interviewed Pauline Yau, director for central government at Microsoft UK. Pauline shared with us her journey, the experiences she’s had being a woman in the workplace, the challenges she’s encountered as a female leader, and her thoughts on the current environment for professional women.
Primeast (P): What is your current role at Microsoft?
Pauline Yau (PY): I am the director for central government at Microsoft UK. What this means in plain English is I have a team of people that are all selling to central government organizations, which are Whitehall departments and central government agencies.
I have a team of 12 people that report into me. I have a mix of sales people and also technology specialists. This means there is a mix of extrovert sales people and then more introvert technology specialists and all of them are out dealing with central government people every single day.
P: It must be an interesting dynamic to manage?
PY: Yeah it is and I think this is where some of your EQ (emotional intelligence quotient) really comes into play because I think personally, it’s a very female trait being able to manage this sort of dynamic. We’re very good at empathising, sensing and putting ourselves in the shoes of others. And so a lot of my role is adapting any messages I need to deliver to the team to individuals in a way that will resonate best for them. For example, whereas I might be a bit more to the point and harsh with my sales people, I’ll maybe go into the reasoning and the data with the more technical folks because they respond better to understanding the reasons why something is happening.
P: What journey did you have to get to where you are?
PY: I left school at 16. One of the best bits of my job is standing in front of teenage girls and telling them that my highest qualification is a GCSE! I have to say it’s not something I’m immensely proud about. I left school with seven grade A GCSEs but it was never presented to me as an option to go to college or university. Nobody in my family had ever done it and I went to a school where that aspiration was just never presented to you, so I just assumed – and my family assumed – that at 16 you’d go out to work.
When I’m talking to young girls I’m always very transparent about the size of the business I run and then I go “but I left school at 16” and you can see their teachers flinching in the background going “don’t tell them that, don’t tell them that”, but actually it seems to resonate really well with them that there is a different option, there is a different path. While I would absolutely hugely encourage any school leaver to continue into further and higher education, it’s not for everyone and there are different options available.
I kind of fell into the technology industry by accident. The first company I worked for was WordPerfect UK and I worked as a telesales person. That was really the start of my technology sales career. I moved to various companies, most recently I was with Adobe running their UK education business. I then had my daughter and decided that actually I just wanted to work for myself and pick and choose the times that I work a bit better so I freelanced for a while, then I went to a start up, then I came to Microsoft two years ago. I never set out to sell technology for a living; it’s just what I ended up doing.
I have a lot of girls coming into Microsoft and they talk to various women and learn about what they do and part of that is about helping people understand that working in the tech industry doesn’t mean that you have to be technical. I am the least technical person on the planet I’m sure but I’ve spent goodness knows how many years working in the technology industry. And I think it’s important that we show that to work in the technology industry you don’t have to be technical.
When you leave school at 16 what you need is just an enormous amount of drive and ambition because you’re relying on that, you’re not relying on any form of formal education to get you a foot in the door anywhere.
During my time in the start-up world I was exposed to a lot of folks who’d chosen entrepreneurship as their career path. They didn’t want to work for anyone else, they wanted to start their own business. I think kids that leave school, college or university with that aspiration have to be commended because it’s tough. But I think we’ve got a long way to go to recognize that as a career choice that we should encourage and support in our young people.
P: What were the main challenges you’ve encountered over the years?
PY: I guess it changes over time, I very vividly remember when I was starting out and in my early 20s, age was always the barrier. You were told you were too young to do things but I never listened to that. After having my daughter – who’s seven now – one of the challenges was ‘what do I do now?’. I was unfortunately made redundant when I was on maternity leave and that was tough. There I was with a small baby thinking I want to work and I think it’s very difficult. This is why organizations need to change because it’s very difficult for external candidates to negotiate flexible working. I really wanted to work but as an external candidate it was really hard for me to be able to negotiate any type of flexible working arrangements. And I think it’s much easier if you’re already working inside an organization and suddenly you need to have that flexible working. So that was a real barrier for me around that time and that’s when I started freelancing. I set up my own business and just did contract work for various organizations. I’d work with them for a three month period, set them up and move onto the next one. So that was a challenge because suddenly I had to build my own business.
P: How did you balance being a mum with your work?
PY: I’m incredibly fortunate in that I have my own mum without whom I wouldn’t be able to do what I do. Thank goodness for the mums. I watch friends of mine who have a career but who don’t have a mum or don’t have a mum near them and they struggle with that. I’m a huge fan of Sheryl Sandberg and her call for men to lean in as well because in order for a woman to lean in, you need a man to lean in too. Again, I’m incredibly fortunate that my husband is a very hands-on dad, we split everything down the middle. I start work early, he works late. So I think that you really do have to have that support network behind you in order for you to do what you chose to do.
P: Now you’re in Microsoft are they more accommodating?
PY: Very much so but I do see young girls who want it all, they want the career, they want to climb the ladder but they also want to do all the school runs as well and be at every single school performance and it’s just never going to happen. And while we would love to say yes you can have it all, the reality is that you can’t and you have to make some choices. My trade-off is that yes I have a fantastic career and I’m really pleased with how that’s going but I don’t see my daughter in the mornings and I probably see her for about an hour and a half a day during the week. I see her in the evenings so I probably get the grumpy half of her as well. I think you have to make your peace with your choices. I see a lot of women in particular struggling with the choices they make but you have to make your peace with it and you have to love what you do. If you don’t, you’ll always have that guilt and that battle going on.
P: Who has helped you most on your career journey?
PY: There hasn’t really been a constant person. I’m hugely self-motivated. I have my own drive and ambition spurring me along every second of the day. I wish I could tell you there’s been a single mentor throughout that journey. I think there have been different people at different stages and as corny as this might sound, I’ve been married for nine years so probably my husband in terms of just that cheerleading from the side-lines and allowing me to pursue what I wanted to pursue and supporting that. He’s had to step up massively since I joined Microsoft. I’ll go away for two weeks at a time and I can be away from home at least one night a week and that puts pressures on him. He’s very good at making sure our daughter isn’t exposed to any gender messages.
When I was in the start-up community my CEO was a huge support to me and a huge inspiration as well as I very much admired his entrepreneurial spirit and his risk taking. Now it’s probably a few other people: my boss at Microsoft, for example, who is very supportive and acts as a mentor and a coach and isn’t afraid to give me very direct feedback.
P: What are your thoughts about a recent Telegraph report about the BBC appointing a woman to the head of BBC trust and describing her as a mum of two? View the article here.
PY: It’s hilarious isn’t it. I rolled my eyes and thought heaven’s sake. I think it actually annoys me that we have to discuss this stuff. We don’t have to discuss it with men. My one hope for my daughter when she grows up is that the whole term ‘working mum’, ‘stay at home mum’, is not even thought about or talked about. These articles, the fact that we have so much debate around women in leadership, I hope that it just doesn’t exist when my daughter grows up.
The whole reporting about stay at home mums versus working mums, ultimately no child of a working mum is any more damaged than a child of a stay at home mum. It’s all down to the parenting. And you never hear the term working dad and stay at home dad. One of the things that make me angry is that when I went over to the States a couple of male colleagues came up to me and said it must be hard being away from your daughter for two weeks and I always reply no more tough than it is for a dad. And I bet nobody goes up to a man and says ‘it must be tough being away from your kids’. So it’s little things like that that perpetuate this belief that it’s a really big thing for a woman to be in a leadership position. Well no, no more than it is for a dad. You make the same sacrifices. One of the things I’m a huge believer in and one of the things that drives me on enormously, is being a really good role model for my own daughter and the fact that you can make your own choices.
There is a statement from Sheryl Sandberg and it goes something like the more dads that are at the school gates the more options children have for themselves. It opens their eyes to opportunity. Because I do think – and I have the upmost respect for any stay at home mum – especially if you’ve got daughters is that they see that as the norm, especially if dad’s not leaning in. Women have a responsibility to make change happen because it’s easy to say I’ll just do the school run.
One thing we do at Microsoft is a lot of training on unconscious bias and one of the facts that I found fascinating is that if you are a man and you’re wife stays at home and your mother stays at home, you are far less likely to promote women and encourage them in your organization.
Diversity in leadership is also important for organizations because their customers are diverse. Our customer base is full of women, young people, old people and every mix of race. So in order for us to be relevant to our customers we have to make sure we’re thinking like them and the only way we can do this is have a diverse leadership team.
P: What are your top tips for women aspiring to a leadership position?
PY: Don’t listen to the naysayers. There are certain individuals that will just sap your energy. Don’t take no for an answer, you have to be persistent. You also need to make your peace with the choices you’re making to allow you to carry on your upwards trajectory. I’d also say you should encourage other women along the way. We have a duty to encourage and support other women.
P: What advice would you give for your daughter about her career?
PY: Be happy in what you do, whatever it is that you chose to do.
P: What does the future hold for you?
PY: Since I came into Microsoft, a world of opportunity opened up to me. Before I thought my career path was very vertical. What I’ve learnt is that the world’s my oyster and if I want to diversify I can. Now I’m thinking ‘what do I want to do next?’. I honestly don’t know but the way that I come at it is ‘what’s my long-term plan? What’s the role after the next one?’ as I think this helps your thinking about what the next role should be but also what are my non-negotiables. One of mine is that it has to involve direct customer engagement as that’s where I get my energy from. If I was put into a role that was very inward looking, you never went out and saw customers, that’s not for me. Personally, I just want to continue to set that really great example for my own daughter and give her a good life in terms of exposing her to opportunities and activities that otherwise we wouldn’t be able to do and continue to be really passionate about my job. It’s important that I enjoy what I do or otherwise it all starts to fall apart.
“Women in Leadership interview, Nancy Mattenberger, now Global Chief Customer Officer at Infor.”
Communication Skills Successful Leaders Need
What Are the Communication Skills Required for Leading a Small Team and Large Organization?
Communication is key to being an effective leader. As leaders, we must communicate clearly and effectively with our team members, peers, superiors, and stakeholders to be successful. It’s the way we get our message across to our followers. It’s the way we motivate them, inspire them, and influence them. How we communicate sets the tone of our leadership, which in turn sets the tone for our followers.
Leaders who are not good communicators will have a challenging time motivating others and getting stakeholders on board with their ideas or plans. In short, without effective communication skills as a leader, there is no effective leadership.
The functions of communication
Before discussing the communication competencies required for leaders, we should understand the functionality of effective communication leadership skills: for what purposes do leaders (and organizations) communicate?
Control
As leaders, we must communicate effectively to ensure that our people are following the organization’s rules, processes, and procedures.
Information
Leaders must have excellent communication skills to provide information to employees, managers, external parties, and other stakeholders. We must keep our people updated with strategy, new processes, organizational goals, etc. Without this information communicated effectively, our organization will function less efficiently.
Motivation
Leaders who communicate well with their peers and employees are more likely to have good relationships in the workplace. We must provide effective feedback to provide positive reinforcement, motivate our people, and improve their performance. This includes setting clear expectations for individuals and teams.
Emotional expression
Communication is a powerful tool that we can use to create empathy, understanding, growth, and connection. As leaders, we must also understand the power of communication to express emotions, as employees voice dissatisfaction and satisfaction. We should also be careful to communicate impartially, removing our own emotions appropriately to manage conflict effectively.
Key communication competencies needed in leaders today
To achieve the four objectives of communication, we must identify and develop the key communication competencies required for leaders, which includes both verbal and nonverbal communication skills.
Adaptability of communication style
As leaders, we must be mindful of our audience and the situation in which we find ourselves and then adapt our communication style accordingly. This will help us to convey ideas in a way that is easy for others to understand, by using plain language and avoiding jargon and technical terms that our audience may not know.
Clarity and conciseness
Clarity and conciseness are two of the most important qualities of effective communication. They are also the qualities that many leaders and managers struggle with the most.
We must ensure that our messaging ─ be it verbal, written, or otherwise ─ is clear, specific, and easy to understand. It must be unambiguous. We should also strive to keep our communication on point and concise ─ fewer words is usually more effective.
Empathy
We are in constant communication with our team, whether it is through emails or face-to-face conversations. It’s crucial that we understand how our people think and feel so that we can see things from different perspectives and communicate empathetically. Not only will this help our messages to be met more positively, but it will also help us to make better decisions for our people and our organizations.
Asking open-ended questions
The goal of leadership communication is rarely to tell but to elicit a response and understand, and then to inspire and motivate the actions we wish people to take. Therefore, we should be good at asking open-ended questions that require more than a ‘yes or no’ reply. This is how we can encourage more thoughtful answers, which enables us to provide more clarity when needed.
Positive body language
Body language is a key component of effective communication. Positive body language can help us set the tone for a conversation, establish rapport with another person, and influence how they feel about themselves or our organization.
Active listening
Active listening is the most important skill of any good leader. We must demonstrate that we care for our employees by asking for their opinions, ideas, and feedback. We should then focus on listening, without interrupting.
When we do this, we find that those we are conversing with will be more open to answering our questions to help our understanding of their perspectives.
Giving and receiving feedback
The most successful leaders know how to give and receive feedback respectfully and constructively. They know that it’s not about them, but about the person they are giving feedback to. Leaders who can’t accept constructive criticism will never grow or develop their wider leadership skills. A word of warning, though ─ when receiving feedback, we must act on it or our desire for feedback will appear unauthentic and we risk losing the trust and confidence of our followers.
How to Develop Essential Communication Skills as a Leader
Communication skills are the most important aspect of effectiveness as a leader. To be influential as a leader, we must be empathetic, listen intently to our people, and communicate with clarity. It is crucial that we are always mindful of our body language, and that we use questions to encourage the exchange of emotions and ideas.
Are you equipped to lead effectively? When was the last time you assessed your communication skills? To learn how our Leadership Circle™ Impact Programme delivers the skills you need to be a more impactful and influential leader, click here.
Defining Culture & Values as Leaders
A brief appraisal of the economic environment of the last 15 years demonstrates the impact of corrosive leadership. Superbly summarised at the beginning of their 2012 book “The Fulfilling Workplace”, Ronald J Burke and Cary L Cooper observed that the leadership of banks and certain corporations (Enron, for example) through the 2000’s serves to show how individual unscrupulousness and toxic cultures can torpedo the honest endeavours of thousands of ordinary workers to deliver great public services.
What is Leadership?
I have long-thought that the primary role of leaders is to create the conditions in which everyone in the organization (or team) can do what they do best every day at work. This definition talks to issues like resource-allocation, personal development, suitability in role, corporate culture and purpose-focus. Understanding purpose and being purposeful is at the heart of being able to create the most effective conditions in which we can deploy the best of ourselves in the work we do. Because we are all individual, good leaders understand that the challenge of how to inspire ‘different strokes for different folks’, and all that has to be customised, flexed and constantly reviewed.
How will we know when we’ve got it?
The journey toward good leadership hangs on the development of a keen sense of self-awareness. Understanding oneself and recognising what we’re doing, and why, is a powerful tool that provides invaluable personal and intimate feedback. Being self-aware enables us to sense-check what we’re doing and why we are doing it the way we are. Furthermore, it helps us to regulate our emotions and responses so that they are proportionate and contextually appropriate. This is particularly important for leaders since the responses and immediate actions of those in positions of influence tend to set the tone of the responses of others and shape opinions.
Can we learn it?
Self-awareness is something that individuals can develop on their own by reserving time for self-reflection, asking themselves questions like ‘How did I do there?’ ‘What could I have done differently?’ ‘What could I have done more of or less of?’ ‘Did I truly understand what the desired outcomes were, before getting involved?’ In the 24-7 connected world in which we live, it’s my experience that we do too little self-reflection.
We can also get feedback from others. In my expeirence, it’s amazing how little we seek out the observations and opinions of others in considering our own style and approach! But, by understanding the views of those whose opinion we trust and respect, we can gain incredible insight into how we ‘land’ in the eyes of others. Combining this with our own self-reflection gives us a substantial data-pickup with which we can adapt and enhance our leadership skills.
There are numerous psychometric assessments, many incorporating a 360 degree element, which provide valuable feedback on our leadership style. Taken ‘in the round’ and overseen by suitably-qualified coaches, they afford the opportunity to get feedback in a structured format which has, ideally, been appropriately validated.
And, we can also ask people who’ve been there before us about the things that worked for them; getting reference points and examples helps us to build the courage and confidence to tackle difficult situations. Talking at length with experienced successful leaders has incredible value.
It’s also within us
Perhaps the most fundamental part of identifying our own leadership approach is having an understanding of and appreciation for our personal values: what are those deep-seated beliefs that shape our behaviors, our attitudes and our relationships? Understanding these and appreciating their impact on our actions and thoughts gives us a real insight into what drives us, and this enables us to define in what context we want to work and to recognize whether our organizational culture is supporting or hindering us. Barrett Values Centre cultural transformation tools is one of the best ways of identifying personal values and understanding how they fit with those of the people around us.
Aligned with the benefit of deeply understanding our values-set is the complementary importance of defining one’s personal purpose. I appreciate that for some of us, identifying our personal purpose might be a life’s work on its own! If one is able to articulate it, then one is able to answer the question of how does what we aspire to fit with your organization’s purpose and that of your significant other colleagues?
Armed with the knowledge of one’s values and personal purpose, and with a deep self-awareness of how one ‘lands’ with others, it is possible to build a powerfully-effective and authentic style of leadership. Of course, it still requires leaders to stay true to themselves and their values in all that they say and do, even when times are tough; this is often the part that lets us down!
Leadership is not a gift: we all have, in my opinion, what it takes to lead; we just need the passion for something that reflects our personal purpose and exudes our values.
Building Resiliency as Leaders
We already knew we were living in uncertain times and then Nature came along to say “You ain’t seen nothing yet”. Without notice, we have been pitched into a global pandemic that has prompted border closures, civil constraints and an economic crisis. This worldwide disruption to lives and livelihoods calls for decisive leadership by governments and institutions… and each of us also face personal challenges about what to do for the best. This is a testing time as we each adjust to the ‘new normal’.
Keep informed
Just getting to the facts is difficult. Fake news, misinformation and vested interests all compete for our attention alongside respected news sources. Even our governments are having to improvise as they address an emergency on a scale not seen in generations. Confusion and contradictory information makes it important to question what we hear, to search out credible views and to find ways of independently verifying what we’ve learnt.
The most important thing to find is authoritative advice about what to do to reduce the risk of catching and spreading the virus. Next we need to turn to the personal economic and social fallout. For many, the impacts will be profound: being laid off, loss of income and more…
Our ability to recover from such problems depends on how we approach them. Having good information, getting help, good decision-making and acting swiftly will all play a part. As this is new ground for all of us, questioning our usual biases (e.g. for pessimism or optimism) and assumptions will be critical. Good information is critical to developing the confidence to act.
Follow the Government’s medical advice
Naturally, we should follow official guidance: trust the medical experts and science rather than your intuition or the guy down the pub (if indeed pubs and bars are still open where you are).
In chaotic and volatile situations people often panic or shrug things off, both of which are counter-productive behaviors. Our own actions may feel insignificant in the current crisis and unlikely to have any effect on the overall situation. However, we can reduce our own risk of infection by taking basic precautions. If everybody follows the health advice, the aggregate effect will be to slow down the rate at which the disease will spread. The slower the infection rate, the fewer people will catch the disease. So, seemingly minor actions taken by many people will add up to saving lives.
Good individual practices build group resilience whether that is in your family, your team at work, your community or the society as a whole. Societal resilience comes from acting in concert, supporting each other, protecting the vulnerable and doing the ‘right thing’ even if it is counter-intuitive or personally inconvenient.
Work out what else needs to happen
When deciding what else we need to do, everyone will have different factors they will need to take into account: things like age, health, income, finances, job, family and the risk of infection. Ask yourself what you need to do in your particular situation. Some questions to get started:
What would make a real difference? How can you do that? What needs to change? …And by when? What difficulties do you anticipate? What support might you need and where can you find it? What are others doing that you might also try? Who should be involved and who else will be affected by what you do? What would success look like?
When thinking about what you’re going to do differently, consider the wider picture: your organization, team, community, people who you depend on and those who depend on you: How might they be affected? What support might they need?
This stage in building resilience is to think about the changes you need to make and the ‘who, what, why, when and how’ of making them. You should consider different scenarios and decide what you might have to do should they occur. A key part of resilience is being flexible enough to react to new situations as they arise.
Choose action not fear
While it’s human to be scared about something so dramatic, some of the media seem to be adding fuel to the fires of our fears. It is undoubtedly serious: at the time of writing, infections are doubling every 4 or 5 days. The numbers of critically ill and of deaths are rising at a similar rate. Without decisive action, our medical facilities may become overwhelmed. Despite knowing that the authorities are working to prevent that happening, the trumpeting of such distressing information obscures the fact that this is a mild infection for most people. If possible, hold on to that. Either way, know that, by following the advice to minimize your risk of infection, you are doing what you can.
The economic effects are a different matter. At the time of writing many Governments around the world have closed almost all non-essential public places and are enforcing a ‘stay at home and work from home if you can’ policy – we are all affected by them. Actively getting to grips with the issues that affect you and finding ways of improving your own situation is a great antidote to anxiety. Some things are easy… do them first (pick the ‘low hanging fruit’). Others, such as changing ingrained habits, are harder… so find some support. We are all in this together and working alongside others helps us stick to our aims.
Resilience means consciously changing to meet new challenges. It is taking control where you can.
Managing anxiety
Worry can be debilitating. At the extreme, it can disable your thinking. So another, often-overlooked element in building resilience is to look after yourself. Set aside the time to:
- Get good quality sleep
- Eat regularly and follow a good diet
- Avoid alcohol and cigarettes
- Exercise
- Relax
- Be in nature (as much as you are permitted to)
- Meditate
- Reflect
Be thorough and systematic about developing good practices for each of these topics (there’s plenty of on-line advice). Doing so will support your immune system and strengthening your mental resources. Mental resilience is as important as being fit and healthy: it enables you be more effective at what you do.
Wishing you every success in rising to the challenges of your ‘new normal’. I hope that you and yours emerge healthy and strong.
To start a conversation about your leadership development or the development opportunities your organization faces – you can email our team directly here.
10 Critical Skills Needed for Leaders
Skills Assessed as Required to Lead Through the Next Crisis
Leading effectively is exciting, not least because of the diverse set of skills you have mastered. A skills assessment will help to evaluate the skills that your leaders possess. Many of these will be hard, technical skills necessary to lead with authority and knowledge. Equally crucial are the skills that are often less measurable but essential to lead people effectively.
Research such as the 2020 survey conducted by LinkedIn examining the future of leadership demonstrates that soft skills are ‘more than a bonus, they’re table stakes’. In other words, they are a bare minimum requirement. Despite this, more than half of the survey’s 14,000 respondents don’t think their leaders are good at soft skills and are underprepared to lead in the future.
So the question is, what soft skills will your leaders need to lead their people and engage them in the purpose of your organization?
Here is a list of the 10 critical skills that your leaders must develop.
#1 Self-awareness and emotional intelligence
Understanding yourself is essential to understanding your emotions, motivations, and reactions. Three things you can do immediately to help develop your emotional intelligence are:
- Keep a diary of your emotions (what happened and how it made you feel)
- Note how your responsibilities make you feel (in all your life roles)
- Predict your emotional responses to different situations
With greater understanding of your own emotional response and how to shape it, you will be able to connect with people more effectively.
#2 Effective communication
Communication capability is essential for leaders to master. Being able to listen actively will help you understand and analyze people’s emotions and their challenges. Only then can you practice thoughtful communication that resonates with your audience.
#3 Positivity
Especially through times of crisis, when the world, industries, teams, and individuals are in chaos, a positive attitude is essential to lead and inspire. Positivity demonstrates confidence in the future, in the business strategy, and in your people. It helps to build the resilience needed to cut through external and internal issues over which you have no influence.
#4 Critical thinking and problem solving
You’ll need to use your knowledge and experience to analyze the plethora of data and facts available before making bold decisions. The ability to think on your feet does not mean making immediate, ill-considered decisions, but rather rapid assessment to develop creative solutions where problems exist.
#5 Motivational
It’s mission-critical to inspire and motivate your people. This requires a deep knowledge of individuals, because we are all motivated by different things. The key is to understand what it is that each person needs to do their work effectively, and offer the support they need as they develop.
#6 Relationship building
Building relationships is central to achieving all you are capable of as a leader. You will give and receive feedback positively (even when it is negative), show interest in people’s lives, recognize and reward contributions, and help people to understand where they fit in and why they are important.
#7 Conflict management skills
Of course, you will also need to deal with people who have bad attitudes or whose poor behavior jeopardises team spirit. You will be judged on how you handle volatile team members and situations.
#8 Have a learning mentality
It is as important to develop yourself as it is to help your team develop. This means making time for self-development, which can be a challenge with everything else that requires your attention. Create time to develop your own skills through reading, networking with others, and taking courses or attending webinars.
#9 The art of delegation
You cannot do everything yourself. Delegation is vital to lead a team to peak performance and realisation of potential. You’ll know when to delegate work and who to delegate work to. You’ll need to use your knowledge of people’s strengths and weaknesses to get tasks done efficiently, but also their goals, likes, and dislikes to ensure that motivation is maintained, and personal development continues.
#10 Trustworthiness
It will be essential that your people feel comfortable enough to approach you, discuss their issues, and seek your support. They need to trust you. Trust, of course, is built over the long term and founded on honesty, accountability, knowledge, vulnerability, and integrity.
Is it time for a skills assessment?
When was the last time you assessed the skills of your incumbent and developing leaders?
Leading a team effectively requires much more than competence in hard skills. The crises we have navigated through 2020 into 2021 highlight the need for a collection of soft skills. To be a successful leader requires you to embed these soft skills, and this requires coaching, time, practice, and feedback on which you act.
You can start now by taking the Leadership Challenge skills assessment.
To learn where you are on the leadership curve and how Prime Leadership can develop your leaders of tomorrow today, contact Primeast.
Nancy Mattenberger, Infor speaks to Sarah Cave
Congratulations to all the women who made The IT Services Report ‘Top 25 Women in IT Services 2020’. As part of Primeast’s 2015 Women in Leadership series, we interviewed Nancy Mattenberger, Vice President for global consulting services at Infor, New York. At No.4, Nancy is now the Global Chief Customer Officer at Infor.
We thought now was a good time to republish our 2015 interview in which Nancy shared with us her journey, the challenges she’s encountered as a female leader, and her tips for those looking to get to the top.
Primeast (P): Explain to us your current role and a bit about your team.
Nancy Mattenberger (NM): I’m Vice President for Consulting Services at Infor, the world’s third largest business applications company, and lead a team of global consultants. Infor provides beautiful crafted software purpose built for specific industries and micro verticals to simplify the way companies work. To achieve this, we have set ourselves a course of disrupting the enterprise application business and we create compelling experiences for enterprise software users, going beyond just the usual look and feel. In fact, we have our own in-house design company in our headquarters in New York City and have been branded “the world’s largest start up”.
P: You didn’t start your career in technology, so tell us about your journey.
NM: I started my life as a translator. I moved around a lot in my childhood and have lived in numerous countries. I speak a few different languages and decided to put them to good use, working as a translator in a major international organization.
I soon got bored and realised that what I really enjoyed doing was managing a global workforce and the challenges that presented, from moving employees and their families from one country to another and ensuring they thrived and adapted to new cultures and environments. Consequently, I went into operational HR, working for a global packaging company with a large mobile workforce and enjoyed assisting staff and their families to move around the world, tapping into my own experience of relocating globally with my family as a child and then an adult.
It was during this time that I got very interested in the PwC technology we were using daily to calculate taxes and compensation packages for expatriates and ultimately was offered a job at PwC. They needed someone who actually came from the HR industry, who would be credible in front of HR executives and who could manage an international team. So I moved to London, joined PwC and transitioned from an HR operational role to an IT management role, successfully managing a European team and increasing revenue numbers across Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
From PwC I moved onto Australia and a job at Kronos, where I held a variety of roles in pre-sales, sales and consulting in the APAC region. I also helped Kronos launch brand new markets in China and India and successfully grow the company footprint across the whole of Asia Pacific for the next 8 years, it was an exciting time and I learnt a lot about launching, expanding and thriving in new markets. It was during this time that I had my first mentor who championed me and helped me grow tremendously in this new role.
I then moved to Oracle to run their Australian ERP consulting services practice and to find ways to compete against tough, low cost competition from offshore companies. I was successful in that role and increased the scope of my responsibilities, taking on the delivery practice of one of Oracle’s SaaS acquisitions and was instrumental in assisting with the transition of the business from a traditional on premise operation to a cloud focused delivery practice.
I enjoyed working for Oracle but wanted to go back to working for a company that was a true game-changer, in a high impact and high visibility position and so I joined Infor a year ago and took on a global position, for which I had to be based out of the US. I relocated to Florida for the outdoors’ lifestyle but commute to New York or to other States to see customers most weeks. It was a really successful move.
With 13,000 people around the globe, Infor could easily be a lumbering corporate giant but instead, it is branded the world’s largest start-up and it truly is! I really love the energy, enthusiasm and the willingness to take risks to be disruptive and innovative in the marketplace. It’s great to see a company of this size invest in its people and their ideas.
P: What are the main challenges you’ve faced?
NM: I started my career in a junior role and as I worked my way up the ladder I do remember some discussions along the way that were very meaningful. I think people are always trying to put you in a box and so I got a lot of people when I was trying to move from operational HR to IT saying “don’t move out of your lane, it’s not possible”. I even remember a significant conversation with a senior HR VP, who was a woman, saying that as women our careers are limited to female oriented roles such as HR, or being an airline hostess. I couldn’t believe I was hearing that kind of language coming out of the company’s most senior HR representative.
Despite claims that all careers are open to women and men, there is still a lot of discrimination in the marketplace and a belief that once you get stuck in one line of business you can’t move to another. I didn’t listen to what people said, moved industries, tried new things, moved countries, took risks and moved up the chain. For me that risk paid off but if I had listened to all the ‘no-sayers’ along the way, I don’t think I would have gotten very far.
P: Did you notice different attitudes to women in different countries?
NM: Absolutely, some countries are more open to female leaders in the workplace. However the Technology sector as a whole is still very much a male dominated industry and it’s harder for a woman to take on certain positions past the glass ceiling and when they do, there are lots of people watching and lots of critics, more than when a man takes the same position. I have found that it is often true what they say that men are judged on their potential whereas women are judged on what they have achieved.
P: How do you balance personal life with career?
NM: Despite the fact I don’t have children, it’s still a balance you have to make. My husband and I approach everything as a partnership. He has been one of my biggest fans along the way and it’s great to have that kind of support.
Every role I’ve taken we’ve talked about it and what it would mean to us. We’ve discussed what each role would mean in terms of travel frequency and my availability to do other things. We talk openly about the job’s constraints. Either he’s all in or we don’t do it. Otherwise it becomes an extra pressure that you have to deal with if your partner is not on board.
P: Have you ever needed flexible working or given it to other female team members?
NM: I’m very conscious of flexible working and the importance of fostering a positive environment where female and male team members can balance their work and family commitments. Many of the companies I have worked for supported flexible working environments and I’ve always tried to make certain accommodations for staff to do more work from home or facilitate moving staff into different roles with less travel or less extended hours when their circumstances required it. We are always conscious of giving people with young families more family time and more time off the road. It takes a little bit of juggling and it’s not always perfect but I try to make it happen otherwise those people end up leaving the company and you lose talent.
P: What are your top tips for women who are aspiring leaders?
NM: No matter what stage of your career, embrace mentorship opportunities, whether it is internally or externally. Outgrowing mentors can happen very fast and is a normal process. I connected with lots of people along the way and the value I got from my mentors was new skills, more confidence, networking and new job opportunities. My external mentors helped me challenge my assumptions and got me thinking about opportunities in a totally different direction. It’s easy to get stuck thinking in the same old way and you need to make sure you surround yourself with people who will continually challenge you and question your thinking.
Also, know who you are and what values you stand for and don’t let others talk you out of it. I learnt the hard way that it’s not worth landing that big job if the company culture isn’t the right fit and you need to work in an environment that goes against your personal values. So make sure you choose the right corporate culture fit in a company that is genuinely supportive of its women leaders.
Think long-term. It was a real eye opener for me talking to a careers executive coach a few years ago who got me thinking about not just the next two years but the next ten or fifteen years. She pushed me to think about what I would want to be doing after my corporate career which got me interested in building up my company Board experience. I then attended a course to be certified as a non-executive director and landed my first board position as a non-executive director in a small start-up and am now well on my way to building some valuable board experience.
It’s also important to talk to the next generation and let girls know they can do anything they put their mind to. In Australia I used to participate in an initiative that was aimed at high school teenage girls to educate them on careers in IT and it was sponsored by Oracle. We would have these 14-15 year old teenagers come in and they would say things like “it’s not cool to be a geek” and “a woman needs to be sexy and have a sexy career”. We would really try to talk to them at their level and let them know that technology can be cool: you can move around the world, you meet a lot of great people and as a woman you can achieve great things.
P: What does the future hold for you?
NM: I am fascinated by the complexity of managing global operations; I understand different cultures intimately and have done business around the world. I would like to continue working for Global companies and become a CEO someday for an international company. I would also like to continue down the non-executive director path and sit on different boards, do charity work and continue to contribute and give back to the community, as I think I get as much satisfaction out of that as I do in my corporate career.
Lots of women don’t know about board opportunities or underestimate their ability to participate or give advice as a board advisor. By sitting on a charity’s board you can help thousands of people by giving that organization better advice about how to run their company as opposed to helping just a few people when you volunteer at your local charity – you can make so much more of an impact in the world.
P: Thank you for taking the time to share your inspirational story with us.
About Infor Infor is a leading provider of business application software helping 73,000 customers in more than 200 countries and territories improve operations, drive growth, and quickly adapt to changes in business demands.
First published on the Primeast Insights pages on 3 March 2015
For more inspiration from women in leadership, take a look at our interviews with “Women in Leadership interview, Andrea Cartwright, group HR director for Supergroup”. and “Women in Leadership interview, Pauline Yau, Microsoft”.
The 5 Creative Competencies you Need to Succeed
In my last Insights post, I talked about one of the diagnostic tools we use when helping leaders to develop – The Leadership Circle. Here I go into more depth about what it can tell you about your leadership competencies and how you can develop them.
As the name suggests the report you receive is shown as a circle. It has 2 hemispheres – upper which shows your creative competencies and lower showing your reactive tendencies. Both have their plus points. In fact, the two hemispheres and their component parts can be seen as two sides of the same coin with the profile owner either reacting to problems or creating outcomes.
The extensive research behind the tool shows that leaders who score highly in the creative competencies (i.e. they are outcome creating) are the most effective leaders and therefore have the greatest impact on the success of their organization.
What creative competencies do you need to maximize your leadership effectiveness and impact?
Relating
The relating dimension measures the leader’s capability to relate to others in a way that brings out the best in people, groups and organizations.
This dimension is made up of 5 sub scales- not surprisingly this is the largest of the creative competencies – after all leading is really all about the people who follow you. Let’s look at them in detail:
Caring connection measures the leader’s interest in and ability to form warm, caring relationships.
Fosters team play – a leader’s ability to foster high performance teamwork among team members who report to him, across the organization and within teams in which he participates.
Collaborator – the extent to which the leader engages others in a manner that allows the parties involved to discover common ground.
Mentoring and Developing measures the leader’s ability to develop others through mentoring and maintaining growth-enhancing relationships.
Interpersonal Intelligence – the interpersonal effectiveness with which the leader listens, engages in conflict and controversy, deals with the feelings of others, and manages his/her own feelings.
Self-Awareness
This dimension explores the leader’s orientation to ongoing personal and professional development, as well as the degree to which self-awareness is expressed through high-integrity leadership.
Selfless Leader measures the extent to which the leader pursues service over self-interest, where the need for credit and personal ambition is far less important than creating results that serve a common good.
Balance measures the leader’s ability to keep a healthy balance between business and family, activity and reflection, work and leisurethe tendency to be self-renewing and handle the stress of life without losing the self.
Composure measures the leader’s ability, in the midst of conflict and high-tension situations to remain composed and centred and to maintain a calm, focused perspective.
Personal Learner measures the degree to which the leader demonstrates a strong and active interest in learning and personal and professional growth. It measures the extent to which she actively pursues growing in self-awareness, wisdom, knowledge and insight.
Authenticity
Authenticity is the leader’s capability to relate to others in an authentic, courageous and high integrity manner.
Integrity – how well the leader adheres to the set of values and principles that she espouses; this is how well she can be trusted to ‘walk the talk’.
Courageous Authenticity is about the leader’s willingness to take tough stands, bring up ‘undiscussables’ – risky issues the group avoids discussing, and openly deal with difficult relationship problems.
Systems awareness
Systems awareness focuses on the world in which the organization operates, the wider system which is critical to the organization’s success. It measures the degree to which the leader’s awareness is focused on whole system improvement, productivity, and community welfare.
Community concern is the service orientation from which the leader leads. It measures the extent to which she links her legacy to service of the community and global welfare.
Sustainable productivity is the leader’s ability to achieve results in a way that maintains or enhances the overall long-term effectiveness of the organization. It measures how well she balances human/technical resources to sustain long term high performance.
Systems Thinker is the degree to which the leader thinks and acts from a whole system perspective as well as the extent to which she makes decisions in the light of the long-term health of the whole system.
Achieving
This is all about how you get results. Made up of 4 sub scales, it measures the extent to which the leader offers visionary, authentic and high achievement leadership.
Strategic focus – the extent to which the leader thinks and plans rigorously and strategically to ensure that the organization will thrive in the near and long-term.
Purposeful and visionary – the extent to which the leader clearly communicates and models commitment to personal purpose and vision.
Achieves results – the degree to which the leader is goal directed and has a track record of goal achievement and high performance.
Decisiveness this is about the leader’s ability to make decisions on time and the extent to which he is comfortable moving forward in uncertainty.
When I read through this list of competencies nothing surprises me. Of course these are what a leader needs to be/do to be effective and to lead the organization, but doing this every day is hard. Sometimes our reactions get in the way but having these as a check list to reflect on daily can be helpful for any leader – new or experienced. In the next post we will examine the reactive tendencies which can derail us and how we can make small changes to become more effective.
Want to find out more about the Leadership Circle Profile? Click here.